This week, when I've not been stressing over the first year timetable, I've mostly been stressing about digital literacies.As our student Digital Literacies in the Disciplines (BioSET) project cranks back into life (the private Facebook group did not sustain activity over the summer break), I've been thinking about the barriers we face. Participating students are obviously confused - the digilit concept is confusing in its own right, and the employability layer on top is a step too far. We are resolving the confusion by stepping back from the student-led approach we wanted to follow and giving the participants more direction about activities, at least to get them started.
But I've also been thinking about the fundamental problem with the digilit concept. "Digital literacy" is either completely transparent (therefore impossible to grasp) or merely an artificial construct with no real world value. I think it's both!
Are our student participants digitally literate? Clearly yes.
Can they articulate this literacy? Not easily.
Why not? Probably a number of reasons, but the lack of utility of the digilit label is a contributing factor.
And Xerte? It's a problem we don't need, so it's on the back burner for now.
Contributor blog posts so far:
Student Employability Team
Logo Design
Evolution of a Biology Logo
BioSET: Digital Literacies Project Introduction
First Meeting of the New Academic Year!
- more to come soon hopefully, following our project meeting today.
Dean Groom: Digital Literacy is a crock
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