Week 6: Futurelab and the importance of childhood digital literacy

Society is becoming increasingly digitised and teachers hold a responsibility to the children that they teach to prepare them for the world that they will eventually inhabit and to help them become active members of society. Digital literacy means enabling children to make critically informed decisions regarding digital media and the way in which it is presented and how they interact with it. By ignoring digital technology educators face the risk of not preparing children to make sense of the world they live in.

Children's access to digital technology has increased over the last decade to the point that it has become central to many children's lives and some schools have failed to change quickly enough to include this within their teaching practices. Most children will encounter digital technology before they start school and already have preconceived ideas and knowledge as to how it operates. However not all children have the same access to digital technology and factors such as class, race, gender and nationality can all effect the amount and type of access that they have. It is for this reason that teachers and schools need to embrace and include digital technology within their teaching practice and foster their pupils’ digital literacy therefore preparing them for a digital future.

As children increasingly encounter digital media outside of school in social and cultural contexts as well as using it to communicate with each other teachers have a responsibility to ensure that they are taught to use it effectively rather than becoming overwhelmed by it. Without guidance from teachers children can practice unsafe use of digital technologies and place themselves in danger. This is yet another reason why it is important for teachers to care about children's digital literacy.

By including digital literacies within their teaching practices teachers are able to build children's knowledge and confidence in the technologies that they are using while also creating a link between their home and school life that will allow children to see the relevance in their education. It can also help to expand children's knowledge of digital media and facilitate them in becoming more active users and creators.

It is said that many of the jobs that the primary aged children of today will have when they are older have yet to be invented and it can also be said that it is fair to assume that many of these jobs will involve digital technology in some form. Therefore it is important that we prepare children as much as possible for the future by teaching them how to be digitally literate while also being safe.

Futurelab (2010) Digital Literacy Across the Curriculum. Available online at http://www2.futurelab.org.uk/resources/documents/handbooks/digital_literacy.pdf (accessed 10/04/2014).