What is ‘digital literacy’? It’s certainly not this…
Microsoft have proudly announced their Digital Literacy Curriculum. They’ve no doubt about what they mean by the term ‘digital literacy’ – the strapline to the bold title on their site being, ‘Helping you develop a fundamental understanding of computers.’
Oh. So, they’ll be teaching you about Mac OSX and Linux, then?
Right, so it’s Microsoft-only operating systems, yes? Well actually, in theory, no. They do say:
What if I don’t use Microsoft products, or have older versions installed?
…
The only software required to run either version of Digital Literacy is a minimum of Internet Explorer 6…
Oh, right then. So in practice, it’s Windows only. And what else do I see?
Aha! So after 3 introductory lessons, they get to what they would term the ‘good stuff’ – Microsoft propaganda. Hmmm… I wonder what programs they’ll be using for their introduction to word processors, spreadsheets, email program and IM clients? 😉
It’s just an adult version of what’s going on in most UK schools, really. And I think it’s shameful. I’m still not entirely sure how I’d define ‘digital literacy’ (it’s the subject of my Ed.D. thesis after all…) but it’s definitely not a souped-up idiot’s guide to using Microsoft products.
And to think, this has the backing (and presumably the funding) of the following:
What would your ‘digital literacy curriculum’ look like? Mine, for one, would look at digital literacies, and involve using a variety of operating systems and programs. That would get at something underneath the processes involved for specific operating system and programs and get a bit more to the fundamentals. 🙂
