 All right, well, hello everyone, and welcome to today's Moodle Academy webinar. My name is Richard LaFroy. I am the learning and media technologist with Moodle Academy, and I'll be introducing and hosting this session, Environmental Awareness as a Core Digital Competence. The development of digital literacy and digital competencies are widely recognised as essential in our increasingly digitised world. However, as we begin to come to terms with the extent of the climate crisis facing the world, this webinar asks the question, is it time for digital literacy to focus its attention on the impact our digital activity has on the environment? Joining us to present today's webinar, we have Dr. Peter Tianan and Dr. Benjamin Mallon from Dublin City University. Peter is an assistant professor, research convener and host of Let's Talk Education Research, a monthly research podcast from the School of STEM Education, Innovation and Global Studies at the DCU Institute of Education. And Ben is assistant professor in geography education in the Institute of Education at DCU. He has expertise in geography, global citizenship and sustainability education and coordinates and teaches undergrad and postgrad modules across the Institute of Education. He is co-director of the DCU Centre for Human Rights and Citizenship Education. So thank you so much to Peter and Ben for being with us today. And I will hand over to them now. OK, I have a thanks, Richard, and thanks for that lovely introduction. It also reminds me that I must update my staff profile. I think it takes about 12 years off my age. I think at this stage it's quite old, but look, we can get away with looking a bit younger for a bit longer. So thanks very much for that lovely introduction myself. And Ben are delighted to be here. And thanks to yourself and Mary for our intro at the start and helping us get settled and all of that. And so are my sharing the right one there? Is that can you see that? Looks good to me. Yeah. OK, so welcome, everybody. And as Richard said, we're going to be talking today really about exploring environmental awareness as a core digital competence. Richard talked at the start about using the chat box and the mic. There may be opportunities or times throughout this presentation where you feel you want to make a comment or ask us a question. We'd like to keep this as free flowing as possible. Absolutely happy to take questions, comments at any point during during the presentation. So, you know, if something occurs to you, pop it in the chat box. We're fortunate enough to be a duo, a partnership today of myself and Ben. So one of us can keep an eye on the chat box and why the other one is. It is talking. So we have that kind of leeway in terms of keeping an eye on what questions are coming through. So thanks for the introduction, Richard. My area really is predominantly digital literacy and digital learning. And I've been in the Institute of Education for coming on 15 years now. And most of that time has been looking at the areas of digital competence, particularly around the ability to create using digital media, create express creativity using digital media and increasingly over the last five or six years looking at information, literacy, focusing on misinformation, disinformation. So how do we how do we know that we can trust information that we find online? How do we know if it's accurate? How do we evaluate it for bias, et cetera? And that's like my background really is in that space. However, over the years, I think as everybody has started started to realize the the impact that all of the activities we do in life. So whether that's driving our cars, the food we eat, the energy we consume more and more, I've started to think about the impact our activities generally have on the environment and the climate. And that has begun to spill over into my thinking around digital literacy and digital competency. And I've been doing a lot of work in the university about compiling frameworks and looking at these frameworks that have been created for evaluating and moving forward digital competence. And it's it's become an area that I think needs some attention. I think we do need to, as the title suggests, explore digital literacy through this lens of environmental awareness and environmental environmental impacts. Ben, I don't know if you want to talk a little bit about your background here before we. Yes, so I mean, I suppose this the presentation today is sort of part of an ongoing discussion that Peter and I have been having for a while now. So my work is within geography education, primarily, to the most part, working with private and student teachers who are trained to be primary school teachers. And I would do a lot of work around climate change education and a lot of work around education for sustainability, where I'd be working with students to explore and how digital technology can help us understand issues related to sustainability, climate change, biodiversity loss, but also can be something that can support action in relation to these issues. And at the same time, very similar to what Peter had mentioned there, personally understanding the some of the environmental costs of the technologies that we're using. So the need to find some some balance. So that's something that I've been sort of grappling with really for the past couple of years. And then this discussion with Peter and is part of that. Right, thanks, Ben. I think one of the things that I hope has come through early in the company in myself and Ben's introduction is that we do see this as an emerging area and an area for conversation and development. And we need to get a coffee just before we start. And we're just talking about how, you know, we see this area as an awareness raising exercise that hopefully will spill over into other areas of individuals' lives. So we're going to talk about this in terms of looking at our students' digital competence, but hopefully that that if we begin to develop an awareness of environmental impact through digital literacy, it may spill over into other aspects of the lives. Anyway, drifting into a monologue there rather than a brief intro. Apologies. So as Richard alluded to, I think based on the blurb that I sent him. So we know some things about digital