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This is a chapter I have read for my master module. I have highlighed some interesting stuff around making elearning accessible.

Over the past 18 months I've been having a series of discussions with Bill Johnston (a colleague of mine here at Strathclyde) around notions information and digital literacy and of what it means to be a digital university.

Project by Dr. Emma Coonan "IntroductionThis short project, based at Cambridge University Library and funded by the Arcadia Programme, sought to develop a practical curriculum for information literacy that meets the needs of the undergraduate student entering higher education over the next five years.The research is grounded in relevant theoretical models and reviews of recent professional literature and existing best practices. In addition, the authors consulted with experts in the information literacy field, and also those working in curriculum design and educational technologies.Project aims and objectivesThis project sought to develop a practical curriculum for information literacy that meets the needs of the undergraduate student entering higher education over the next five years. Specifically the project aimed:* To understand the information needs of future undergraduate students on entering higher education* To develop a revolutionary curriculum for information literacy that can be used with undergraduate students entering UK higher education* To provide practical guidance about how best to equip students with the knowledge, skills and behaviour around information use to support their learning in the digital age* To develop a flexible curriculum that can be used and adapted in the higher education community and used in face to face, blended and online learning provision."

In combination with academic literacies, digital and information literacies represent a broad spectrum of knowledge and skills that ideally should be developed as an integral part of subject specific learning. The challenge at an institutional level is helping academic staff and students achieve this in a manner that is fully integrated and sustainable. As part of the JISC funded Digidol Project (http://digidol.cardiff.ac.uk) at Cardiff University work is being done to create a common framework and methodology to enable professional services staff, academic staff and students to arrive at a shared understanding of what literacies are required and how they can best be realised through meaningful learning and teaching practices.

"The Faculty Learning Communities discussed this idea in their creative think tank sessions with the aim of articulating a digital literacy definition for each Faculty or School. These digital literacy definitions have been shared with the wider community on this blog as one of the project outputs.   These statements are also joined by a list of Faculty digital literacy attributes for learners. The stakeholders in the Faculty Learning Communities devised and then refined a set of digital literacy competencies for learners based on the JISC Learning Literacies Development Framework. The digital literacy attributes for each Faculty and School are made available below." Each of the competencies is avaialable as a PDF poster.

"We need to stop digital literacy training that uses the internet and social media to achieve pre-defined outcomes. For example, working backwards from goals such as finding a job or setting up a business. This might address immediate student anxieties but it is a short-term solution. Based on my experiences of working with students and academics, I would make a case for digital literacy to be much more than the mechanical operation of tools and technology. It should enable us to use the social digital landscape for reflection and conversations. And in our ability to enter into dialogue on the basis of shared values, we become individual agents of change." Dr Abhay Adhikari

Digitally Ready is a JISC funded project, funded under the Developing Digital Literacies programme Our project will develop a holistic and inclusive approach drawing on both the strong history of successful JISC and general e-learning project delivery and harnessing our expertise, resources and evidence base to: * Baseline our digital competence, needs and desires using JISC audit tools;* Develop a strategy for the University of Reading to ensure all members of the University have the digital literacies for their current role and have access to resources to ensure they are Digitally Ready for their future and to better support the University's aims and objectives;* Develop change management processes to ensure realisation of the strategy;* Begin implementation of the strategy;* Document our methods so that they can be applied to other institutions and lead to further areas of study.

Digitally Ready is a JISC funded project, funded under the Developing Digital Literacies programme Our project will develop a holistic and inclusive approach drawing on both the strong history of successful JISC and general e-learning project delivery and harnessing our expertise, resources and evidence base to: * Baseline our digital competence, needs and desires using JISC audit tools;* Develop a strategy for the University of Reading to ensure all members of the University have the digital literacies for their current role and have access to resources to ensure they are Digitally Ready for their future and to better support the University's aims and objectives;* Develop change management processes to ensure realisation of the strategy;* Begin implementation of the strategy;* Document our methods so that they can be applied to other institutions and lead to further areas of study.

