Digital, technological and information literacy are increasingly major focuses of mine in my teaching. But I am also involved in a committee at my university that focuses on emerging technologies and their relation to our work as educators.
One question that we found ourselves pondering at a recent meeting is this one:
What are the essential technological skills and abilities that all students in our day and age ought to have, whether as prerequisites before starting university, or as things we ensure they acquire prior to graduation?
In asking colleagues for their input, I have found that there are some that frequently come up across a range of departments and disciplines.
Even when we think of such basics as Word or other word processing software, I think many faculty assume that students are tech savvy enough to manage with such programs. But their familiarity may be only with running the program and typing, and they may be completely unaware of what many of the tabs and buttons across the top are actually for.
How would you answer this question? What are the essential program competencies and technological skills and experiences that everyone graduating from university ought to be guaranteed to have?
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