Digital Media Literacy & Wellbeing
Digital media Literacy forms part of the Wellbeing programme. Wellbeing in junior cycle is about young people feeling confident, happy, healthy and connected.
The junior cycle years are a critical time in young people’s lives. Students are exposed to a range of influences and require support to make positive responsible decisions relating to their health and wellbeing and the wellbeing of others. DML plays an important role in a students wellbeing as it aims to extend and refine students’ ability to use digital technology, communication tools, and the internet creatively, critically and safely, in support of their development, learning and capacity to participate effectively in social and community life.
Students & the Digital World
Young people are actively manipulating digital media to participate in social and cultural life. Making and sharing media has become an increasingly important feature of how young people communicate and engage with each other and with the wider world. For them, posting, linking, sharing and searching are among the ways they participate in their communities and socialise. This short course offers students opportunities to explore and discover the information and knowledge accessible online, enabling them to pursue their interests, to express themselves online and solve problems relevant to their lives.
DML encourages students to
- learn to use digital technology, communication tools and the internet to engage in self-directed enquiry.
- develop their digital literacy skills and improve their capacity to know what they are looking for, what information to ignore or discard, and how to identify what can be useful or significant.
- learn to discriminate between the multiple sources of information available online and to challenge the views they find there.
- learn how to create, collaborate and communicate effectively and to understand how and when digital technologies can best be used to support these processes.
Course Overview
The specification for this junior cycle short course in digital media literacy develops in students a greater sense of what it takes to thrive in a digital environment through four inter-connected strands: My digital world; Following my interests online; Checking the facts and Publishing myself.
Strand 1: My digital world.
In this strand, students explore how and why to use digital technologies; investigate the ethical and legal issues around downloading media from the internet and develop an understanding of online safety for themselves and others.
Strand 2: Following my interests online.
In this strand, students will explore how digital texts are published and their various purposes; they will compare how similar information is presented in different formats and explore how to represent information using digital imagery.
Strand 3: Checking the facts.
In this strand, students will investigate how the choice of digital media influences and impacts on
consumer patterns and explore the notion of bias and influence online.
Strand 4: Publishing myself.
In this strand, students investigate online rights and risks, demonstrate good standards and protocols for online sharing of information and learn to cite and reference accurately when using online sources.
Students explore these interconnected strands through a diverse range of creative lessons and projects working together as a class, individually and also in smaller groups. One weekly class period is allocated to DML.