Technology and Information Literacy - A different vision

Last week we looked at technology and information (media) literacy in Minnesota as it currently stands. Te recap: in 2006 a bill was passed which directed the commissioner of education to “…revise and appropriately embed technology and information literacy standards consistent with recommendations from school media specialists into the state's academic standards and graduation requirements...” Is this enough or is a different vision needed?

If, as Senator Kelley described, technology literacy has become “essential to function in a world flooded and mediated by technology skills” we may need more drastic changes to ensure that all students are adequately educated about technology. Just as the arts, social studies, science, language arts and math have been deemed critical enough for the future success of students in Minnesota that they have received special status by the state in the creation of specific content standards which students must meet prior to graduation perhaps a dedicated set of technological literacy standards should also be established. If our world truly is “flooded and mediated by technology skills” should not fluency with technology on par with traditional academic skills be an essential part of our basic education? Why should technology be relegated to infusion within existing standards? Teachers are often ill-prepared to deal with the history and nature of technology or preparing students for future technologies and instead focus on using existing technologies which only increases our dependence on technology without understanding it. Luckily I am not the first to think of these questions.

In the late 1990s the International Technology Education Association and the Technology for All Americans Project, under the direction of the National Science Foundation and NASA and with input from the National Research Council and the National Academy of Engineering, developed “Standards for Technological Literacy: Content for the Study of Technology” also known as the STL. These standards were specifically designed to combat the problem of a nation increasingly dependent on technology but with a population “largely ignorant of the history and fundamental nature of the technology which sustains it” by increasing the technological literacy of students.

We see that the Minnesota bill does mention technological literacy in concert with information literacy but it seems to have a different result. The STL define technological literacy much more broadly as “the ability to use, manage, assess and understand technology.” Under the legislation passed in Minnesota changes to academic standards aimed at embedding technology and information literacy seem to emphasize the use of technology instead of on an understanding of technology which is arguably more important as specific technologies are constantly changing and skills in the use of technology soon become outdated. If our goal is to prepare students for a world “flooded and mediated by technology skills” perhaps the solution we have arrived at in this well meaning legislation is not working as intended and new solutions to the problem of technological literacy should be explored.