Digital Skills
What are Digital Literacy and Digital Skills?
Digital literacy is the ability to find, evaluate, utilize, share, and create content using information technologies and the Internet. (Cornell: 2009)For more help with your Digital Literacy, see Library and Information Literacy to use digital tools in your search for, and evaluation of, information.
Digital skills focus on which tools to use for which task and how to use those tools. Digital skills cover a wide range of software and services, depending on your specialism(s) and future career, but the following content provides a very good place for all students to begin their digital journey:
Using systems and services
- Blackboard - Virtual Learning Environment (VLE) used for module teaching materials
- PebblePad - eportfolio used for recording experiences, learning and reflection
- Turnitin - Assignment submission and plagiarism detection
- Cite them right - the online version of the university's referencing system
Using Software
- Microsoft Office:
- Excel
- PowerPoint
- Word
Getting organised
- File Conversion
- File Management Strategies
- File & Document Backup Strategies
- Joining up different files into a single document
Working on the web
Multimedia
- Presentations
- Working with images (scanning, editing and image resizing)
- Working with sound (digital recordings, podcasting and editing)
Communicating
- Student Email (Office 365)
- Skype for Business
- Social Media
Hardware and Devices
- Interactive White Boards are an integral piece of equipment at the University. If you are doing a presentation you may find yourself presenting on a whiteboard. They are also a very important in teacher education.
- Scanning and Printing
Skills@Cumbria (Blackboard)
The Students tab, in Blackboard, also provides direct access to a wide range of resources/support and:
- Turnitin Test Area - check your work/referencing before your final submission