You know that the world is changing when new forms of ‘literacy’ are being described and taught in schools.
‘Literacy’ used to involve students developing the knowledge and skills to read, write and interpret language confidently. But that was back in the days before fake news, credit cards, and Twitter.
Of course, reading and writing are still foundational skills. But there are other ‘literacies’ emerging that may well be equally critical in the future lives of our students. Here are a few of the most important:
- Digital literacy — skills associated with harnessing computer-based devices and services;
- Data & Media literacy — being able to access, filter, digest and make meaning of the masses of available data and to leverage different platforms of data consumption and delivery;
- News literacy — learning to discern between, efficiently evaluate, and effectively respond to different news sources and stories;
- Financial literacy — being empowered to understand and harness the increasingly complex and personalised financial systems available to us;
- Wellbeing literacy — having the skills and knowledge to nurture our own wellbeing and the wellbeing of people we care about.
Schools are pretty good, on the whole, at carefully scaffolding the learning of traditional ‘literacy’. They’ve been doing it for a while! And, now, it’s exciting to see that many progressive and responsive schools are turning their attention to tackling the challenge of teaching a new generation of literacies too – to really prepare their students for a changing world.
David's Blog 