technology. So we know that it is pervasive. We know that the use of technology and digital tools is ubiquitous. And it has transformed the way we carry out many activities in our day to day lives. So the way we collaborate, we're all from all corners of the earth here at different times, communicating and engaging via this webinar. And that happens in a myriad of ways throughout our lives, through social media platforms, through educational tools such as Loup and Zoom and Google Meet and all of the Microsoft teams and all of these other platforms that help us to collaborate and engage, which is positive. It also changed the way we worked, the tools that we use to work, the way we share files, the way we interact, the way we develop products. We were joking before we started about the Moodle Mogue. And I asked Richard, will you send me through the blueprints for that? And I'll 3D print it. But, you know, there's truth in some of the technological advancements in how very timely sip of your mug there, Richard. There's truth in the impact of technology on the way that businesses operate, social enterprises operate and the way we go about our business. We know that it's changed the way people learn. I mean, pre-COVID, it had changed the way people learn in that there was options to learn online, there was options to learn from institutions from across the world rather than being reliant on the school or university that was within a bus or walking distance of where you live. And since COVID, we know that students' expectations of what university is has started to shift and they do want more flexible resources. They want more opportunities to engage in synchronous and asynchronous ways with their content. And the YouTube symbol there just indicates it's also changed the way we entertain ourselves and consume media. So, you know, especially students of a certain age range will consume a lot of their content online, whether that be short TikTok videos, YouTube, Netflix, a range of different platforms where they consume their entertainment. So the coinciding with that digital literacy is recognized as this essential skill for 24th century living and for lifelong learning. So we know that if we're engaging increasingly in a digital world for a variety of reasons our competence in consuming content, so being critical consumers of content, being able to create content using digital tools, being able to collaborate online, being able to operate online in a safe and respectful manner. So looking after our wellbeing, looking after the wellbeing of others, all of that stuff is really, really important. So, you know, just to say at the outset if digital literacy is one of my key areas and I'm not saying throughout this talk that any of the things where we espouse around digital literacy should be taken away, it's just shifting some of the focus or adding a focus to digital literacy. And, you know, I'm sure some of you on the Zoom are aware of the amount of research that has been conducted on digital literacy and the policy documents from an EU national and global level on the importance of digital literacy and the development of these digital competencies across society. I mean, I'll touch on some of these in a moment, but there's so many frameworks from DigiComp to JISC to the Open University framework, some of them looking at slightly different cohorts. So you've got the DigiComp which is a very societal wide framework, a JISC which seems to look more at higher ed and adults. And then there's a very popular one from British Columbia which focuses on post-primary. Anyway, so a lot of work has been done in this area and it's very recognized as an essential competence or a set of competencies for survival in the 21st century. But what we really want to move the needle or move the conversation forward slightly is as we all know, we're on this precipice of climate disaster. So is it time for digital literacy to begin to focus its impact on the focus, its attention on the impact of our digital lives on the environment. So, we... Go ahead, Ben. Oh, sorry, Peter. I mean, maybe just to sort of give some context around the situation in relation to climate change at the moment. So the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change in its most recent report has highlighted increasing global emissions and increased global warming. And then it has made connections to how we use our land, the amount of energy we use and then other connections to lifestyles and patterns of consumption and production. So that's sort of just this wider context that all this is happening in. Thanks, Peter. Thank you, Ben. So what we wanted to do really to start off or to provide a bit of background and context and maybe to prompt some questions or to give you some hints or suggestions around the direction that we're taking this conversation. So we know that there's authors who are much more eminent scholars than me that have begun discussions around EdTech and like, do we need all of the technology in the classroom all the time? You know, authors like Fraser and Sel and who are very prolific writers in this area and ask some very important questions about educational technology and its place in education. Do we need to upgrade everything all the time? Should we unplug from certain scenarios is technology required in all of these instances? I suppose what we're arguing is more on a broader scale. So do we need to, as part of digital literacy, begin to help our students to see their day-to-day use of technology and the impact that has on society and on the climate? So taking it out of the classroom, so to speak, and out into their everyday lives. So I just wanted to acknowledge that these conversations are happening around EdTech. This is a slightly different slant on that and looking at the impact of users' digital lives. So the next couple of slides are just highlighting some of those areas that we may not be aware have such an impact on the climate and on the environment. So we know that platforms such as Netflix Prime and there's others, the usage of video streaming services has soared. So Netflix has 67 million subscribers. Amazon Prime has 2.2 million, although I think that has gone up since I created that slide. I think a lot of people subscribed for