Digital Literacy

September 6, 2012

Digital Literacy /

Multi-literacies

Students

“The Web is a learning tool that differs from other tools

used in education because students acquire a great many

Web skills in an out-of-school context and also regard

themselves as skilled Web users. This is reflected in the

perception of many teachers that their students' Web skills

are superior to their own, which may result in

underestimating the support students need when using the

Web for educational purposes.”

…and Teachers

Their skills quickly improve

relative to their elders

Most of our

students are

‘digital natives’

Instant-messaging, photo sharing, texting, social

networking, video-streaming, and mobile Internet

Young people don’t need coaxing

to take up Internet technologies

It is true

BUT…

a generation of youth who are deeply

immersed in cyberspace yet are not fully

digitally literate

without guidance most of our students

remain …

amateur users of information and

communication technology (ICT)

In other words,…

Students who think they’re tech savvy are not

necessarily web literate: they consider that

surfing the web immediately means benefitting

properly or fully from the web’s potential.

Students don’t know that they don’t know, so

they don’t feel the need to ask.

Students don’t trust their teachers or parents

could guide them in this area.

One of the models of digital literacy as

developed by Calvani, Fini and Ranieri

(2009):

Despite the various terms and concepts

attached to digital literacy, there is

consensus that…

the use of technology has to be pedagogically

meaningful taking into consideration the

critical skills needed to assess information as

well as the ethical and social implications

involved.

Objectives Become better informed as teachers

• what the rights and responsibilities of web

users are (digital citizenship)

• what skills are required to search and

manage web content (information and media

literacy)

• and why it is important for us teachers at

this point (design more purposeful / informed

assignments)

Think about a better integration of digital

citizenship and web literacy in the curriculum

(through training and not just instruction)

Digital Literacy Under the “digital literacy umbrella” are a wide

range of interrelated skills that traditionally fall

under:

• Technology literacy (from basic computer skills to

more complex tasks like editing a digital film or

writing computer code)

• Visual literacy, Communication literacy, and

Social literacy

• Media and Information literacy (our ability

to access, analyze, evaluate and produce

media)

ISTE Standards

The International Society for Technology in

Education (ISTE) frames its benchmarks for digital

literacy around six standards:

creativity and innovation;

communication and collaboration;

research and information fluency;

critical thinking, problem solving, and decision

making;

and technology operations and concepts

digital citizenship;

Digital Citizenship

…or “character education” in a

networked world

Examples of Digital Citizenship

• How to use a cell phone in public (etiquette)

• How to write proper emails / which pictures

to post (communication)

• Benefit from web tools to learn or take

classes as in videoconferencing (education)

• Connect community members to the

Internet (access)

• Beware of illegal activities in case of

commerce as in online shopping

(commerce)

More Examples of Digital

Citizenship

• Respect copyright by citing resources for

e.g. no stealing or plagiarism or

downloading illegal music (responsibility)

• Protect privacy and free speech as in having

the right to publish personal opinions (right)

• Not give personal info to strangers or open

suspicious emails / avoid eye strain or lack

of sleep (safety)

• Manage virus protection and data backup

(security)

Information and Media Literacy

Skills

1. Define an information problem or formulate a

research statement

2. Access Information efficiently (time) and

effectively (sources)

3. Evaluate information critically and competently

4. Manage and use the information

5. Create products

6. Share and communicate

How much do you know about

information literacy?

What strategies do you use?

- Which search engines to use?

- Which search tools or key words to use?

- How to evaluate websites / media?

- How to manage the flow of information?

- How to use the information accurately and

ethically?



Take the following quiz (11 questions) to see

if you are:

Somewhat Savvy (0-4 points)

Moderately Savvy (5-8 points)

Downright Nerdy (8+ points)



1. List 3 major search engines and a major

directory.

2. What is a blog?

3. Why might you use quotation marks when

conducting a search?

4. URL is an acronym for…

5. Identify three Boolean search terms.


information literacy? 6. How do you find the owner or publisher of

a Web site?

