The first association for openness in today’s world is, at least for me, connected to digital means and access. Even though the technical requirements for digital equipment would be fulfilled, there is more needed to acquire digital literacy.
According to Beetham and Sharpe (2010), apart from technological knowledge, digital skills also include skills and motivations. Beetham and Sharpe describe digital literacy as a development process of skills to even include one’s personal identity. One could say, developing one’s digital skills means developing one’s identity.
Digital literacy is divided into different literacies (Definition of digital literacies, 2020). Not all of these literacies, like information and media literacy, are solely technology-dependent. On the other hand, skills like communication or life-planning can not be left simply in the hands of technology. Here the personal aspects, courage and curiousness, come into play.
It seems to me that the skills, and how we use them, shape not only our professional self but probably also our personal self. Our motivations direct how we use and increase our skills, which has and effect on our learning. This becomes a circle of personal characteristics affecting learning, and learning again improving the development of personal characteristics.
In my view, the “digital” is just a tool, “literacy” is a personal skill that develops together with personal development. In this way I fit in to David White’s (2021) definition of a “visitor”, who sees internet as “tools”, instead of a “resident”, who experiences the internet as “places”.
Technology can’t fill in the missing personal features. If a person lacks curiosity and a willingness to explore, many resources and tools, however open, might remain unexplored. On top or practical technical skills, the development of personal features in students should be encouraged.
Digital literacy varies between contexts, applying one or several of the different literacies included (JISCInfoNet, 2014). How digitally literate a person is could be defined by how well he recognizes, which skills need to be activated and when, and how well a person employs them. A digitally literate person is also conscious of lacks in his literacy skills, and seeks to improve them, with the help of already existing skills.
David White described in a webinar (2021) the “resident” view on the internet as a place, where one needs to have a digital identity to “engage with others online”. The existence of one’s digital identity is probably highly dependent on one’s digital literacy. The ICT literacy one possesses affects in which spaces on the internet a person is present. Communication and collaboration skills affect in what manner a person connects with other people (or should one say, “digital identities”?) present in the same space. The technological resources are just a starting point of the journey. But can a visitor become a resident of the internet, and if yes, when does it happen? Maybe when digital literacy becomes part of your personality.
References:
Beetham and Sharpe, 2010. http://web.archive.org/web/20141011224212/http://jiscdesignstudio.pbworks.com/w/page/46740204/Digital%20literacy%20framework
Definition of digital literacies, 2020. http://web.archive.org/web/20140720191009/http://jiscdesignstudio.pbworks.com/w/page/59974972/definition%20of%20digital%20literacies
JISCInfoNet, 2014. Available at http://web.archive.org/web/20141011143516/http://www.jiscinfonet.ac.uk/infokits/digital-literacies/
White, David, 2021. Digital literacies. Webinar on 9th of March, 2021.
