Examining the possibilities for children’s digital literacy practices at home: Two theoretical perspectives

The everyday use of digital technologies influences the literacy practices of young children and their families. Literate knowledge, skills, and understandings emerge through interactions between elements of the environment, artefacts or ‘tools’ (digital and non-digital), and people. As technologies become increasingly portable, affordable and efficient there is need to examine how digital experiences contribute to emergent literacy development. I draw upon the 2020 Australian COVID-19 experience which saw children and their families using technology in unprecedented ways. Using a television advertisement that showcased children at play, and was first seen during the isolation period, I look to how various semiotics including speech, colour, movement, image and sound work together to build our understanding of the potential for children’s digital literacy. Looking at this as an instance of social semiotics, I then use Engeström s (1993) activity theory to further understand digital experiences in home contexts as I examine the relationships between issues of access, the affordances of the digital resources, potential for interaction and literacy learning opportunities. Drawing upon these two theoretical perspectives enables an agenda to be set to more fully examine implications for digital literacy practices in home contexts.