7. Identify these extensions and what they

represent:

.org .com

.sch .k12

.edu .gov

.ac .net

.mil .co


information literacy? 8. What clues in a Web address might indicate

you are on a personal Web site?

9. How would you conduct a search for the

following: a list of Web sites of all the

academic institutions in South Africa?

(Hint: South Africa’s country code is .za)



10. How would you conduct a search for the

following: US higher education Web sites

that contain the word turtle?

11. How do sites get to the top of a result list

in Google?

Applying Web-related Research

Skills “Research shows that students primarily use

one search engine and then only look at the

first page of results. They can quickly give up

or settle for something “close enough” when

they don’t find the information they’re

looking for. Huge amounts of time are being

wasted in searches void of the rigor of

research.”

Finding the Information: Reading Google Search Engine Results Page

1. In addition to the pages it finds in response to

your query, Google

• draws on searches other people have done

before you to offer related searches at the

bottom of the page.

• exposes information in the panel on the

right.

• provides results even before you finish

typing in the words you have in mind.


2. Notice that when you point at a particular

search result, called a result block, a small,

sideways chevron appears next to it (>>).

Clicking on that chevron allows you to

preview a document, letting you determine

what kind of document is behind the link.


3. Result blocks consist of:

The snippet is not a complete summary of the text on a page; it

is only search terms in context, extracted from the document.

Text that is taken out and replaced by the ellipses (…) could

be critical to answering your question.


4. Result blocks might provide links to specific

pages within the website :


5. Result blocks of complex websites usually displays a search box that will allow you to search exclusively within that site:


6. Last tip: Not only is it helpful to know how to

understand a single result, but you can gain a

lot from taking a moment to look over an entire

screen or page full of results. If you find

discrepancies among the results, try to find the

name of organizations that could be primary

sources and change your search terms.

Finding the Information: Different Kinds of Content

Google offers access to multiple media such as:

Finding the Information: Different Kinds of Content

In addition to the

left-hand panel,

there is the bar

across the top of

the screen:

And even more…

such as Google

Scholar.

Finding the Information: Google Operators

What is an operator?

It is a command that you add to your query to give Google special instructions about how you want it to deal with a specific search term.

1. The “site: operator” to limit results to pages that come from a specific website

e.g. “Gibran Khalil Gibran site:aub.edu.lb”

or “car accident rates site:.gov.lb”

You can explore this feature further by clicking on Images or News, or even by limiting the time, in the left-hand panel.


2. The “filetype: operator” to limit results to files or documents of a particular kind

e.g. “Gibran Khalil Gibran site:aub.edu.lb filetype:pdf”

File types:

o PDF files (mostly for manuals, reports, etc.)

o flash files i.e. animated web content (SWF)

o Google Earth files (KML; KMZ)

o Excel files (XLS)

o PPT

o DOCX


3. The “minus sign (-) operator” is just a hyphen that's put in front of a term (usually an invasive term) that you want to have excluded from the search results. You can also add multiple minuses together.

For example, if you were looking for a recipe about salsa, you might search for [salsa] and discover that there are multiple definitions of salsa.

There's the dance. There's the music. Don’t forget the food.


By using [-dancing] or [-music], we can

actually focus just on salsa recipes: [salsa -

dance -music].

But now, suppose you are trying to get a

recipe that does not have tomatoes in it.

Maybe you are allergic to tomatoes.

You would then use [-tomatoes] to get rid of

recipes mentioning tomatoes:

[salsa -dance -music -tomatoes]


4. The “double quotes operator” to signify a

phrase search. The goal is to focus the results

on pages where those words appear in the same

order they appear in the quoted phrase.

5. The “OR operator” (always in caps) provides

a way of combining ideas so that you can

search for pages including at least one out of a

set of related terms or synonyms. e.g. uk OR

england (put between quotation marks if you

have more than one word).


6. The “intext: operator” allows you to find

pages that have a specific word in the body of

the text somewhere--it forces inclusion on the

page.

