Getting Ready for the New School Year: Digital Learning Resources to Explore

As we begin a new school year, this is a great opportunity to look at the digital learning resources available to support your learners, staff, and agency goals.

Whether you are determining where to begin with digital literacy, thinking about how technology fits into your program, exploring artificial intelligence, or looking for additional support, here are a few resources to help you plan for the year ahead.

1. Find the Right Starting Point for Digital Literacy

When new learners enter our programs, our approach to digital literacy may need to shift based on their skills, experiences, and needs.

Our Digital Literacy Curriculum Guide can help you identify where your learners may be starting and determine which curriculum or resources may provide the best support.

The guide brings together three curriculum options across a digital literacy spectrum:

• DART provides an ESL-focused approach that builds digital literacy alongside language development.

• Northstar Digital Literacy provides interactive learning modules and assessment tools that can help identify specific skills learners may need to develop through simulations of computer and online navigation.

• Google Applied Digital Skills provides opportunities for learners to practice digital skills while applying them within projects and real-life scenarios.

These curricula are also aligned through the BRIDGES Digital Resilience framework, providing a way to understand the broader areas of digital skills and resilience being developed regardless of which curriculum you use.

Learners do not need to complete each curriculum separately or move through all three in order. Instead, you can identify a skill or need and move across the digital literacy spectrum to find the resource that best supports your learner at that point in their learning.

This provides an opportunity to differentiate instruction, strengthen foundational skills, and continue building digital resilience throughout the year. Click here to access our Digital Literacy Curriculum Guide to have an idea on where to begin.

2. Use the Digital Learning Plan to Guide Your Approach

Digital literacy is not limited to a single lesson, curriculum, or classroom. Our Digital Learning Plan can help you think intentionally about how digital learning is supported at the classroom, program, or agency-wide level.

The plan focuses on four connected components:

• Digital Opportunity & Accessibility looks at the access to technology and information learners need in order to participate in the digital world.

• Digital Literacy focuses on the skills learners are developing and the frameworks that can help identify broader goals for digital skill development.

• Tech Implementation considers how those skills and technologies are brought into instruction through digital literacy curricula, classroom strategies, technology integration, and other resources.

• Tech Support asks an important question: What happens when a learner or staff member experiences a technical issue or encounters a skill gap?

  
  

Support is an important part of building digital resilience. Identifying recurring challenges can help determine where additional practice, resources, or procedures may be needed so technology becomes less of a barrier to learning.

Digital Learning Plan Part Two: The Digital Literacy Curricula also includes practical tools to help with this process.

The Foundational Digital Skills Checklist focuses on foundational computer skills that are important for accessing and participating in online learning using laptops and computers. A tutorial video walks through how to use the checklist and how it can help prioritize skills when working with learners.

A second framework-based resource can help programs take the skills identified through digital skill profiles and connect them with available activities, lessons, and resources. Rather than starting from scratch, you can identify the need and then find resources that can help you address it.

3. Explore Artificial Intelligence Intentionally

We have also continued working with agencies on the use of artificial intelligence in adult education.

Our AI resources include introductory information about artificial intelligence, along with curated activities and lessons developed by organizations working in this area.

You can also find our Essential Guidelines for AI Use, designed to help learners and staff approach AI safely and intentionally.

Additional examples demonstrate how AI can be used in different contexts, along with AI tool recommendations that provide opportunities to experiment and determine what may be useful for your classroom or program.

New This Year: Monthly Hands-On AI Workshops

This year, we are also introducing a monthly hands-on AI workshop.

The goal is simple: come in and try AI.

Rather than focusing only on presentations about AI, these sessions will provide time to practice using AI tools, ask questions, explore possibilities, and learn from one another.

If you have something you have been experimenting with, bring it for a show-and-tell. If you have questions about how something might work in your classroom, bring those too.

Throughout these sessions, we will continue exploring how to get the most out of AI while maintaining an important part of the learning process: the thinking, practice, and cognitive engagement that learners still need to do themselves.

AI can expand what is possible, but the goal is to use it intentionally to strengthen learning rather than remove the learning process.

AI in Practice Hands-On Sessions.pdf

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4. Digital Navigator Day

We have a Digital Navigator Onboarding/Refresher Training scheduled for October 22. Additional information will be shared as the event approaches.

Agencies participating in the Technology Integration and Expansion of Services initiative are required to participate.

The session will serve as both a refresher for current Digital Navigators and an introductory training for new Digital Navigators.

However, you do not need to hold the Digital Navigator title to participate. Anyone who supports learners or staff with using technology in the classroom is welcome to attend.

During the session, we will review Digital Navigator responsibilities, explore practical examples and applications, share updates to the work happening this year, and discuss resources and additional support available to agencies.

And Remember: You Don't Have to Figure It Out Alone

Digital ATDN provides technology implementation and support related to digital literacy, artificial intelligence, educational technology, technology integration, and more.

You can schedule a free support session at any point during the year.

Support can range from finding the answer to a specific question about a website or EdTech tool to brainstorming instructional strategies, developing procedures or guidelines, identifying resources, or thinking through how technology can better support your program.

The goal is not simply to add more technology, but to help you use technology in ways that support your learners and align with the goals your agency has already established.

As you begin the new school year, take some time to explore these resources, identify what fits your needs, and know that support is available along the way.

Have a great start to the school year!