What is Digital Well-being?

Digital Literacy

Digital literacy is the ability to use information and communication technologies to find, evaluate, create, and communicate information, requiring both cognitive and technical skills. Use our wiki to learn about digital literacy skills, whether you’re teaching a lesson or helping children at home.

What is Digital Literacy?

Digital Literacy is the ability and skill to find, evaluate, utilise, share, and create content using information technologies and the Internet.

It differs from regular literacy that is offline and involves reading, writing, grammar and syntax.

Digital Literacy may be about a person’s ability to read and write online or using technology such as computers, smartphones and Kindles, but it’s also a lot more than that. With the impact of social media, Digital Literacy skills also now includes a wide range of skills like uploading content on YouTube to sharing things on Facebook.

Especially in the connected, online world we live in today, there are some essential digital literacy skills that we need to achieve our goals and live our day-to-day lives.

Digital literacy is an ever more important factor in education from a young age.Digital literacy in education, students must develop specific digital literacy skills when reading and interacting with online content that may contain embedded resources such as hyperlinks, audio clips, graphs, or charts that require students to make choices. Students today are also being asked to go one step further to create, collaborate, and share digital content and to do so responsibly. For these reasons teachers need to understand the importance of digital literacy skills for students and teaching digital literacy in the classroom.

Why is Digital Literacy more than reading online?

Being able to find and read online content independently is certainly an indicator of digital literacy that students will need to demonstrate. However, developing and teaching digital literacy is much more than reading online. For example,reading a book online, in most cases, is not much different from reading a print book. It simply replaces words on a page with text on a screen. It may only require that students know how to turn pages online. Essential digital literacy skills, as you can imagine, go so much further. However, students who use both cognitive and technical skills to find, evaluate, create, and communicate information are certainly on their way to becoming digitally literate consumers.

What are the 4 principles of Digital Literacy?

There are 4 major principles of digital literacy that should be taken into account when you, your child or your students are learning and developing your digital literacy skills and using technology. These principles are as follows:

1. Comprehension – Students first must reach a level of comprehension of digital literacy through lessons, home practice and support group work. This will help children grasp basic concepts of safety and digital literacy that will form the foundation of their learning.
2. Interdependence – The next principle that children will learn is interdependence. This is the concept that different digital platforms are dependent on each other. Students will learn that all forms of digital media are connected to another. This can also help them understand data protection as, due to the sheer abundance of media, it is necessary that media forms not simply co-exist, but supplement one another.
3. Social Factors – It is important that children understand that there are social influences and factors in having an online digital presence. Sharing information, content, media and stories through a certain digital platform can determine the success of that media.
4. Curation – The final principle that students will learn about is curating their own content and digital information. An easy way to do this is through using platforms that offer the ability to store and save content for later. Sites with a focus on this such as Pintrest.com allow students to save content and ideas on their own platforms whilst sharing minimal personal data.

A more detailed depiction has been completed by the Open University in the Netherlands. These researchers released an article detailing more information on other examples of Digital Literacy and the requirements of gaining complete digital literacy. They believe that there are twelve digital competency areas:

• General knowledge – knowing the basics of digital devices.
• Use in everyday life – being able to use these devices day-to-day.
• Work and creative expression – being able to use digital skills to work better and also express your creativity.
• Communication and collaboration – using technology to effectively communicate, share and collaborate with other people in the technical environment.
• Processing information – using technology to gather information, research and data.
• Privacy – being able to protect your privacy online effectively.
• Legal and ethical practices – being able to operate and use digital platforms in a socially responsible way, including understanding the laws around using the Internet and other digital devices.
• Balanced attitude – having the right open-minded mindset about technology.
• Awareness – of ICT’s role in society and the impact it has.
• Always learning – familiarising and getting comfortable with new technologies all the time.
• Informed decisions on appropriate digital technologies – being aware of most relevant and common technologies.
• Seamless use – confidently and creatively using technology to increase your effectiveness and efficiency.

Why are Digital Literacy skills important?

Digital Literacy skills are more important than ever in the world today. Children now grow up with technology all around them, to the extent that topics like coding and social media are now part of our national curriculums.School leaders and teachers are focusing more and more on the benefits of digital literacy skills in schools because today’s students are looking to the internet and social media as a key source of information. This makes the ability to use digital platforms safely, securely and efficiently even more important to their education and future lives.

Bringing digital literacy into the classroom is key to nurture students who are able to understand the basics of internet safety including creating strong passwords, understanding and using privacy settings, and knowing what to share or not on social media. They can also be supported in understanding the dangers of cyberbullying and seeking help. Warschauer and Matuchniak are two theorists who have done a lot of research into Digital Literacy and what they call ’21st Century Skills’. They identified certain new skills that are now needed in order for a person to comfortably live in the 21st Century.

There are many reasons why we at Twinkl value the importance of learning digital literacy skills in school, here are some of the key benefits to digital literacy that demonstrate how important these skills are:

Efficient working: Children are often required to complete longer written assignments and curate research projects. Digital literacy and proficiency in using technology can help students complete this work more accurately and faster. This would allow them to progress through the curriculum easier and smoother, taking full advantage of the educational support that technology offers.