Here is an example: You want to find pages

from the Stanford.edu website that include the

phrase “coral bleaching.” However, you also

want to assure that the term geophysics appears

on any page you find. The query would look

like this:

[coral bleaching site:stanford.edu intext:geophysics]


The reason you sometimes need this is when

you're searching for a page that has multiple

terms on it, some terms you ask for in the search

box may drop out of your search and not get

used. When you want a word to be on that page,

use intext: to force the inclusion of that result.


Combining Operators:

[filetype:kmz shipwrecks OR “ship wrecks”

florida -site:floridamarine.org -

site:thejacobs.org]


NASA’s website indicates that the agency is a model of

sustainability. You want to get a better notion of what

others think about NASA’s environmental

management. You decide to look at what other

government (.gov) or military (.mil) organizations have

to say about NASA’s programs. You do not want to see

results from NASA.gov itself.

You know that you want the following elements in your

search: [nasa environmental management OR policy];

.mil sites; .gov sites; but NOT anything from

NASA.gov.


Did your search match any of the following?

Which will work best?

1. [nasa environmental management OR policy

site:gov OR site:mil]


site:gov OR site:mil -site:nasa.gov]


site:gov OR site:mil -nasa]

4. [nasa environmental management policy

site:gov site:mil -site:nasa.gov]


7. Advanced Search:

You could use all

these operators and

others through the

advanced search

features very

quickly.


Checking Your Findings

Just because Google puts a result first does

not necessarily give it any credibility. It

only means it is popular among other

considerations (200, Google expert says!)

Some of the useful methods in checking

credibility:

Checking Your Findings 1. Reading the web address (URL): the

directory imperialism in this address

http://www.historywebsite.com/imperialis

m/panamacanal.html indicates a specific

perspective.

2. Checking the time range (use the time

feature on Google’s left-hand panel)

3. Checking the accuracy of quotes

(“Elementary, my dear Watson”)

http://www.historywebsite.com/imperialism/panamacanal.html

http://www.historywebsite.com/imperialism/panamacanal.html

Checking Your Findings

4. Checking the owner or the publisher of the web site.

5. Looking for a primary source especially in case of variant information. For example, between a Wikipedia article and a BBC article on an experiment conducted in the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, it is better to check the mit.edu as a primary source.

Quiz Answer Key -1-

1. List 3 major search engines and a major

directory.

• A Web directory is a listing of Web sites organized in a

hierarchy or interconnected list of categories.

http://www.dmoz.org/Computers/Internet/Searching/Directories/

• The Best Search for Your Information Need:

http://www.noodletools.com/debbie/literacies/information/5locate/adviceengine.html

• NoodleQuest Search Strategies Wizard:

http://www.noodletools.com/noodlequest

http://www.dmoz.org/Computers/Internet/Searching/Directories/



http://www.noodletools.com/noodlequest

Quiz Answer Key -2-

2. What is a blog?

Blog is short for weblog. It is like an online

diary (a public one) where anyone can post

personal comments.

There are many free platforms to create a

personal blog such as Blogger and Wordpress.

Quiz Answer Key -3-

3. Why might you use quotation marks

when conducting a search?

Use “quotation marks” to ensure your

keywords appear in your search results in

the order you have specified. It could yield

almost half the results of the same query

without quotation marks.

Quiz Answer Key 4-5

4. URL is an acronym for…

Uniform Resource Locator

5. Identify three Boolean search terms.

AND, OR, NOT

Quiz Answer Key -6-

6. How do you find the owner or publisher

of a Web site?

• Go to www.easywhois.com and enter the

URL of the site you would like to research.

• Find owner information for the

site www.harrypotter.com

http://www.easywhois.com/

http://www.harrypotter.com/

Quiz Answer Key -7-


represent:

• .org – organization

• .com – company

• .sch – school (used outside of US)

• .k12 – most US school sites

• .edu – US higher ed

• .gov – US government (add country code

for outside US)

Quiz Answer Key -7-


represent:

• .ac – higher ed outside of US usually used

with country code, example, “.ac.uk”

• .net – network

• .mil – US military

• .co – Company (if paired with a country

code, example “.co.uk,” the state of

Colorado or the country, Columbia)

Quiz Answer Key -8-

8. What clues in a Web address might

indicate you are on a personal Web site?