the Lord of the Rings and then canceled fairly quickly afterwards when I didn't live up to expectations but users watch streaming services for an average of nine hours per week. And obviously this amount of activity has a significant carbon footprint. All of these services, you know, you're streaming and it doesn't appear on your screen from nowhere. So that content needs to be housed somewhere. The servers and the computing power that's needed to make sure that your Netflix and your Amazon Prime isn't buffering every 10 seconds and the quality isn't pixelated. That all has a cost in terms of energy. And there was research conducted on the emissions that were created by watching Netflix and streaming services. And actually a lot of the emissions come from the device the device on which this content is viewed on. So if I'm sitting on the couch and I watch Netflix on my phone, it costs a certain amount of energy. If I decide to watch that on a 40-inch HDTV it consumes 80% more energy. So it's just an example of some of these kinks in our consumption that could be changed very easily. And our users are aware of the changes and aware of the differences in how we consume this content. So what we're trying to do here and we'll move on to another one is just highlight some examples of the day-to-day consumption of media and digital tools and digital technologies. And we're highlighting some of the facts and what we'll get to later is wondering or considering do our students that do, does society consider these questions at all? And if not, should they start to consider these questions? That makes sense. Another example is the shift to platforms such as Spotify and Apple Music. So we know that the shift away from the vinyl and CD, notwithstanding the relatively recent resurgence of vinyl as a collector's item, which has its place, but the move away from vinyl and CD obviously has reduced the amount of plastic. But an analysis of the, again, the amount of emissions from platforms such as Spotify, Storing and distributing that music online has doubled since 2000. So there is this interplay between moving, assuming that one form of technology will solve a problem, but actually it's creating another problem. And I wonder, do Spotify users have any awareness or understanding that what they're doing has an impact on the environment? We know that social media use increases. It changes by generation. I made a student tell me the other day that they have a Facebook account so that they can tell what their mom is up to, which made me feel incredibly old. I tell them that I share things on Twitter and they tell me they won't see me there. They're using things like Be Real and TikTok and they're still kind of on YouTube. So the platforms change, but overall the usage of social media platforms is increasing and obviously that has demands on data centers and decisions around what we do with our day-to-day lives. So I made a fatal error the other day. I went to Nando's with my wife and I didn't take a picture of my chicken burger and share it on Instagram. So people have started of a certain generation document every single moment of their lives and it's become a cultural phenomenon. Why has it become a cultural phenomenon? And do they consider the impact of storing, 600 photos a day on their Google Drive or on their Apple Cloud, but iCloud storage or whatever it is, their Microsoft version OneDrive that they're storing their information. Is there an awareness that this cultural shift of documenting every single moment of our lives online has an impact on the environment? For ourselves, we know that online lectures and meetings can drastically reduce carbon emissions and energy consumption. I mean, if we had decided to make a wonderful trip to visit Richard in Perth and all of you joined us for this session, which I'm sure would have been worth the trip, obviously the carbon footprint would have been astronomical and this is a much more efficient way of doing that. And the same with universities a lot, especially at postgraduate level are starting to offer more of a blended approach. So you've in Ireland, for example, I know universities who've got a footprint across a student footprint across the country will now be offering much more blended approach so students aren't coming to the university, let's say for lectures as often as they were, especially at postgraduate level. There are a lot of simple things in this space too. So I remember during COVID, there was a policy of please have your camera on so that we could look at your wonderful face while we were delivering lectures. There is questions around who was that for. Was that for the students or was that for us? We didn't want to look into a stare into a black hole. Did they really get anything more from the lectures by having their camera on? There's research on both sides of that argument. Are we aware that turning your camera off on Zoom actually reduces the energy consumption by 96%? Should we be aware? Should we be asking people to have cameras on or off? I'm not arguing either side of this and a lot of these are just points to help move the conversation forward and it's about individuals becoming aware that there is choices and being aware that each of those choices have an impact. So they're making more informed decisions about their use of technology rather than just saying all of this is bad. So I hope it's not coming across that way. We're not saying that all of those decisions are wrong. We're just saying that they are decisions that have an impact. And just kind of an anecdotal one. Reducing unnecessary thank you emails could save the equivalent of 3,000 diesel cars per annum. So again, at Google, they've changed their slogan but I think it was about 10 years ago. They had the slogan when Gmail became really popular. I could be off of my timeline a little bit. It was search, don't delete. Or something like that. So Gmail was popular because you've got this huge amount of storage and their slogan was Gmail. Can't remember exactly the phrase. It was something like search, don't delete. So they're actually actively encouraging you to store emails. Now they've changed since, but I think it shows the lack of awareness around all of that storage costs something and all of those emails. So Mary, all of those thank you emails have some costs. So that's just a snapshot to raise some questions around everyday use of technologies. And if we look at our current definitions of... Actually, Ben, did you want to come in there at one point? No, no, that's all good Peter. Okay. So we look at our definitions and frameworks around digital literacy. So looking at some definitions of digital literacy, there's lots. So this is just, again, a snapshot. I tried to do a mini timeline, took one that's from a very seminal piece of work from Martin in 2005. And I'm not sure how to pronounce N-N-G. I don't know how to pronounce their surname from 2012. They've a very prominent digital literacy framework. So I'll just capture a few. So we look at some of the definitions of digital literacy. We talk about using digital tools to identify, evaluate, analyze and synthesize digital resources. The ability to search for, evaluate, understand and integrate information found online. The ability to use technologies to collect, analyze and evaluate information, as well as construct new information and communicate with others. And the ability to search for and evaluate information. So common theme, very important skills, absolutely critical in a digital world to be able to do it. However, there's little evidence in the literature of environmental impact as even coming into the conversation from academics, I must note, coming in from academics who are interested in the digital literacy space. So of course there's academics and Ben is one who's here who is interested in environmental impact, but it seems to be separate to when we talk about competence in a digital world, it doesn't seem to be part of the conversation yet. And as part of, there's a paper I have on this topic called Gently Down the Streaming, which is available open access. So as part of that I conducted, I would call it like a system of ties review. So on a number of academic databases. So academic search complete access science, applied social sciences index and abstracts and the British education index. And I did a search for digital literacy and climate in the abstract or title, digital literacy and carbon footprint in the abstract or title, digital literacy and global warming in the title or abstract, digital literacy and environmental impact in the title or abstract. And there was zero results. So again, I'm not suggesting that nobody's talking about this, but it certainly doesn't come through very strongly in the academic literature. And I suppose not to hammer home the point too strongly, but the same can be said for the academic literature and can be said for some of the competencies. So we talk about ICT literacy, media literacy, new literacy, critical literacy, information collection, evaluation, management and just picking out some of these technical dimensions, a cognitive dimension. But again, in those core competencies, very little evidence of environmental impact coming through. So then I've mentioned some of these at the top. And so across all of the digital literacy framework, so I've done some work on evaluating these frameworks and I would consult these on a daily or weekly basis around the work that I do with students on increasing their digital competencies. For the purposes of this talk, just looking at DigiComp, the UNESCO framework which is built upon the DigiComp framework, the JISC framework, Open University and British Columbia's digital literacy. Framework and the only real mention of in the environmental impact is nestled under digital safety in the UNESCO and DigiComp frameworks. Now I do know that updates to these frameworks are happening, but I think given the urgency at which or the urgency of the current situation in terms of our global climate and climate change and the impact of all of our actions on the environment, what we're saying is that rather than being nestled somewhere where somebody needs to go look for it and is it digital safety? Digital safety is one thing, but I think we need to move the conversation away from the environmental impact of our digital lives being nestled somewhere to being more prominent and more front and center and begin to help individuals understand what that looks like. So for the remainder of this talk, now we're gonna talk about how we might take some steps in the right direction. So like the first half was really about setting the scene and the second half now is going to be about how we start to take some steps in the right direction. And I mean, I think to sort of add to what Peter is saying there, this is discussion which is happening within broader education. So questions around to what extent is education for sustainability embedded in other approaches? Is it seen as a bolt on? Is it something separate? So it's a question for educating more broadly and for different fields within education. And I suppose one of the things that I'd be particularly interested in is in focusing on digital technology and digital literacy, what might that have to offer for the broader education discussions around these things? Thanks Ben. So as I said, we're really thinking about taking some steps in the right direction now. So for those of us involved in digital literacy education, I think as Ben has alluded to there, I think more broadly, so not those of us just involved in digital literacy education. Obviously that's my area and I'm very comfortable in that space and I'm comfortable talking to other academics in that space and we argue over the minutiae of frameworks, et cetera. So that would be my initial driver was that but I think Ben makes a very valid point and that really it's about education more broadly and society more broadly seeing the connected nature of everything and it's not about siloed understanding of these things. It's about broadening out the discussion so that there's an element. We can understand how environment, how everything we do impacts on the environment. So one of the things that we have put together and it's actually part of another project called Navigate Digital. So we've been working with post primary and further education, which is our adult kind of education space in Ireland around digital competencies. And what we have found is that that there's nearly too much out