Safety: Learning about digital literacy in a controlled and safe environment such as the classroom can prepare children to explore the online world safely and keep their personal information safe from strangers online. This safe and secure environment can also teach children about the dangers of cyberbullying and online scams to reduce the risk of your students falling victim to these behaviours.

Self-awareness:With every post to Instagram, every Tweet and every blog post, kids are leaving behind a digital footprint. By learning digital literacy skills, children will learn how they can leave good footprints and not ones they will regret later. The focus here is teaching them how to use social media and other online platforms to create a positive online reputation.

Emotional health: Gaining digital literacy skills can give children another platform to express their thoughts and feelings safely to benefit their well-being. For example, through text, email or even a blog (with care to use the best privacy settings).

Examples of Digital Literacy skills

• Using your phone to check emails.
• Using an online search engine to find the answer to a question.
• Using online search to complete a research project
• Creating an online profile on a social media platform

Children will learn digital literacy skills by using technology and this will help them to interact in this digital world around them. We also have a lot of resources on digital literacy that will help students with this exploration in a safe and supported way. This Digital literacy journey resource pack contains an entire week’s worth of lessons to help children explore and understand different changes in digital technologies that are developing every day.

Benefits to using technology to support learning

It is amazing how fast the use of technology in the classroom is advancing to support student learning. There are many benefits to getting digital with your learning at home or in the classroom.Here are some of the main benefits of using technology in the classroom.

1. Encourages individual learning.

Technology provides great opportunities for making learning more effective for everyone with different needs. For example,students can learn at their own speed, review difficult concepts or skip ahead if they need to.

2. Better memory and knowledge retention.

Students who are engaged and interested in things they are studying, often have a better knowledge retention. As mentioned before, technology can help to encourage active participation in the classroom which also is a very important factor for increased knowledge retention.

3. Flexible teaching strategies.

Virtual lesson plans, grading software and online assessments can help teachers save a lot time. This valuable time can be used for working with students who are struggling. What is more, having virtual learning environments in schools enhances collaboration and knowledge sharing between teachers.

4 Encourage communication and teamwork.

Students can practice collaboration skills by getting involved in different online activities. For instance, working on different projects by collaborating with others on forums or by sharing documents on their virtual learning environments. Technology can encourage collaboration with students in the same classroom, same school and even with other classrooms around the world.

Helping children develop their Digital Literacy skills:

There are lots of ways that parents and teachers can help children to develop their Digital Literacy skills – and there are many aspects that they will be better at than yourself! If you are teaching in a modern-day classroom, there is a good chance that you are already teaching valuable digital literacy skills. We are here to support and enhance your lessons and remote learning.

Playing interactive games like our Twinkl Go! Resources are great for younger children to not only develop their confidence in technology but other important numeracy and literacy skills. We have hundreds of digital literacy resources to make your classroom learning more diverse, engaging and informative for all ages, check out our collections of digital literacy resources and teaching aids here.

A lot of their Digital Literacy skills will also develop naturally with the introduction of common technologies now happening around children all the time. They will learn to use smartphones, computers and the Internet earlier than most generations due to it now being a part of their day-to-day life!

How to begin talking about digital literacy in the classroom

In today’s digital world, chances are as a teacher or parent you’ve been teaching your students digital literacy basics and enhancing their skills all along, perhaps without even realizing it. When beginning conversations about digital literacy, internet and digital safety is a key topic that needs to be central to the conversation.While the digital world has immense value, our online world also comes with inherent risks, particularly for children and students.

Digital platforms make children very vulnerable to criminals and cyber bullies (especially during times of lockdown and social isolation). These risks and situations can cause students to compare themselves to others on social media, inciting feelings of inadequacy, detachment, isolation, and even the development of mental health issues. Students, through these online platforms, can also be victim to misinformation and manipulation from strangers online that will take advantage of their age and vulnerability online. Therefore, when opening discussions around digital literacy students need to understand what it means to behave well online and how to act in online environments. Try this fantastic Newsroom Fake News Quiz- Misinformation and Disinformation to open discussions on spotting and combatting misinformation and manipulation online

Digital Literacy Skills Resources

• Online Scavenger Hunt: Fancy helping children get up and away from their desks? Then this online scavenger hunt is for you! It helps reinforce all the digital literacy skills children have learnt in an engaging way.
• Word Processing Guide: Sometimes we need a reminder of the important facts, and that’s what this word processing guide provides. It’s a useful teaching and learning tool to have on standby where digital literacy skills are concerned.
• Digital Footprints Differentiated Comprehension: Fancy forging cross-curricular links? This reading comprehension helps children work on their reading skills while learning more about digital footprints.
• Digital Money Word Search: For something a bit different, we’ve created this digital money word search. It helps children with not only their decoding and spelling skills, but also with their understanding of how the online world works.
• Internet And Phone Safety Multiple Choice Quiz Game: Last but not least, this multiple quiz game is a brilliant whole-class activity to do. It would round off your lesson on digital literacy skills really nicely.

Remember that if you’ve opted for a Twinkl membership, then you’ll be able to use these digital literacy skills resources with no limits. Each of the resources mentioned are so simple to download and use, and will help further children’s digital literacy skills.