In all honesty, I’m embarassed to say this but I haven’t really broached the topic of teaching my students’ digital literacy. Partially because I feel like they don’t care what I have to say and secondly I feel like there are ethical implications involved. However, it is something I think teachers should MOST definitely be doing. Hence why I’m ashamed that it hasn’t really crossed my mind to do a unit study on this. I teach English literature too so I feel like I can easily incorportate it into my lessons.
The quote shared in today’s zoom class by Marshall McLuhan:
reveals the importance of teaching students not be shaped by the demands of social media. There is a lot of pressure for young people now to fit into the expected fabric of online identity creation. As also mentioned today we are living within echo chambers. Students and even young adults are struggling to develop their own perspectives and viewpoints as we/they are bombarded by certain ways of thinking. With the rise of mis-information and fake news too it’s tough to decipher what is real and what is propaganda.
. 
The most startling point shared in today’s lecture was, computer scientist and tech ethicist, Tristian Harris’ warning of persusive technology. I looked into this a bit more and found this interesting clip where Harris essentially highlights that apps like Twitter, Snapchat, even outlook and emailing funtions on our phone are designed to seduce us and make us dependent on notifications. Hence why I think now it necessary more than ever to teach students about developing their digital footprints and identity (even though I will be debating the negative of this). There is just too much out there that targets young people and I think it is our job as educators to make them aware.
When Dr. Couros shared that the internet can be good because it gives people a voice, but then it can also be bad because it gives EVERYONE a voice. It also reminded me this great mini speech by Sacha Baron Cohen where he discusses the importance of establishing whether all people should have the right to the freedom of reach that Twitter gives. For example imagine Hitler today having access to Twitter 😭
Today was a great class as lots of eye-opening knowledge was shared.
Leave a Reply