Lifelong Learning

Lifelong learning is learning through our lifetime. This learning used to be a formal form of learning, you would have to enroll in tafe, take a class or a course for something as simple as learning to put your make-up on correctly, but just think how ‘kids these days’ learn to do all these types of things. They simply Google it or watch a YouTube clip. The way in which we are learning throughout our lifetime is changing, we are able to informally learn about topics that were never available to us before. We are able to harness digital skills to make us lifelong learners that extend beyond our schooling. 

We are living in the age of knowledge, everybody wants to know why things are happening and the ways in which they can investigate and/or find out their desired answers. Lifelong learning makes finding out these answers and building a knowledge base of how to investigate these answers. Teachers are the people required to embedded students with the skills to lifelong learn. 

 

We need to create lifelong learners…………….. 

 

 

 

 

Digital Blurring

 

Digital burring is the things that we do in our private digital life that influence what we do in our work/learning digital life. Digital blurring can be the set of skills that transfer between these two different digital worlds, for example taking photos, playing the wii or emailing all provide skills that can be adapted or transferred into other areas of teaching and learning.

 

Jane McGonigal believes that gaming can make for a better world and after watching her video, I am now also a believer in this theory.

 

Just think: You are doing a presentation on China, you cannot physically take all your students to China but what if you could virtually expose your students to China, their culture, the food, the people, wouldn’t you want to give each student the chance to do this, virtual worlds can give your students this experience.

 

There are many other games and online resources that can be used within the classroom to not only enhance student’s digital skills but provide many different learning experiences in all different classroom subjects.

 

Helpful links

 

worldwithoutoil.org

archive.superstruckgame.net

www.urgentevoke.com

www.sploder.com

 

 

My Sploder Example

http://www.sploder.com/publish.php?s=d00436qt

Digital Fluency

Digital Fluency is “an evolving aptitude that empowers the individual to effectively and ethically interpret information, discover meaning, design content, construct knowledge, and communicate ideas in a digitally connected world” (Boise State University, 2014, pg1).

Children in schools need to become digitally fluent to be able to move into more complex digital outlooks in higher levels of schooling but also to play a part in our digitally changing society. There are many basic digital processes that students should know by the time they leave primary school, some of these are:

• Word
• Excel
• Power point
• Advanced web searching skill, both critical and practical skills
• Animation
• Blogging
• Podcasting
• Making a movie or video
• Web design

Students don’t need to know everything about these processes but should have a basic understanding of how to use these programs.

Scratch is an example of a basic animation program. Scratch is a completely online site that allows children to create animations and/or games. I believe this site would be a great tool to teach children the different ways of viewing animations and the ways in which basic formations can create animations. I believe this would be a great tool to use as a project assignment for children’s technology work as they can make the animations as complex or as simple as their skills will allow.

I believe that children need to discover and become digital to succeed in our everyday world. This is done by play, exploration and inquiry, children need meaningful learning experiences.

 

References

Boise State University: Definition of digital fluency. (2014). Retrieved from: http://at.boisestate.edu/home/definition-of-digital-fluency/

 

Resources

Make movies, games, animations ect Scratch: http://scratch.mit.edu/projects/20585654/#editor

Digital Information

Digital Information is a tangle of images, text, web links and audio files that provide us with quick, multiple ways of understanding and interpreting information. The way we are receiving information is no longer just written within the pages of a book but, how do we know what information we can trust? Is there information from digital resources that is false and misleading?

 

Of course there is information available on the internet that is not a viable resource but you just need to be smart about where you are looking and what you are searching. A good idea would be to look at the URL, .gov and .edu sites are run by massive organisations and are viable resources for information.  

 

There are also organisations such as; PANDORA (http://pandora.nla.gov.au/tep/10691) and National Archives of Australia (http://www.naa.gov.au/records-management/digital-transition-policy/benefits-of-digital-information.aspx) that keep information that was once known to us as archives. You would remember these from your local library, parts of history and information. These known sources are turning websites and archives into digital resources that will be consistently available for use within classrooms. These websites would be a reliable source for history components of your currents class and can be used as a learning tool for students to find there information.

http://digitisation.net.au/ provides much needed information for teachers, parents and caregivers who aren’t feeling digital or need a push in the upcoming direction. This site also explains different ways in using technology to gain the most experience and valuable knowledge.

 

Additional Resources

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sO4BgY64XFs  (A house run on completely digital technology)