"Digital media is quickly replacing traditional media forms as those most accessible to most 21st century learners. The impact of this change is extraordinarily broad, but for now we'll narrow it down to changes in how learners respond to the media they consume. The most fundamental pattern of formal academia is to read something and then write about it. Sometimes this writing comes in the form of responding to questions, while other time it's in the form of an essay. And sometimes the reading is watching, playing with, or otherwise interacting with a digital media. So I thought it might make sense to compile a list of "things" learners can do as the result of "consuming" a digital media."

The insertion of social media in education has the potential to advance core aims of our society: to teach students how to engage with their families, neighbors, and communities in a new way. The combination of social media and education requires that we teach students how to become literate in a digital world. The skills of literacy are no longer just about reading and writing, but about abilities that surround our responsibilities as authors. In Digital and Media Literacy: A Plan of Action, researcher Renee Hobbs offers that digital and media literacy is constructed of five crucial abilities:

Literacy has always been a collection of cultural and communicative practices shared among members of particular groups. As society and technology change, so does literacy. Because technology has increased the intensity and complexity of literate environments, the twenty-first century demands that a literate person possess a wide range of abilities and competencies, many literacies. These literacies-from reading online newspapers to participating in virtual classrooms-are multiple, dynamic, and malleable. As in the past, they are inextricably linked with particular histories, life possibilities and social trajectories of individuals and groups

"Your brain's important, but not all that important," said Dr. James Paul Gee, a professor at Arizona State University and a leading authority on literacy and the potential of educational games, during a talk at the Learning and Brain conference last week.

"Our ability to communicate - Unlike our parents, who recall sitting down at a desk to deliberately draft a letter with paper, pen, envelope and stamp, today's youth have radically expanded options in how we communicate our observations, reflections and emotions. Oral and written communication have merged into a constant flow of commentary that tends to incentivize wit, irony and novelty. Of greatest significance, online communication is often many-to-many rather than one-to-one, an adjustment that has proven difficult for older generations.

Two years ago, in Towards a comprehensive definition of digital skills, I depicted digital literacy according to five different categories, being those categories technological literacy, informational literacy, media literacy, digital presence and e-awareness. Explaining these concepts with a single example (that is, all the concepts using the very same example for all of them) is not always easy, so you end up using different examples with each category or concept. Today I just found that single example that can be used to explain all of them...

The Digitally Ready team recently invited staff and students to a workshop to explore and reflect on their own digital literacies. We asked people to feedback from their groups and their own personal reflections about access to facilities, their digital skills or lack of them, what they do and don't do in practice. Emerging trends suggest that although basic needs are robustly fulfilled - hardware, software and a good network - the overriding message is that most people feel they do not have adequate time to develop and discover how new technologies can be useful and relevant to them. Some people seem unaware of what is currently available and where they can go for help. It was suggested that colleagues who share best practice provide a powerful trigger for others to invest time in personal development. We finally asked people to complete 'To become more digitally ready, I will…….'

From the outset, the PriDE project will be interested in exploring what it means to be 'digitally literate' within the subject disciplines. The Faculty Learning Communities will this discuss this idea in their creative think tank sessions with the aim of articulating a digital literacy statement. These statements will then be shared with the wider community on this blog as one of the project outputs. In time, these statements will be joined by a list of Faculty digital literacy attributes and, potentially, some more specific lists of attributes for particular stakeholder groups - learners, academics, support staff.

Rutgers RIOT (Research Information Online Tutorial) Lessons in selecting  a topic, finding resources, selecting keywords, identifying citations and evaluating sources.

A nifty little quiz for developing search skills and you get a certificate. I've tweeted the link from the dig lit feed too :)

"Today's society is becoming more and more socially focused with each passing day. Social media is not simply a passing trend; it is here to stay. Now more than ever, students need to understand the basics of social media and how it can affect their future both negatively and positively. A strong or weak social media presence now affects both college admissions and the workforce."

Talking Ed's is a new electronic resource made by students for students. The resource is a friendly welcoming gateway for new students and their expectations of studying at Edinburgh.