Defining Digital Media: What Does it Mean to You?
2.14.11 | What does the term “digital media” mean to you? Spotlight seeks input from educators, game developers, museum administrators, policy makers and anyone else who thinks digital media is central to learning, in or out of the classroom ...
Spotlight is looking to expand and further define its coverage areas, and we need your help.
As you can see from our name, “digital media” is central to our purpose here at Spotlight. But what do we mean by it? Digital media is one of those squishy terms that can take on many interpretations, based on who’s using it and for what purpose.
We’re curious: How do you define digital media?
How does it differ from other media? Is digital media just the internet and smart phones? Or do you think of digital media more broadly, springing from, for example, our new roles as authors and editors of media? Do you include just the tools or the dispositions that the tools afford as well?
Tell us in the comments how you define digital media—in the most narrow or broadest sense—and, if you’re so inclined, feel free to add how you’re using it to help kids learn (or, if you’re a student, how are you using it yourself?). Your input will help us develop new features and starting points for discussion this spring.
Feel free to re-post, and thanks for your input!
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Comments
Rex Ray (Richards Career Academy, Chicago, IL)
2/14/11
6:04pm
As a teacher, digital media can mean many things. Digital media can mean online resources that kids use to research and write, i.e. PC’s hooked up to an internet connection. Digital media, however, can also mean use of TV (streaming online or otherwise), radio, and recorded media, both visual and sound. Digital media can involve the use of recording equipment, both visual and sound, for students to use in creative projects. Students in some art classes use PC’s to create digital art. The actual uses in the classroom and possibilities for expansion of the use of digital media are not endless, but large. In short, to define digital media, is at the moment an amorphous concept. We are still discovering what it is, what it means, and how it can be used.
Rex Ray
Bernie
2/14/11
7:08pm
Digital literacy, to me, signifies an entire ideological approach to education and life; it’s not simply a discreet set of skills. Teachers, in my mind, need to be providing students the critical and creative tools to survive and thrive in a mediated culture that wants to keep them as passive consumers. Being digitally literate means being able to navigate the sights and sounds of our cultural lives, something most adults are not able to do.
So in that light, I wouldn’t mind seeing more examples of good cultural criticism—that teachers could then use as models for digital literacy. The end result of teaching digital literacy should be students who can evaluate works of culture like TV shows, music, etc—and determine which ones make the world a little better and which ones make the world a little worse—and then act.
Laura Fleming
2/14/11
9:44pm
Digital Media are shared tools, support materials, and resources for learning that help to build bridges of opportunity for all learners. Digital Media extends learning across multiple platforms and transform sometimes one-dimensional tasks into three-dimensional learning experiences. Using media in this way builds environments for learning that do not replicate the classroom space but rather connect and extend it to build new environments and worlds.
Jon Kruithof (Hamilton, Canada)
2/15/11
12:23pm
Digital media is simply the delivery device of the communication between two people connected through computers. Those computers could be desktops, laptops, mobile devices, gaming platforms or servers. The media could be text based like in blogs and webpages, video based like in video chatting or over social sharing or through virtual simulations.
I think asking how we use it to help kids learn is the wrong question - that reinforces the old paradigms when a new one is clearly being defined - one where kids define their own learning. While teachers will always be teachers - I think the most inspiring ones I see are the ones who bring good questions for kids to answer.