Introducing Literacy with ICT Across the Curriculum

Literacy with ICT

Literacy with ICT means choosing and using ICT, responsibly and ethically, to support critical and creative thinking about information and about communication as citizens of the global community. Literacy with ICT consists of critical and creative thinking, ethics and responsibility, and ICT literacy.

Technology as a Foundation Skill

To prepare students to become citizens of the global community, Manitoba Education, Citizenship and Youth identified technology, literacy and communication, problem solving, and human relations as foundation skills to be developed across the curriculum from Kindergarten to Grade 12 (see Manitoba Education and Training, A Foundation for Excellence, 1995). Although students in the past have focused on developing literacy skills such as reading, writing, and numeracy, 21st-century students must develop multiple literacies that will allow them to respond to changing ideas, attitudes, and technologies as their communities and their world evolve.

In 1998, Manitoba Education, Citizenship and Youth published Technology As a Foundation Skill Area: A Journey toward Information Technology Literacy. This document stated the following vision for Manitoba:

The use of information technology will help enable all students to solve problems, improve their personal performance, and gain the critical and abstract thinking skills necessary to become lifelong learners and contributing members of their communities.

Literacy with ICT Across the Curriculum

Literacy with ICT Across the Curriculum builds on the framework of Technology As a Foundation Skill Area: A Journey toward Information Technology Literacy. It incorporates promising practices from the current work of

• K-8 classroom teachers
• Manitoba school divisions and schools
• Manitoba Education, Citizenship and Youth
• educational researchers

Literacy with ICT Across the Curriculum describes how students use ICT to enhance and extend their learning. It includes the following components:

• a definition of literacy with ICT
• a developmental continuum of descriptors illustrating how students extend their critical and creative thinking with ICT in a responsible and ethical manner
• “snapshots” that show how emerging, developing, transitioning, and expanding learners demonstrate their literacy with ICT
• assessment and reporting guidelines for Literacy with ICT Across the Curriculum
• action research and capacity-building support for implementation teams
• customized three-year phase-in plans for implementation in each Manitoba school division
• online professional learning communities
• professional learning for teachers through divisional implementation teams
• funding for professional learning of K-8 teachers on Literacy with ICT Across the Curriculum
• a parent information booklet outlining what it means to be literate with ICT, how children develop their literacy with ICT in Manitoba schools, and how parents can support their children