Web Seminars Contributed by EDUCAUSE and Net Generation Learner

As international culture and commerce become increasingly reliant on visual communications, visual literacy has developed into an essential skill for 21st-century college graduates. With advancements in technology and the digitizing of information, digital literacy has also grown in importance. Digital visual literacy (DVL) is the ability to critically analyze digital visual materials, create effective visual communications, and make judgments and decisions using visual representations of thoughts and ideas. These skills, which actively engage our cognitive processing of visual images, have evolved from concepts at the intersection of a range of established disciplines. This session will discuss this exciting new literacy, showcase the free materials developed under a National Science Foundation Advanced Technological Education grant, and share recent feedback from instructors who have integrated these pioneering instructional modules into their courses. The discussion will benefit faculty, staff, and administrators infusing their curriculum with fresh IT skills.

Information literacy has been a key focus for many academic library programs for over 30 years. Today, information literacy is being revisited as an institutional imperative. This Web seminar will explore the forces leading to this renewed interest as well as the basic concepts of information literacy and key elements of successful programs. It will also answer the question of whose role it is to design and deliver an information literacy program.

University of Central Florida students Jared Lang and Jessica Vargas will discuss how Net Gen students use technology inside and outside the classroom. They will focus on various social networking tools, Web 2.0 applications, and information fluency issues. Fellow student Christopher Conover will provide technical assistance as they review different Web sites to illustrate their points.

Student Life is evolving exponentially and technology is driving the demands of the next generation of students. The prudent planning, financing, and operating of the Student Life facilities of the future will require accurate data, insight, and a peek into the crystal ball. The presenters will illustrate the impact of emerging trends on student lifestyle, media consumption, entertainment, personal communications, fitness, and computing needs found in the campus facilities that support Student Life.

The rise of the millenials has spawned new conversations about engagement and learning on today's college campuses. But what do these Net Gen learners really want? From the mouth of a confessed Net junkie, learn what makes these students tick, what ticks them off, and what faculty and administrators need to know to bridge the generational divide. Using anecdotes from her own life and the lives of her peers, Carie Windham will provide an overview of Net Gen characteristics and how those characteristics translate to the classroom, including the "Ten Commandments of Net Gen Teaching and Engagement."

In response to increasing rates of media piracy, particularly among college-aged students, the content industry has tried a variety of methods to dissuade questionable file-sharing practices, including airing commercials, filing lawsuits, and urging schools to provide access to sanctioned legal services, but progress to date has been minimal. Students themselves have not been consulted about their actual attitudes and behavior in this arena, although diverse motives have been ascribed to them. To gain a richer understanding of this key demographic, 42 undergraduates from a major East Coast university were interviewed at length about their media-acquisition habits and their responses to industry antipiracy efforts. This presentation will cover the students' viewpoints on this controversial topic.

EDUCAUSE Vice President Diana Oblinger will moderate Ron Bleed's Web Seminar, "Visual Literacy in Higher Education," which is also the title of his recent ELI Explorations paper (please see the "Explore Emerging Issues" section of the ELI Community Exchange). In the paper, Bleed describes the emerging challenge of understanding and promoting visual literacy:

Today's environment is highly visual—television, Web sites, video, and images dominate our lives—and visuals created with new technologies are changing what it means to be literate. The literacy of the 21st century will increasingly rely not only on text and words but also on digital images and sounds. This paper explores the emergence of visual literacy, which will become as important as textual literacy for learning, and the need to integrate it into the curriculum at colleges and universities.

During his Web Seminar, Bleed will explore the concept of visual literacy in greater depth, highlight its emergence as a topic of importance in higher education, and discuss its implications for the future of teaching and learning.

Today's teens are taking charge of their media environment. Millions of kids already produce their own Web sites; millions more are multitasking and deciding when to pay attention to TV—and when not to. Their expectations reflect the digital surroundings in which they've grown up, and they will take those expectations with them to college.

Traditional teaching doesn't mesh well with their perspectives on the role and use of technology. This session will use the results from the industry's most detailed surveys of kids' technology to explore the implications of this disconnect, as well as the new environment for teaching and learning it represents.

Learn more about:
* How kids are taking control of the technology they use
* Teens' use of technology for schoolwork
* Kids' attitudes about learning and technology
* Media multitaskers' use of television, Internet, and radio

Findings will be drawn from Grunwald Associates' surveys of kids, parents, and media, as well educational decision makers.

For the past decade, we have talked about how information technology has changed how we work, live, and learn. At the same time, learners have changed. The learning styles, attitudes, and approaches of today's high school students differ from those of 18–22-year-old college students as well adult learners. An essential component of creating effective learning environments is understanding learners. The purpose of this presentation is to describe what we know about the next-generation learner and consider the implications for higher education.