Difference between traditional literacy and digital literacy

When you think of traditional literacy, reading and writing come to mind. Learning phonics, sight words and eventually, reading literature. Today, students need more than the written word to succeed in elementary school, high school and continued education. Digital literacy expands the scope of traditional literacy. It encompasses e-learning skills that incorporate audio and video for strengthening thinking and learning in students.

When combining digital and traditional literacies, not only do students learn how to read and write, but they also learn how to expand their communication, language and media skills. They grow and engage the world through images, diagrams, audio and video media, taking their reading and writing skills to a higher level of learning. They also develop dynamic creativity that helps them think, communicate, design and engage in the world around them.

When reinforcing literacy skills, conventional teaching methods involve:

• Textbooks
• Workbooks
• Written tests
• Recitation
• Digital literacy teaching methods expand on print literacy with the following tools:
• • Cloud computing
  • Courseware
  • Multimedia slides
  • Game-based learning
  • Educational video
  • Audio learning
  • Digital production
  • Interacting on digital devices
  • Combining virtual and physical world
  • Some differences between traditional and digital literacy are listed below

  Traditional literacy	Digital literacy
  It is teacher-centered, memory- focused instruction.	It is student-centered, performance focused learning method.
  Limited media, single-sense stimulation	Media-rich, multi-sensory stimulation.
  In-school expertise, content and activities.	Global expertise, information and learning experiences.
  Isolated work on invented exercises.	Collaborative work on authentic, real-world projects.
  Knowledge from limited, authoritative sources.	Learner- constructed knowledge from multiple information sources and experiences

   

  Conventional and digital literacy go hand-in-hand in the classroom, enriching your students’ creative thinking and integrating them into today’s digital world.