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eSkills 1.2 What are digital skills

Speaker: Well, hello, and welcome back to Module One of this Developing digital skills in your
classroom online MOOC from the European Schoolnet Academy. Module One has got six parts.
The first part was Introduction. The second part is What are digital skills? The third part: The
future of work. The fourth part: Jobs of the future. Fifth part: Accessing jobs of the future
and the sixth part: Future thinking. And this is the unit on What are digital skills? I guess
before we start to look at the definition of what digital skills are, we also need a bit of an
appreciation about why digital is so important. Fundamentally, technology, in particular digital
technology has changed the way that we go about our lives. From the way that we shop,
increasingly, people are doing more shopping online. From the way that we carry out financial
transactions. Gone are the days of the check book. Now most things are done either by online
payments, or indeed by mobile phone payments, increasingly. Even the way that we play has
started to significantly change. Even though young people still play outside, they increasingly play
on computer games. And of course, its not just the domain of your people. Adults also do this as
well. Even the way that we socialize has started to be influenced by technology. People still go
out for a coffee or for a pint of beer but increasingly they carry on these conversations using
social media sites such as Facebook. And indeed, these social media sites allow us to keep in
touch with people we have not seen for a long time. The European Union, like many other
agencies across the world, has recognized that the digital agenda is incredibly important. Hence,
the creation of the document:A digital agenda for Europe. A 2020 initiative. This document
outlines a number of interesting statistics. For example, it suggests that 90% of jobs today in 2015
require some form of digital skills. It also highlights some of the shortages that we might have
across Europe by 2020. For example, its predicted that we might be short of 825 000 ICT
professionals. And if that wasnt enough, it also predicts that we might be short of 215 000
eLeaders by 2020. Its very very clear that we need to do something about this. Not just in terms
of upskilling ourselves as teachers but also making sure that young people have got the skill set
that they need to enter a work force which is going to be fit for 2015 and beyond. So, what are
digital skills? Well, its actually surprisingly hard to define. digitalskills.com which is an initiative
from the UK Government defines digital skills as: basic digital skills are a minimum level of digital
skills you need in order to safely use digital technology to access the benefits that it can provide.
It then also breaks this down a little bit more and divides digital skills into a number of categories.
The first category is around the digital skill of managing information: how do you find, manage
and store digital information and content? The second skill is around communicating: how do
you use digital technology to communicate, interact, collaborate, share and connect with other
people? The third one is around transacting: how do we use digital technology to purchase and
sell goods and services, organize your own finances, register for and use increasingly government
digital services? The fourth is around problem solving. How do we increase independence and
confidence by solving problems using digital tools but also using digital tools to find solutions?
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And the fifth one is around creating: how do we get people to engage with communities by
creating digital content? And this notion of creating digital content is a particularly important
thing for schools, I think. Of course, when we talk about digital skills, it would also be fair to say
that weve got basic digital skills and advanced digital skills in each of these categories. Lets go
back to that important category of creating again. Its very very easy to create something using
text only. For example, producing an online document. And well cover some of that during
Module Three. Its a bit more complicated, though, to programme something online using code.
Hopefully, you get the idea of what Im talking about here is that weve got digital skills but some
of these digital skills are basic and some of these will be advanced. And of course, as time moves
on, these more advanced digital skills will be required by all people. Fundamentally, I guess what
were talking a little bit about here is not just digital skills but also people gaining digital
competence to exist in the place that they live and the place that they want to work. Digital
competence is the set of knowledge, skills and attitudes that are required when using ICT and
digital media to perform tasks, to solve problems, to communicate, to manage information, to
collaborate, to create and share content effectively online. And if were looking to sort of display
this as a simple model, ultimately what we mean is the more digital skills we have, the increased
levels of digital competence that we have. So, within Europe, weve also got something which is
called The e-Competence Framework. And The e-Competence Framework is really aimed at
business. And what this is designed to do is that it provides 40 e-competences that are required
and applied to the Information Technology Community workplace. Now, even though this is quite
important, I think its even more important for us to look at actually what might be relevant in
the classroom. The website Mashable suggested 10 things that young people should be leaving
school with in 2015 and these are the 10 things:
1. The ability to set up a Wi-Fi network
2. The ability to back up to the cloud
3. Basic photo editing
4. Basic video editing
5. Google docs and Microsoft Office
6. HTML and basic coding
7. How to set up a website and domain
8. Converting file formats
9. Online banking
10. How do you brand yourself in a digital community
Now whether you agree with some of these things or not, its important for us, I think, to think
about digital skills. So, I cover a few questions for you to think about before we move on to the
next video:
1. What digital skills do you think are important in 2015? Do you agree with the Mashable
website?
2. What digital skills do you think will be important by 2030?
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Remember, theres loads of support which is available, not just on social media but also on
the European Schoolnet Academy MOOC homepage as well. See you in the next video.