Author – Monica Leong, Digital Divide Project consultant and Embedding Digital Skills in Learning series facilitator.
Over the past year, I’ve had the privilege of working as a coach with four community organizations in Calgary as they delivered basic digital literacy programs to adults learning at the foundational level who often have little to no reliable access to the tools, hardware, software and infrastructure to engage with the digital world. This blog post highlights key messages and impactful quotes from coaching partners in an effort to share what we have learned. We invite other organizations to use our experience to build and strengthen their own digital literacy programs.
“It’s not rocket science” is meant to reassure us that something isn’t too difficult to grasp. But in this project, even figuring out what “it” was turned out to be part of the work. As you’ll see in our questions and reflections below, defining and redefining “it” – basic digital literacy programming – stretched our thinking. At times, it was a real mental workout demanding humility, curiosity, patience, laughter and bravery. We had to leave the familiar ‘teaching technology’ way of thinking behind. Throughout the process, we had to keep coming back to a core reminder: basic digital literacy programs must focus on learning, not technology. In the end, ‘it’ wasn’t impossible or beyond us—but it did launch us into unfamiliar and surprising territory.
Questions we faced
Basic digital literacy programming is complex, people-centred work. It can feel daunting to start a program. In our project year, we grappled with many questions – both about what to do and how to do it effectively. Here are some of our major questions:
- Where do we even begin?
- How do we measure progress? What does success look like?
- How basic does basic digital literacy need to be?
- How digital does basic digital literacy need to be?
- How can we deal with the barriers to technology/devices/internet that our learners face?
- What does it mean to be flexible and responsive in our programming?
Principles at the heart of this project
To wrestle with the questions we faced, we focused on learning – not technology – and consistently returned to principles of adult foundational learning such as:
- Start where the learners are at and build on what they already know and can do.
- Slow down, and make the pace and content serve the learners, not the other way around.
- Keep it relevant, hands-on, and goal oriented.
The outcomes-based measurement (OME) framework, a core part of Calgary Learns funded programming, also kept us focused on:
- Increased learner confidence
- Skills use outside class
- Steps toward personal learning goals
- Relevance of content and materials
- Creating a welcoming space where relationships matter more than content
Our core message
Given the OMEs, it was clear that the funder (Calgary Learns) had not set any technology-specific outcomes for the basic digital literacy programs we were working in. The focus was always meant to be on learning—not on technology—so we captured that important realization in a core message that guided our work throughout the year.
“The focus (of the program) isn’t on whether or not learners can do (a particular digital skill) in your class. It’s about whether or not they:
- can use their digital skills outside of class -because that’s where most of their life is-
- have the vocabulary to be able to talk about what they’re doing and ask for help when needed, in class and outside class,
- and have the confidence to try and to persevere when things go wrong.”
Tips and takeaways from our team’s experience
- Start with learners and stay learner-centred
- Start with intake interviews to ask learners what device(s) they have access to, what they want to be able to do on it, and why that matters to them.
- Assess learners’ goals, skills, and gaps. Find out what the learners have access to, what they can do, what they want, and what they need.It’s not helpful to start with a list of digital skills or tools unless it fits with the learners’ needs.
- Focus on learners’ goals, but stay flexible. Learners may start with vague or long-term goals, and these often shift as they better understand their needs..
- Break down learner goals into smaller steps and focus on building the digital knowledge and skills required for those steps.
“Focus on the big picture. What do you want the students to walk away with?”
“Start small. Don’t do everything all at once.”
- Be flexible with the content and pace of learning
- Slow downand go at the pace that is right for the learners. That likely means you can only work on a fairly limited number of digital skills, not a long checklist.
- Adjust as you go. Learners and groups can progress differently—and that’s okay. What matters is that learning supports their goals and builds confidence and skills.
- Offer repeated practice of the same skillsso learners can truly gain confidence in their new skills and a level of control of the vocabulary they need. (Remember the core message above.)
- Use an emergent curriculum model to stay flexible. Unlike fixed and tidy, pre-planned programs, this approach evolves during the course and requires rethinking how programs are designed.
“Flexibility is key.”
“Using the learners’ interests as a driver for developing curriculum (was) hard to conceptualize, until you actually put it into practice”
“Move slowly.”
