Just do it: designing and implementing a digital literacy course in a public high school

Abstract

This project examines the theoretical and practical educational challenges of designing a ‘digital literacy’ Board/Authority Authorized (BAA) course for implementation in a British Columbia secondary public school. There were three guiding questions for this project: (1) What is digital literacy? (2) How digitally literate are today’s youth through their own practices? and, (3) What is the role of formal education in developing digital literacy in our youth? The project had three corresponding stages: defining digital literacy through the existing literature; designing a digital literacy course that met students’ contemporary learning needs; and structuring the course for implementation in a public secondary school. Through a synthesis of existing discourses regarding learners in a digital age and the author’s classroom-based teaching experiences, digital literacy was defined as “the ability to interact critically, creatively and ethically with text, tools and people in digital contexts.” Further, the course was designed to engage and impact contemporary students’ personal and social constructivist approaches to learning in online and face-to-face contexts. Finally, the BAA course shell was created addressing provincial Ministry of Education, District and school-based criteria, as well as students’ competencies for implementation as a grade 12 elective in a local high school for the following academic year.