Lesson 6 Developing Basic Digital Skills

Lesson 6

Developing Basic Digital Skills

          In the new digital world of information and communication technology, teachers are challenged to adjust their teaching in order to obtain effectively and successfully the teaching and learning objectives and learning outcomes. In order for them to do this is to clearly understand what basic knowledge, skills and values (or literacies) need to be developed by digital learners.

          The basic literacies will not replace the 3Rs, but they will be complimented by the six fluency skills. These are: solution fluency it refers to capacity and creativity in problem solving, information fluency it involves three subsets of skills which are ability to access information, to retrieve information and ability to reflect, assess and rewrite for instructive information packages, collaboration fluency this refers to teamwork with virtual or real partners in the online environment, media fluency it refers to the ability to evaluate the message of the chosen media as well as the creative ability to publish digital image, creativity fluency refers to the artistic proficiency that adds meaning by way of design, art, story-telling to package a message, and lastly the digital ethics that refers to the ability to follow the guidelines and principles of leadership, global responsibility, environmental awareness, global citizenship and personal accountability.

          In primary education and even in pre-school I already experienced the 3 Rs (reading, writing and ‘rithmetic) which is basically one of the foundations of the acquisition of knowledge. As for today, in this digital age I already experienced the different fluency skills.

Fluency	Experiences
Solution Fluency	Science research, biochemistry case studies, problem sets, “R” Biostatistics project
Information Fluency	Genetics research, blog, science research, case studies
Collaboration Fluency	Edmodo, email requiremets to teachers, online gaming
Media Fluency	Video documentation for Social Dimensions of Education, podcast, blog
Creativity Fluency	Reporting through the use of ppt presentation, photo editing, video editing, blog
Digital Ethics	“Think before you click” principle, following the computer ethics (Information Technology)

          Developing basic digital skills is indeed, very important. The 3 rs alone isn’t enough to fully attend and satisfy the educational needs of the students. The fluency skills can really uplift the knowledge of the learners to a higher level that is required for them to adapt and live successfully in the new digital world.

          Knowing the fluency skills, teachers can improve the quality of teaching through using suitable instructional techniques based on the fluencies to utilize them all. Also, teachers nowadays can match correctly learning activities to specific learning objectives that will really improve and enhance the students’ acquisition of the higher order thinking skills.