Look for a tilde “~” or the “%” sign

or a personal name “jdoe”

or the word “user” after the domain name and

the first forward slash “/”

Quiz Answer Key -9- 9. How would you conduct a search for the

following: a list of Web sites of all the

academic institutions in South Africa?

(Hint: South Africa’s country code is .za)

• Go to Google: www.google.com and type

“site:ac.za” in the search box

• For a full list of country codes,

visit http://goes.gsfc.nasa.gov/text/web_country_c

odes.html

http://www.google.com/

http://goes.gsfc.nasa.gov/text/web_country_codes.html

http://goes.gsfc.nasa.gov/text/web_country_codes.html

Quiz Answer Key -10-

10. How would you conduct a search for

the following: US higher education Web

sites that contain the word turtle?

Go to Google: www.google.com

Type in the search box “site:

“site:edu

“site:edu turtle”

http://www.google.com/

Quiz Answer Key -11-

11. How do sites get to the top of a result

list in Google?

One factor Google uses to rank sites is

popularity. It counts the number of links from

sites all around the Web. There are several

additional factors as well, including but not

limited to the title of the site and the actual

content of the site.

Managing the Flow of Information

A logical starting point to teach students how

to be organized and to collaborate in their

search experience is to use a social

bookmarking tool such as

Diigo http://www.diigo.com

or delicious http://delicious.com

http://www.diigo.com/

http://delicious.com/


Diigo helps users:

- Keep a record of sites and images from the

web

- Organize them using personal notes and

keywords called “tags” (tags can relate to

subjects, content areas, individual projects,

and more.)

- Annotate resources using embedded sticky

notes


Users can also use a social bookmarking

tool such as Diigo

as a search engine to check resources

collected and shared by other online users

or groups. A little time spent searching

through these groups might prove to be

more productive than spending the same

amount of time searching with Google.


Students can use Diigo

to collaborate on a class project; they can

agree to use a specific tag. A simple search

on Diigo for this tag would provide each

student with the resources found by all.


One of the greatest benefits of using a

tool such as Diigo is that the students’

libraries follow them from class to class and

from year to year. Therefore, a student who

studies biology as a part of the seventh-

grade curriculum can return and add to the

resources found when taking biology again

in high school and then in college.

How Does One Learn Best?

– Watching, reading,

listening to someone else

talk about it

– Direct exploration and

experimentation

– A combination of both

The LoTi Digital

Age Survey will

help you reflect

on and direct your

learning process:

http://www.loticon

nection.com/

http://www.loticonnection.com/

http://www.loticonnection.com/

References http://informationr.net/ir/13-3/paper351.html

http://apescience.com/id/fulltext/research-on-digital-literacy-assessment-instruments

http://mediasmarts.ca/digital-media-literacy-fundamentals

http://www.edweek.org/dd/articles/2009/01/21/03techlit.h02.html

http://novemberlearning.com/resources/information-literacy-resources/

http://www.digitalcitizenship.net/uploads/2ndLL.pdf

http://blogs.ksbe.edu/ets/files/2008/08/webliteracyforeducators.pdf

http://support.google.com/websearch/?hl=eng

http://www.powersearchingwithgoogle.com/course

http://informationr.net/ir/13-3/paper351.html




























http://www.digitalcitizenship.net/uploads/2ndLL.pdf



http://support.google.com/websearch/?hl=eng

http://www.powersearchingwithgoogle.com/course

References http://www.eschoolnews.com/2012/05/08/why-more-schools-

arent-teaching-web-literacy-and-how-they-can-start/

http://www.eschoolnews.com/2012/05/25/web-literacy-where-the-common-core-meets-common-sense/3/

http://www.eschoolnews.com/2012/05/08/why-more-schools-arent-teaching-web-literacy-and-how-they-can-start/






































