FLO Friday: A DIY Toolkit for Digital Literacy

*Note: This session has passed. Please view the resources and recording below.

About the Session

Join us for this exciting Facilitating Learning Online (FLO) session in partnership with Vancouver Island University.  FLO Friday logo 2023

Jessica Gemella and Anwen Burk are curriculum, teaching, and learning specialists with the Centre for Innovation in Education and Learning (CIEL) at Vancouver Island University (VIU). Responding to faculty requests on how best to use emerging technologies in their classroom, Jessica built a digital literacy toolkit. Anwen was subsequently invited to collaborate on expanding it.

The result? A toolkit designed to support higher education professionals to facilitate conversations on the ethical use of digital technologies for meaningful collaborations within digital communities. Specifically, this toolkit aims to support faculty in collaboratively creating class agreements addressing issues such as ethical digital technology use, netiquette, and digital citizenship, all in service of maintaining overall well-being.  

This toolkit helps learning communities to:  

  • Consider the ethical and legal implications of collecting and disseminating digital information  
  • Assess the risks and benefits of having an online presence 
  • Establish healthy limits with technology to maintain well-being 
  • Engage in meaningful communication and collaboration with digital communities 
  • Explore how digital tools such as artificial intelligence (AI) can extend teaching and learning opportunities  

The overarching goal is to make this digital literacy toolkit adaptable for widespread adoption. As such, it will be available to reuse and adapt.  

Join us for this free one-hour virtual FLO session! You will participate in a co-creation activity and be asked to reflect on the process and the outcomes. Participants will be invited to start thinking about how they could use the toolkit at their institutions and how it could be adapted for their use. 

Recording and Resources


About the Facilitators

Your FLO facilitators for this FLO Friday session will be Anwen Burk and Jessica Gemella.  

Anwen Burk (she/her) is a curriculum, teaching and learning specialist at VIU’s Nanaimo campus. She is particularly interested in how technology can be leveraged to make learning more flexible, accessible, and human centered. She previously worked at the University of Alberta as an instructor and as digital learning consultantand at Red Deer Polytechnic as an instructional designer. She lives on the traditional and unceded territory of the Snuneymuxw First Nation with her husband and her cat.  

Jessica Gemella (she/her) is a curriculum, teaching, and learning specialist (CTLS) at VIU, situated on the traditional lands of the Coast Salish peoples including the Snuneymuxw, Snaw-Naw-As, Quw’utsun, and Tla’amin. Jessica has a background in teaching horticulture and has also served as VIU’s trades and applied technology CTLS. With a commitment to enhancing the quality of digital education, Jessica is pursuing a Master of Arts in Learning and Technology at Royal Roads University. Her research interests centre on building resilience in higher education, faculty development, and digital literacy. 

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