Information and digital literacy in education via the digital path

Last week, I introduced the COUP framework, which is a great framework to start with OER research. However, some categories of the COUP framework have been researched more extensively than others. For example, one of the biggest “selling points” of OER is cost. But is a free resource always the better option if students don’t achieve good grades in the end?

Digital Competence Framework for Educators (DigCompEdu)

The teaching professions face rapidly changing demands, which require a new, broader and more sophisticated set of competences than before. The ubiquity of digital devices and applications, in particular, requires educators to develop their digital competence.

The European Framework for the Digital Competence of Educators (DigCompEdu) is a scientifically sound framework describing what it means for educators to be digitally competent. It provides a general reference frame to support the development of educator-specific digital competences in Europe. DigCompEdu is directed towards educators at all levels of education, from early childhood to higher and adult education, including general and vocational education and training, special needs education, and non-formal learning contexts.

Digital Literacy is increasingly important in an age where many students read as much on screens as they do from books.

In fact, the very definition of many of these terms is changing as the overlap across media forms increases. Interactive eBooks can function like both long-form blogs and traditional books. Threaded email can look and function like social media. Email and texting and social media messaging are increasingly similar.

An introduction to the Information Literacy Framework and Portal for health information. Presented by Eilean Craig and Rob Westwood at the CILIPS Centenary Con…

Blogging is a digital activity with immense pedagogical benefits for students. Besides developing a number of key multimedia literacy skills essential for thriving in the 21st century classroom, blogging also empowers students voice and helps them communicate more effectively. 

The Universal Design for Learning (UDL) framework allows us to understand the importance of utilizing web 2.0 in teaching and learning. Social annotation tools such as Hypothes.is allow teachers to fulfil the three essential UDL components: engagement, representation, and action & expression through thoughtful use of the platform.

Social annotation tools such as Hypothesis and Voice Thread, when used well, boost student engagement, enhance critical thinking, expand reading comprehension, and increase student interaction. Of the several social annotation tools currently available, our institution uses Hypothesis. Hypothesis’ motto—“Making reading active, visible and social”—sums up why we think social annotation is so valuable for our students: it engages students and invites them to read and think together as a group by sharing real-time annotations of websites or PDFs (Hypothesis, 2021). The richly multimodal, interactive nature of Hypothesis offers instructors a platform through which they can employ the principles of Universal Design for Learning (UDL) to improve engagement and accessibility for all learners.

Vice-chancellors and senior executives from more than 40 UK universities have contributed to a new framework, launched today, to help higher education leaders realise the benefits of a long-term strategic approach to digital technology.

Key takeaways

1. Explicitly teach writing. Don’t just assign writing tasks and hope for the best. Instead, break writing instruction down into manageable chunks for students to tackle using deliberate practice activities.
2. Teach students how to write great sentences. Sentences are the building blocks of excellent writing, so writing instruction needs to give students plenty of practice at sentence-level writing
3. Embed writing into the teaching of content. Don’t see this as another thing to teach on top of content; instead, use writing instruction to deepen students’ engagement with what they’re learning.
4. Teach grammar as you teach writing. Stifle the yawn and let your students in on the secrets of excellent writing, this includes teaching the proper structure and function of great sentences while they write.

Knowing how to write is an essential skill. Constructing written work that effectively explains, informs or persuades helps students succeed in school, and later in their working lives. People spend a lot of time at work using network tools that require them to write. Email, social media and text messaging mean that whatever path students choose in life, their ability to communicate thoughts and ideas effectively in writing sets them up to thrive. Unfortunately, schools don’t always teach writing very well. Teachers often ask students to complete a lot of writing but less frequently carve out instructional time to explicitly teach students how to build effective sentences and combine these sentences into effective paragraphs and essays. Thankfully, Judith Hochman and Natalie Wexler have a book that tells you exactly how to teach your students to be better writers. The Writing Revolution: A Guide to Advancing Thinking Through Writing in All Subjects and Grades provides a comprehensive school-wide framework for developing better writers and is jam-packed full of classroom-ready activities and strategies.