there for teachers to have time to look at. So they go looking to see what digital competence is about and they find the DigiCom framework which is 67 pages long and do they have the time to digest that? Do they have the time to think about how to integrate that into their class? So even if they read up on what information literacy is, do they have time to think about integrating some of that into their lessons? So DigiCom is a wonderful framework and it has levels for evaluating your stages across different competencies, but teachers often feel that they lack this very pragmatic, okay, so I'm a science teacher. How do I build information into my lessons? So that's a slight tangent, but as part of that project, we've put together this, we're looking to call it another framework. We've tried to summarize the key aspects of other digital literacy frameworks in an understandable and digestible form. So we talk about critical engagement with online content, content production, participation and collaboration, safety, security and wellbeing, and we have added in this environmental awareness element here. Now myself and Ben were talking the other day just putting together the notes for today's presentation and on reflection, I actually think our argument is that number five environmental awareness should really be at the center of this wheel rather than a separate element. During our design of this kind of summary of the important elements of digital competencies and digital literacy, our motivation really was to put it front and center. So to not have it nestled somewhere, to have it somewhere that was visible. So then, you know, we have a website associated with this project and this is the first thing people see. There's five areas you should be aware of when you're considering digital competence and digital literacy. As I say, I think on reflection, maybe it's either in the center or it goes around the outside of this wheel. So it's something that we were talking about the other day and we're considering making some changes to this, but the motivation must have put this front and center. So again, back to this kind of taking steps in the right direction. So a lot of us are comfortable with the language of digital competence. So just giving back, looking at some of the original definitions of digital literacy, so I went too far. Like a lot of people are involved in digital learning and digital literacy education will be very comfortable with these definitions and thinking about asking their students to do things around this or developing these skills in students. So they'll be very comfortable developing learning interventions that support students to ability to search for, evaluate, understand and integrate information online. So things like creating a catalog of videos and asking the students to find accurate information in those videos, justify their selection. So was there bias in that video? Who created the video? What's the motivations behind that? So a lot of work has been done in this area. So what we're suggesting is not a complete reinvention of the wheel and no pun intended based on our graphic, not a complete reinvention of that, but to think about these things as a development of the skills that we're already talking about. So looking at Gilster's original definition in 97, we might say it's the ability to locate and understand information regarding the impact of our digital lives and then use this information to make decisions which take account of the natural environment. So we would already ask students to go and look for information regarding their topic and make decisions about why they've decided to use that information. So as I say, rather than a reinvention of that, just a shift in our perspective and say, well, we're already asking students to be critical consumers of content. Now let's develop that skills so that they can focus on the impact of their digital lives on our environment. We might talk about Martin's definition, encouraging students to identify their current digital activities and analyze. So again, picking out those action words that we would be very familiar with, analyze their environmental impact before evaluating areas where they could make improvements. So what is the impact of their cloud storage, their online music streaming service, their use of YouTube, TikTok, Netflix, Amazon Prime? What's the impact? What are the changes that they could make to improve that impact? And what we're trying to do is look at what's working in areas that Ben is very, very familiar with and learn it in around climate awareness and climate change education and education for sustainability. How can those questions, conversations help us to build on this kind of core environmental awareness competence? So how can what's already happening in sustainability education help us to define the kind of sub points under this? So what does environmental awareness look like? What questions do students need to ask? So we're using this, what is the title of this again, Ben? Yes, so I can go through it. So I mean, in our discussions over the past couple of months, a lot of it came back to the types of questions that we might want students to ask about their use of digital technology and the impact of digital technology on their environment. And this framework is called the Development Compass Rose. And it's been sort of around for a while since 1995 developed by the Development Education Centre in Birmingham. And it's set up as a Compass Rose. So it basically shows a prompt for questions around the connection between development issues and environmental issues. And it really sort of spring to mind from my discussions with Peter when we think about the use of digital technologies embedded in people's lives, both in Ireland, across Europe and across the world, and is a big part of our response to many of the big development challenges we're faced with. So it's split into the sort of four areas north, south, east and west. And in relation to sort of some of those questions that Peter was developing, if we look at the north part of the Compass Rose, the framework encourages learners to think about questions related to the natural environment or the natural aspects of the world around us. So questions about