“Be patient, be flexible and willing to support the needs of the learner. So …slowing down… even if you don’t get through all the content that you wanted to get through. I think it’s more about the inclusion and trust that you build with the learner.”
- Build vocabulary and confidence
- Be intentional about building vocabulary. Learners need to be able to talk about what they’re doing and to ask for help. (Remember the core message above.)
- Use ‘Think Aloud’ strategies to model how you solve problems with digital tools. This helps learners see the process and builds their vocabulary and confidence to do the same.
- Be a confidence detective. Slow down, watch, listen, and notice small steps. Celebrate, reinforce, and document evidence of learners’ efforts to try new things, engage in productive struggle, and solve problems. Ask questions like: “How did you know what to click?” or “How did you go back when you made a mistake?”
“Small steps are valuable steps.”
“I feel like the smaller moments kind of make something. They’re the most meaningful, because the little progress that they’re making is building up to them being able to go do something on their own.”
“Prioritize confidence. Take time for students to celebrate success.”
“(we noticed) increased confidence with digital skills, even if the progress was minute…the idea of, I can do this and it’s going to be okay, right? Like, even if I make a mistake, I’m not going to break anything.”
- Understand and mitigate barriers to learning
- Be thoughtful and responsive. Learners face layered barriers—like limited language, literacy, access, or vision—which may outweigh the benefits of a planned solution. One program planned to reduce winter travel barriers by going online but learners only had smartphones at home and faced vision and hearing challenges. It wasn’t working. They adapted and offered in-person classes, keeping learners engaged despite travel issues.
- Prepare for the emotional side of digital learning. Tech frustrations are common, so help learners build self-awareness and coping strategies. Slow down, take breaks, and create a welcoming space to support emotional readiness.
- Use low-tech activities to support learning. Paper-based tasks can feel more familiar, reduce eye strain, encourage movement, and create a relaxed learning space. For example, password lessons can include paper games that build skills in spotting errors or matching characters.
- Encourage collaboration among learners. When learners help each other, they build their connections, skills, and vocabulary (in any language). Our programs saw learners build their confidence and their community by translating for each other and stepping out of their comfort zone to support another person.
“For the students … doing this thing that they don’t know how to do, and it’s hard and scary… being in that space, yes, of course, emotions are going to come up.”
“using paper, as much as we did, was probably not the initial plan or the initial expectation, but …they get a sense of how things look, and then when they get to the screen, they’re familiar with some of those things, and it doesn’t feel so foreign and scary.”
Putting it all into practice
It is complex and challenging to put all these ideas into practice, but we witnessed it happening for our project partners. Together, we were intentional about starting with learners and staying learner-centred as much as possible. We explored ways to be flexible with content and pace, to focus on building vocabulary and confidence, and to understand and reduce barriers to learning. The mental shift was challenging, but we think it was worth it.
“I think there was a general idea of wanting to get that information from the beginning, get a sense of where they’re starting: What access to technology do they have? What experience with technology do they have? But I think it was very abstract… it’s not until you’re working with the students that you get to really (make that concrete).”
“…the list of skills themselves that people learn is far less important than the increased confidence they feel in being able to do that little thing and do it on their own!”
“As soon as (the instructors) realized that they had a lot of flexibility… that let them relax and just focus on the learning process. And they didn’t stress so much about (teaching a checklist of skills). It was like, maybe that thing isn’t the goal, right?”
“It’s a real mind shift!”
Of course, questions still remain.
“How do you make sure that learners can continue to apply the skills that they’ve learned outside of the program? For example, learners who don’t have devices or technology or access to technology or don’t have Wi Fi or internet at home. …How do we go about that? And I honestly still don’t have an answer for that question yet.”
Our partners, however, are committed to making basic digital literacy programming accessible for adult foundational learners and responsive to their needs. We hope this post supports your programs to do the same.
Thank you to our partners for all their courage and hard work. And thank you to Calgary Learns for supporting brave learning spaces for practitioners.
Additional resources:
Articles:
- What Makes a Digital Literacy Program Strong?
- Tips for Digital Literacy Programs
- How to help adult learners overcome learning anxiety and self-doubt
Useful websites:
- Labour Education Centre: Learner Website
- ABC Connect for Learning
- DART: A Foundational Digital Literacy ESL Curriculum
Coaching videos created for practitioners:
Calgary Learns’ Digital Divide Project:
