Defining Technology Literacy

One of the goals of Title II, Part D of the No Child Left Behind Act of 2001 (NCLB) is to assist every student in crossing the digital divide by ensuring that every student is technologically literate by the time the student finishes the eighth grade, regardless of the student's race, ethnicity, gender, family income, geographic location, or disability. Defining technology literacy, though, was left up to each state.

In 2002, the State Educational Technology Directors Association (SETDA) convened a Technology Literacy Assessment (TLA) Work Group at its 2002 National Leadership Institute (NLI) to establish a shared definition of technology literacy for states to use as a starting place for their state-specific definition and guidelines. The 2005 Washington state Technology Literacy for Students Working Group used this common definition as a starting place for its work:

"Technology literacy is the ability to responsibly use appropriate technology to communicate, solve problems, and access, manage, integrate, evaluate, and create information to improve learning in all subject areas and to acquire lifelong knowledge and skills in the 21st century. [1]

The Technology Literacy Working Group also re-visited the Seven Essential Learnings for Technology from the 1994 Washington State Technology Plan and the Technology Foundation Standards for Students adopted in the 2002 Washington State Educational Technology Plan from the National Educational Technology Standards (NETS) for Students. In addition, they reviewed the work of the Partnership for 21^st Century Skills (2003), the "Digital Transformation: A Framework for ICT Literacy" report by the Information and Communication Technologies (ICT) Panel (2002), and a number of resources from school districts in Washington and other states and countries.

As a result, the Working Group concluded that technology literacy should not be limited to primarily the mastery of technical skills, but needed to be broadened to include general literacy skills, as well as critical thinking and problem solving. As a result, they expanded the definition to include "technology fluency", drawing upon the work of the National Resource Council in the publication Being Fluent with Information Technology:

People fluent with information technology are able to express themselves creatively, to reformulate knowledge, and to synthesize new information. Fluency with information technology entails a process of lifelong learning in which individuals continually apply what they know to adapt to change and acquire more knowledge to be more effective at applying information technology to their work and personal lives. [2]

Definitions of Technology Literacy and Fluency

Technology Literacy is the ability to responsibly, creatively, and effectively use appropriate technology[3]to:

• communicate;
• access,collect, manage, integrate, and evaluate information;
• solve problems and create solutions;
• build and share knowledge; and
• improve and enhance learning in all subject areas and experiences.

Technology fluency builds upon technology literacy and is demonstrated when students:

• apply technology [4] to real-world experiences;
• adapt to changing technologies;
• modify current and create new technologies; and
• personalize technology to meet personal needs, interests, and learning styles.