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Learning/WebLiteraciesWhitePaper (view source)
Revision as of 14:13, 3 January 2013
, 3 January 2013Changed formatting and a couple of words towards end of 'What are we talking about?' section
Dajbelshaw (talk | contribs) (Added to and clarified opening paragraphs of section: 'What are we talking about?') |
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The open Web has enabled a dramatic increase in everyday access to information. Just as importantly it has facilitated new ways for people and communities to connect. In fact, it has allowed communities to form that never before would have come together. Many of these communities want to learn things together and achieve new skills using the Web as a platform. This makes being able to use the Web effectively relevant to <em>everyone</em>: developers, teachers, doctors, construction workers and many more, especially learners of any kind. We feel there is <strong>a new necessary set of literacies for modern citizens</strong> - web literacies - that prepare them to effectively use the web to get information, connect with others and express themselves. | The open Web has enabled a dramatic increase in everyday access to information. Just as importantly it has facilitated new ways for people and communities to connect. In fact, it has allowed communities to form that never before would have come together. Many of these communities want to learn things together and achieve new skills using the Web as a platform. This makes being able to use the Web effectively relevant to <em>everyone</em>: developers, teachers, doctors, construction workers and many more, especially learners of any kind. We feel there is <strong>a new necessary set of literacies for modern citizens</strong> - web literacies - that prepare them to effectively use the web to get information, connect with others and express themselves. | ||
Literacy isn’t just about reading, but about writing too. When we think about literacies on the web it’s important to go beyond just the differences between paper and screen. Those differences, | Literacy isn’t just about reading, but about writing too. When we think about literacies on the web it’s important to go beyond just the differences between paper and screen. Those differences, such as the <em>hypertextuality</em> of the web, are certainly important. But mastering these differences does not automatically lead to fluent use of the Web. <strong>Being Web literate means not only being able to read the Web but also having the ability to ‘write’ it.</strong> | ||
Writing the web - creating pages, documents and multimedia assets - means understanding the building blocks of the web. As Mitchell Baker (Chairperson of Mozilla) says, we want to move beyond ‘elegant consumption’ towards creating a generation of <em>Webmakers</em>. <strong>We’re not talking about everyone becoming a fully-fledged programmer, but we do believe that everyone should have the skills, competencies and literacies to be able to tinker and make things with and on the web.</strong> This is what Martha, the teacher in our example above, wants to help her students learn. She wants them to be able to make parts of the web as well as consume them. | Writing the web - creating pages, documents and multimedia assets - means <em>understanding the building blocks of the web</em>. As Mitchell Baker (Chairperson of Mozilla) says, we want to move beyond ‘elegant consumption’ towards creating a generation of <em>Webmakers</em>. <strong>We’re not talking about everyone becoming a fully-fledged programmer, but we do believe that everyone should have the skills, competencies and literacies to be able to tinker and make things with and on the web.</strong> This is what Martha, the teacher in our example above, wants to help her students learn. She wants them to be able to make parts of the web as well as consume them. | ||
Although a knowledge of the physical makeup of the internet is necessary at some level, we’re primarily interested in the web as accessed through a browser. We recognise that there are ‘Pre-Beginner’ skills such as identifying a web browser’s address bar, using copy/paste functions, and entering the URL of a site directly (rather than searching). Likewise, there’s ‘Advanced’ skills such as code workflows and server-side technologies that go beyond what we’re talking about here. <strong>Both ‘Pre-Beginner’ and ‘Advanced’ skills are currently out of scope for this white paper.</strong> We’re focusing on the kinds of skills that Abdullah might teach at his weekend sessions, or Leo might learn at his weekly HTML classes. | Although a knowledge of the physical makeup of the internet is necessary at some level, we’re primarily interested in the web as accessed through a browser. We recognise that there are ‘Pre-Beginner’ skills such as identifying a web browser’s address bar, using copy/paste functions, and entering the URL of a site directly (rather than searching). Likewise, there’s ‘Advanced’ skills such as code workflows and server-side technologies that go beyond what we’re talking about here. <strong>Both ‘Pre-Beginner’ and ‘Advanced’ skills are currently out of scope for this white paper.</strong> We’re focusing on the kinds of skills that Abdullah might teach at his weekend sessions, or Leo might learn at his weekly HTML classes. | ||