Developing Digital Literacy with Virtual History Excursions

The advent of the new Australian Curriculum (Version 9.0) has pinpointed a strong emphasis on the relevance and significance for students to develop their digital literacy skills. In the new curriculum, digital literacy involves students ‘critically identifying and appropriately selecting and using digital devices or systems; [and] learning to make the most of the technologies available to them…’.1 The renaming of the ICT capability to ‘Digital Literacy’ highlights the necessity to teach students about the relevance and usefulness of digital technologies in their everyday lives, now and in future. Further, the emphasis on digital literacy as a general capability is a testament to the urgency for teachers to teach students how to digitally create, communicate, investigate, manage , and operate with digital technologies across the curriculum.²