Literacy and Essential Skills: Why Digital Literacy is Crucial
by Dr. Sarah Elaine Eaton
   
     Coming into a classroom with a dedicated laptop for each one of my students, I have really had to reflect on the ways that I use technology in the classroom and what it means to be digitally literate.  I agree with this author's assertion that simply being able to use a computer is not being digitally literate and is not enough, but I do believe that students who do not know how to use a touch screen or the internet will be able to acquire those skills fairly quickly.

My concern is that students who have not had exposure to technology in the elementary grades may very well fall behind, but because they haven't learned how to access, process and use this type of information.  So much about the way that we access information is changing, that students need instruction just on navigating and comprehending internet text.  Information on the internet is also dramatically different in the way that it requires the reader to evaluate its accuracy, its point of view and its biases.  When readers are connected to information on the web, there is no guarantee that the author has any expertise on the subject and much of the work is published with the expectation that others will alter it.  Today's students need to not only be capable of higher level thinking when engaging with digital media, but it probably needs to be second nature for them.

I think that it's always important to remember that we don't know what skills these students may need to possess in ten or twenty years.  What are the essential skills for today's students?  What is the most important work for us to be doing right now?