Kimberly Olson balances digital tools with the messy, hands-on experiences young learners need.

Kimberly Olson

When it comes to digital literacy, my students sometimes turn the tables, outweighing me in expertise. It is truly an unfair advantage when they are schooling me in whatever my analog brain canʼt comprehend! Much of my job involves navigating the discrepancy between myself and my students when it comes to all things digital.

It is challenging to develop a balance that counters the digital-native reality that can impede intrinsic motivation, curiosity, and individuality. Insisting on plenty of foundational, non-tech experiences in my classroom cultivates creativity and innovation through hands-on, screen-off, tactile, often messy activities that develop fine motor skills and familiarity with materials.

While I acknowledge the value and magic of technology, I carefully select from the digital menu: programs, apps, and devices that promote creative engagement. I integrate technology as a natural next step in foundational lessons. I am reassured that my observations of studentsʼ tech trance are being recognized as my district develops policies limiting studentsʼ access to and reliance on technology during the school day.

Originally, I viewed technology like crafts: Students don’t need me to teach it. They arrive with access and ability. They are digitally literate from day one. The language of technology, and technology itself, speaks to them, literally, with the onslaught of AI-generated apps and programs that can encourage an unhealthy reliance on immediate positive responses.

Children spend supervised time at our 1:1 device schools accessing fantastic programs that adapt to student progress, resulting in valuable data used for interventions and state reporting. But children are more than screen-trance data points.

I choose to build studentsʼ digital literacy by supporting their interests and understanding based on our relationships and bolstering it in tangible ways. Creative thinking need not be tech-generated; it needs to come from children’s own brains so we can continue the tradition of great thoughts, original thoughts—thoughts that can be developed by an individual through time, perseverance, and grit.

Sharing these authentic and meaningful seeds inspires intelligence, problem-solving, collaboration, communication, and critical thinking. Through our contributions to a child’s education over minutes, days, or years, we can contribute significantly to their reliance on creative and innovative thinking and doing.

While I am not slighting the fabulous opportunities, supports, and differentiated instruction these amazing tools offer—especially to those of us who didnʼt grow up with them—when you have a three-year-old in front of you, you want them to get messy. You want them to explore, put their natural energy into their work, and experience the kinetic aspects missing from sitting-still technology.

Children are naturally wiggly and imaginative. They need to get messy, hold tools in their hands, exercise all their fingers, strengthen their core, look friends in the eye, and create what is inside their unique minds.

Outside my art room, I know that students encounter and access many varieties of technology. I am not so naive to discount appropriate uses in moderation.

Digital applications I use that have been worthwhile in supporting the next steps of an early learner lesson include Tinkercad, Do Ink, Stop Motion Studio, QRCode Monkey, museum and artist websites, and image repositories.

In many K–2 lessons, technology supports student learning through image preparation, interactive slideshows, lesson books, thinking pages, Smartboard access, and fonts used to teach graphic design. Students also use QR codes to access assessment surveys, research topics, and resources that apply to tangible ideas they can pursue. They record artist statements or knowledge reviews to accompany original visual works using iPads.

Specific technology components appear across grade-levels units. In a second-grade self-portrait chair lesson, for example, children sketch their designs on paper, create a 3D cardboard model, and then collaborate with our technology teacher to translate their idea into Tinkercad, producing miniature 3D-printed versions. Other tech collaborations include stop-motion videos of drawn characters come to life, green-screen productions, and animated art shows.

My classroom Instagram provides digital home connections for parents, offering glimpses into children’s experiences, processes, and individual work. Beyond introducing artists through picture books, I have embraced the value of digital tools for gaining and sustaining students’ attention, including viewing artist interviews on my Smartboard.

Offering children an opportunity to learn that truly reflects who they are requires technology. Choosing appropriate and well-timed opportunities adds to their sense of belonging in the classroom, but we still get messy!

Kimberly Olson has spent twenty-three years getting messy with preschoolers through second graders in the art room. She balances hands-on materials with appropriate digital media and uses technology to connect with families and share students' experiences. She looks forward to navigating new legislation in her state that may encourage less screen time and more opportunities for getting messy, creating, and spending time outside. kolson@sau90.org.

The Digitally Literate Early Learner & Me