energy, air, water, soil, living things and their relationship to each other. And also it sort of encourages questions around the built environment, which is important in terms of some of the issues connected to digital technology. So what you've seen a couple of examples that Peter was given earlier, the questions might be around sort of energy consumption connected to digital technology. But it also, and even in the discussions with Peter, the prompt there around to consider water is important if we consider the use of water within data sensors, for example, and the challenges we're faced and will increasingly be faced with in terms of access to water. What the Compass does also is consider these environmental issues sort of not in isolation. So if we look at the southern end of the Compass Rose, there are questions about the social aspects of environmental issues. So people, their relationship to each other, traditions and cultures. And already earlier in the presentation, Peter had alluded to the embedding of digital technology within cultures, thinking about how we use technology, how it's, yeah, deeply connected to everyday practices that we or our students or the children in their classes will be involved in. So the idea is that the Compass Rose can sort of prompt the questions around both a natural and social aspects of these environmental issues. One of the other things that we sort of discussed with the processes by which digital technology is made from raw materials, transportation, the people and the jobs and the economies tied to those processes are used to technologies and whether things are designed in a way that's intended to extend their life cycle. And then the questions about what happens when those technologies are broken or obsolete, where do they go next? And what are the environmental impacts of those decisions? And how are they connected to the lives of people in terms of jobs, livelihoods, et cetera? Yeah, I think that there was some research carried out in the EU 2019, I think was the last start. I was frantically trying to find the paper there while Ben was talking just around mobile phones. And there is a slow move towards consumers becoming aware that renewing your phone as often as the phone companies would like you to renew it is probably not a good thing for the environment, but we still have this average of 18 months, two years of people upgrading their phones. And I think a lot of what the Compass helps us to do is categorize some of the questions that we should ask. So what is the impact of that on the natural environment? So where does the materials come for that phone? Where do they come from? What is the impact of the natural environment of all of the transportation costs that come with that? And the disposal of your phone, where does it go? What's the impact of that? So I think if we're going back to this idea of environmental awareness, what we're suggesting, I think, and this is again, it's a conversation for myself and Ben too, we're on a journey towards this additional element to a framework rather than as we joked yesterday during our final run through, rather than an empirically tested version of this. Yes, so that might be one of the questions that we nestle under the environmental awareness. So what are the impacts on the natural environment? What are the impacts on energy? What are the impacts on air, water, soil? What are the impacts on the built environment around you? If another data center needs to be built because everybody is storing their photographs from their lunch in Nando's, what's that replacing? Is that replacing somewhere that really we should be rewilding? What is the relationship between rewilding and technology? Like where do those relationships happen? What are the consequences of those? And I think the social part as well. Ben, I don't know if you are you going to talk about the impact of decision-making? I'll hand back over to you. Yeah, I mean, do you want to skip it on to... Yeah, sorry. Yeah, I mean, there was the point you had then around sort of drawing inspiration from Kim, which and thinking about where they go from their investigations and then the types of decisions that people can make and thinking about sort of trends over time and the fact that, I mean, what we're sort of really aware of is how quickly digital technology changes. I mean, over the last couple of months or within the context that me and Peter are working in, you know, the role of artificial intelligence has suddenly like come to the fore. There are questions around the environmental impact of that as well. And also an understanding that AI can have a role in addressing some of these issues. And if you flip through to the final slide, Peter, I mean, that really there was, if we look at the East and the West on that campus, I mean, they allude to maybe some of the things that are often a bit more difficult to talk about within this space. So the economic questions around sort of trade and ownership and been connected to sort of ideas around consumption and production that Peter had talked about, but at the West of the campus rose, that there's the focus on sort of who decides and power and decision making. So how do we make decisions who gets to eventually decide when we make decisions who benefits who loses and what's the cost of decisions that we make? And really importantly, in terms of issues like climate change by diversity loss, we understand that future generations will be impacted to a much greater degree. So there are questions around sort of what this means for future generations as well. Do you want to add anything there, Peter? I think, especially around the who decides. So for those of you who are here who are familiar with digital literacy, media literacy is often in that space. So understanding the motivations behind the messages, who is funding a message? Who's the audience? Who's represented? Why are they represented? Why are they not represented? So who's being spoken to and the people that aren't the target of the message? Why aren't they the target? So I think some of that also feeds into this. So who's the technology being pushed at? Who's the consumers of the technology and who suffers the consequences of all that consumption of the technology? So again, I think a lot