
As you prepare for the inter-semester break and step back from your studies, now is the perfect moment to reflect on your experiences from Semester 1. Were you able to maintain your well-being while juggling deadlines? How did you find managing communications and collaborative work? Did your presentations and posters communicate your message effectively?
The upcoming semester brings fresh opportunities to apply the learnings from your reflections. Group projects, assessed coursework, and academic communication are likely to remain central to your university life. By honing your skills now, you can work more efficiently, giving yourself more time to enjoy life beyond your studies.
Our Digital Skills Survey showed that many students are eager to improve their digital capabilities but are unsure of where to start. The good news? Building these skills doesn’t have to be daunting. Often, it’s about taking small, intentional steps to refine how you work.
What Are Digital Capabilities and Why Do They Matter?
According to JISC, digital capabilities are defined as "the skills and attitudes that individuals and organisations need to thrive in a digital environment.” Your digital literacy skills are an essential component of your digital capabilities and involve being able to use digital tools confidently and critically to live, learn, and work effectively. In essence, these are the skills that will help you excel both academically and professionally, enabling you to communicate effectively, create engaging content, and collaborate seamlessly.
Developing your digital capabilities offers significant benefits. It helps you:
- Improve your academic performance by simplifying the way you study and get things done.
- Communicate your ideas more effectively through impactful presentations and well-designed documents.
- Collaborate more productively in group settings, whether in person or online.
- Manage your well-being by using technology to organise and balance your workload.
Introducing Our New Digital Skills Resources
To help you reflect on your current skills and identify areas for growth, we created four new short resources in MySkills that focus on foundational digital capabilities. These resources are designed to help you take the first steps on your journey to building confidence and competence in your digital skills. They represent a starting point, offering simple and practical guidance to set you on the right path.
- Tips For Designing and Formatting Your Work Better. This short resource provides a few practical tips on how to enhance presentations, posters, infographics and other academic work by following graphic design and accessibility principles.
- Email Essentials: The Student's Guide to Digital Etiquette. This short guide provides practical foundational guidance to help you craft emails in academic and professional settings.
- Explore How Microsoft Teams Can Support You With Group Work. This short guide explains how certain features in Teams can facilitate collaboration when working in groups.
- Five Simple Steps to Avoid Tech Overload. This short resource provides five practical tips that could help you to create and maintain a positive and healthy relation with technology.
A Lifelong Skill Set
These resources are designed to support the start of your digital journey, which extends well beyond graduation. Building digital literacy is a lifelong process that grows alongside advancements in technology and changes in your personal and professional needs. By dedicating time now to strengthen your digital skills, you’re not only preparing for success during your university studies but also gaining essential tools for thriving in the future workplace.
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