Esther Moon is working in an internship with the Gilbert Public School District Technology Department this summer, on a technology instruction initative designed to address digital literacy. The digital literacy project is necessary to address a knowledge gap among K-12 school-aged students regarding appropriate use of digital devices and digital data. The project will address digital risk issues that students are exposed to due to the integration and transformation of educational learning methods to a digital environment. She will be researching digital literacy topics such as authenticating photos and videos, identifying credible news and academic resources for student research and will create a digital literacy curriculum within the districts digital curriculum platform Ogment, intended for launch in 2018.
Gilbert Public Schools will find this digital literacy curriculum of great value to its teachers and students and reflects one of nine elements of Digital Citizenship that must be developed . The Digital Citizenship Curriculum will serve as a model for other school districts in closing the digital knowledge gap and providing a safeguard that helps reduce the digital risk for students.
The internship opportunity is a proactive approach to providing the information students need to understand the appropriate use of digital devices and data. In addition to reducing digital risk to students this project completes a portion of the district's goal to increase a teacher's capacity to gather accessible digital citizenship curriculum while freeing up valuable time spent in lesson plan development. It will provide a supplement of instructional material to the current curriculum, around the concept of digital scholarship, which meets education standards and prepares students for real-world experience in higher education and the workforce. All of these advantages help Gilbert Public Schools maintain its national competitiveness, furthering the goal of student engagement and supports diverse learners through scholarship, innovation, and technology.