of these competencies and scales around the digital literacy side, it's more of a refocus back to our, I think opening slide or maybe slide number three about it's not about it's about refocusing our attention rather than a complete rewriting of our attention. So a lot of these things, a lot of these skills and competencies are being taught and being developed just not focused on this area. One of them that stuck me driving home a couple of weeks ago, I heard TikTok being advertised on the radio. I was wondering why are TikTok, why are the radio, why are another media platform advertising on the radio that wants us to get home from this thing to the radio open TikTok, which itself is funded by advertising. There's this kind of cycle of media consumption. It just made me think about the drivers behind that that there is this push to have us looking at screens the whole time from one side, from the people who own these platforms. On the other side, we've got very real cautions about overuse of screen time and what that does to our creativity and engagement with other people. So a lot of those questions can be addressed by the who decides. So I mean addressed or a lot of those questions can be asked at least by who decides what's the motivating factors and what's their motivations behind it. So to finish, I think that brings us roughly to time. Does it, Richard? Roughly to time. So I think what we're advocating for is that there's an increased focus in digital literacy and digital competencies on the environmental impact of our day-to-day use of digital technologies. And I think a little bit broader than that, understanding the increased cost of technology from multiple perspectives and promoting a digital, promoting a more critical use of the tools and services that we use in our day-to-day lives. And our hope is that if that were to be achieved, then that would spill over into other aspects of our lives. So if you imagine you become more critical of your use of technology, your mobile phone, how often you renew that, might that help you to question how often you turn on the heat at home? Where does that heat come from? What's the energy consumption of that? Or might it impact your decisions to buy clothes because you understand that things have costs in production? So if I understand that fast technology is a bad thing, does it spill over into fast fashion? So that is our hope. Still look, as you can, as I'm sure you can tell, we, you know, some of this is musings and underdevelopment. We hope that you got something from that and that it was interesting for you and we'd be delighted. And we tried to say this at the start. We'd be delighted to collaborate with people on this interested in future research around this, but also delighted to take any questions or comments on what we've talked to have for the last 40 minutes or so. Beautiful. Thank you. Thank you so much, Peter. Yeah, look, if anyone does have any questions, please feel free to drop them in the chat or jump on the mic. Just a thought that I was having sort of going back a little way in terms of our own, you know, our own use of all these digital technologies and this solution called the cloud, which is, you know, essentially it's marketed as just this thing up in the ether, which just exists. But, you know, as we know, it's not just this thing up there. It's actually these huge data centers that have these massive footprints and massive energy consumption. And it's, yeah, it's just interesting. It's almost like an out of sight, out of mind thing, especially when it comes to storing your Nando's photos from lunch, all 6,000 of them. And like you say, you know, having this awareness that it's not just this thing that doesn't really exist up in the cloud. There's actually physical space being taken up. There's energy that's being used for all of your digital actions. That was just a very good question. I wonder if we framed it as instead of storing in the cloud, if we said store it in the earth. Like, you know, it's philosophically the same thing. We're saying one's up, one's down, but the cloud seems like this fluffy, nice thing in the sky. Well, not judging by some of the comments, it's been raining everywhere. But when you think of our imagination, what we imagine a cloud is a nice fluffy white thing. But if we said we're going to store it in the earth, it's, you know, philosophically, it's the same thing, it's just this concept. But yet it would change the way we see it. Interesting. Actually, I'm sorry, Ben, I know you want to come in there, but my daughter, she's just gone five. And Richard, I know you lived in Dublin for a little while. So we were driving across, do you remember the East Link Bridge? So across the Liffey, and you're heading out towards the south side. So basically, if anybody just doubled in port, so the docks. And my daughter was looking out the window and she said, what are all those boxes? You know, the freight boxes for the chips. And I said, well, that's where everything comes into Ireland. So what do you mean? That just struck me that, you know, the disconnects around things that I know she shouldn't understand. She's five. But as I was driving, just struck me, you know, the disconnect around even that physical act of buying a new iPad, let's say. Like the journey that took to get from, you know, wherever the Apple production centre that it was created in. How did it get there? And I think Richard, you live in Australia. It would also be, I mean, we're an island on the edge of Europe, you're an island, you know, further away, let's say, from some of the production places. What's the cost of it actually getting physically? You know, I think because in some ways, I think we live in such a. Like fiber connected world in that we can all connect instantly over a network that the concept of a physical thing moving from place to place has been lost a little as in it still needs to go on a giant freight ship move across oceans and get to another physical location. That's just my own music rather than evidence based. Why do you think there's been a loss, the disconnect between that physical moving of goods and products? And that's sort of supported by, you know, companies like Amazon who just kind of ship something, you click a button on