Recalling key tenets of theoretical debates about the term, I traced a gradual expansion of the concept’s range of address from reading and writing skills via communication in various modes and media, ending up with a notion of critical digital literacy that combines reflective user skills with critical awareness of digital technologies’ wider societal, political, economic, cultural, and environmental implications. Subsequently, I critiqued current discourses and practices of technologyinclusion in schools and universities as precisely lacking such critical aspects.

…critical reflection about whether or not education is in need of improvement at all, how exactly new technologies are meant to contribute, and why the massive investments in new devices are supposed to achieve better results than alternative measures, often remains lacking. 

HOLGER PÖTZSCH
FOSS: “…solutions that are developed through collaborative practices, that are free of charge, and that serve a variety of purposes, are hardly ever mentioned in education-related public debate even though these alternatives would save strained educational budgets significant amounts of money and would enable critical reflection regarding genuine advantages but also potential pitfalls of current drives toward digitisation.”

Pötzsch, H., & Tromsø, U. (2019). Critical Digital Literacy : Technology in Education Beyond Issues of User Competence and Labour-Market Qualifications, 17(August), 221–240. https://doi.org/10.31269/triplec.v17i2.1093