Literacy and Digital Literacy
LITERACY
It’s International Literacy Day today, and a good time to remind everyone about a startling Australian statistic : That around half of the Australian population still struggles with literacy skills - more here http://love2read.org.au/library/files/Flyer280510generic.pdf
For many of us who are lucky enough to have had a quality education and lots of opportunities, and are completely connected with reading, books, literature and online material, the statistic quoted above seems unreal (”That can’t be true” comes to mind). But it is, and it’s affecting our communities and our quality of life. That’s why Australian Library Associations and Libraries are going to be leading the National Year of Reading in 2012. There will be thousands of events, initiatives and activities organised during the year and we also seek the support of the Australian Government to make significant improvements to our national literacy statistics.
DIGITAL LITERACY & 5 minutes on the NBN
In my previous blog post I was waiting for an election outcome …. took abit longer than we thought to find out who would form the government, but at least we can get on with it all now. Last night after the eventual election result was announced I needed a cab ride to my Sydney hotel after meetings, and the taxi driver had the political talkback on the radio. I was engrosed in my iPhone and #ausvotes twitter news still as we started chatting about the result and things in general. A colleague once commented to me that he believed that cab drivers are the true political ‘wick’ of the nation (ask a Cab Driver who will win an election, and they will probably be right) My cabbie then asked me “So why do we need this NBN thing??” “Why is it so important?” he comments. Ironic, I thought, seeing as I was sitting there utilising such technology. Trying to explain the NBN in 5 minutes to a layperson who is not ‘internet connected’ was my challenge. There had been a great analogy made during the day for the NBN and national infrastructure - ” What if the Hume Highway had never been built? Where would we be? ” and I tried in a number of quick and simple ways to describe how the NBN will work.
In his 7 September announcement Tony Windsor noted that Broadband was possibly one of the most critical issues - for regional Australians “to engage with the infrastructure of this century”.
Rob Oakeshott mentioned education and the NBN in his (lengthy) in the ”eyes of my children” decision. Digital literacy will be a critical skill for all Australians to be able to truly engage with the NBN. We hope that Mr Oakeshott will continue to learn from his involvement with, and the submissions and hearings of the House of Representatives Inquiry into School Libraries and Teacher Librarians about just one part of the future of creating Australian Digital Citizens, and increasing regional education opportunities. All sectors of the Australian library community are also already delivering services and skill development in these areas.
ALIA’s NBN comments are found at http://www.alia.org.au/advocacy/broadband.html
So I challenge you to try out an elevator pitch to a cabbie about why the NBN is important from your perspective. Perhaps that’s why our Independents commented on it in their speeches yesterday - lots of people talking about it in the taxi cabs of Australia.
Sue Hutley, ALIA Executive Director