Digital literacy for all: reflections on creating a short course in digital literacy

Byrne, Ann; Davey, Emberly; O'Dowd, Irene

Publication

Digital literacy for all: reflections on creating a short course in digital literacy

Byrne, Ann; Davey, Emberly; O'Dowd, Irene

Abstract

Presented at the A&SL LAI Conference, 21st of March 2024, Dublin, Ireland. In today’s internet-dominated interconnected world, where anyone with a phone can publish something and share it worldwide, critically assessing the integrity of information has never been more important or more challenging, and to do this successfully requires digital literacy skills. Inspired by global initiatives such as the United Nations SDGs and the European Commission’s DigComp framework, we created an open digital educational resource to help foster digital literacy within our institution and beyond. This project ties in with an ongoing academic integrity project within our institution; it also coincides with the increasing availability of generative artificial intelligence systems that can potentially spread misinformation at scale. In this context, we feel the project is a very timely one. In this paper, we reflect on the process of developing the course, share what we have learned along the way, and indicate future directions for the project.