As many of you may know, I have returned to school to get a Masters in Library Studies. This blog post, and several more to come, will be part of a class assignment. I have been wanting to do some library/reading related posts anyway, so this will be a good place to start.
Today I want to talk about IT proficiency/fluency, in particular, my own IT proficiency/fluency.
I am at the very tail end of the baby boomers, and I was not born into technology like younger generations. I was briefly introduced to computers in high school, where some of my friends were in a computer class. Several of them have gone on to careers in computer fields. In college I was required to take an Intro to Computers class, and I have played with computers ever since; always looking for reasons to have a computer or spend time on one, but never really diving into that world. I am proficient, I can figure out how to do things or find things (I've always been good at finding information, in any context), but I would not consider myself to be IT fluent. The difference between fluency and proficiency really makes sense if you think of it in a language context. I can get by in the computer world, but I often have to stop to figure something out, just as a non native English speaker might be able to function well in an English speaking country, but sometimes has to stop to think about how to say something. As an example, I have had this blog for a very long time (and yes, it is way past time to update all of it). These past few years I have noticed that I like the "feel" of Wordpress blogs, so I got on their website this morning with the idea of maybe switching over. But ugh. The learning curve is more than I can manage at the moment. I am sure that I can figure it out, and I intend to do so eventually, but it is going to take some time. I have also been reading a book on productivity, Do More Better by Tim Challies (great book, I will review it soon). He advocates using Google Calendar, Todoist, and Evernote. I have been using Google calendar for a couple of years, but Todoist and Evernote are brand new to me. Todoist was easy to figure out and is rapidly becoming part of my daily life. But Evernote... again, I can figure it out, but it is taking time. I have to look up instructions, but there is no obvious instant way to do that and it is a struggle for me.
I am not IT fluent, but would like to become so. Obviously the only way to increase proficiency and fluency is to keep learning and keep practicing... I am sure this Information Technology class will provide a lot of both of those.
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