your mouse and then it arrives at your doorstep the same day or the next day. And again, that's that disconnect between something having to make that physical. You know, an actual physical journey and we can't just email you a coffee mug. Yes, I'm disappointed now that I've talked to myself out of a coffee mug. Ben, I know you want. Just very quickly where we're getting very, very close to the hour. I mean, as far as I'm concerned, I'm very happy to keep this discussion going and keep the conversation going for anyone who would like to jump in. Maybe I can come in. Absolutely. Well, it's a very complex topic, obviously, and there's no simple solution to it that doesn't create new problems. But what I found from your presentation is that there is actually an underlying necessity and this is critical thinking skills. So we need to encourage our users if you want to call them or the next generations or whoever is the target group. Well, actually, it's all of us to develop some critical thinking in a specific direction and environmental awareness. And I'm very much for that. I know that we can't reach all of those people in the same way as much as we would have liked to. The issue that I also see is that there are driving forces behind these developments that are much more powerful than the critical thinking can compensate for. What I mean is that, for example, if you look at the YouTube consumption, I mean, YouTube has increased its advertising time in the videos dramatically and previously you had the odd ads that skipped in. But now it's almost like well, almost the size of the actual video that you want to watch. And there is valuable content there, but it is diluted and extended. So the streaming action and the streaming service is artificially enhanced by advertising moves. And it's the same with, say, Facebook conversations and so on. You're constantly bombarded with a lot of advertising that you have to scroll over. And this obviously extends your consumption time on your phones and so on. There's very little we can do about that in terms of user control. Oh, what do you think? Yeah, no, I agree, Ben would probably be more learned in this space than me in terms of the push and pull of it. But definitely, I think that there is so to separate two things out. I think you are saying a number of things. So I think, yes, a lot of what we're saying is essentially critical thinking around environmental impact. I do think not to sound and not to sound as if I'm forcing an issue. I do think we're saying a little bit more in that it's also around. So when we've critically thought it's about maybe also communicating those findings. So it's it's building on some of the other digital skills too. But I agree. And in essence, I agree yet. So I think that that's one part of it. So if you imagine that as a bottom up, you know, we have our users becoming more critical, but I do think that there needs to be a change top down too. So I mean, what are the regulations on these industries? What are the targets that are set in terms of the environmental impact of these, you know, monoliths of companies that are controlling a lot of the digital space and storing things in the earth rather than the cloud? What are they are they being held responsible? Some of that, I think Wolfgang and also around advertising. So I'm assuming it's certainly in Ireland. There's regulations around what you can advertise when like some of it is that top down regulation of what needs to happen to. I made a kind of a joke with my class last week. Not many people here will be familiar with Tommy Tierenin, the comedian. He's my namesake. He did a great sketch probably about 10 years ago, about a presuming all aware of the financial crash in Ireland in 2008. He did a great sketch about that. He said, look, I never had any money. You know, we were a poor country for, you know, about 100 years. And then we got money and absolutely bananas because we didn't know what to do with it. And everything went everything went, you know, I can't think of a non-rude way of saying this. Everyone belly up and but it wasn't our fault because we didn't we didn't know we never had money before. I made a joke to my students the other day that I think the internet age is coming to the point where we we never had all this connectivity before. We never had all this access to information for. We never had this far. I mean, giddy excitement jumped to Fenian to a lot of this stuff. And we're approaching the, how would you say, the hangover of us where it's OK, what do we do with all this now? We've we're approaching a point of reflection, I think. So the way you can't blame us in that all of these tools came along and this connectivity and these new ways of doing things. We just jumped into us. And I do think either it's happening naturally or people are beginning to force the issue of reflecting on what all this means now. And look, that's a really broad question. I think it comes into things like trolling on the internet and cyber bullying and all of that, it all feeds into us. But I think that's part of the conversation, too. Yeah, I would agree. Maybe just to just to add, I mean, I do I do agree around definitely within my work. I think that idea of critical thinking has to be embedded across education and and I mean, to connect to something that Richard was saying, you know, I think one of the potential of all of it. The reason why it's so important to focus on digital technology in this space is that it's such a big part of children's lives. I mean, for me, you know, I'm working with student teachers and it's a really big part of their lives. But there's also an opportunity to really think about ways in which we're connected to other people, ways in which we're connected to our environment for good and for bad. And so it can give us it can be a really powerful lens for teachers to work with, I think. And it's it's a really it's this really complex space where the thing that we're talking about having a negative impact on the environment is also the thing that right now could facilitate Wolfgang, Richard, Ben and Peter collaborating to create something that would tackle the very problem we're talking about. So it is this yin and yang. And I think it's important that the yin and the yang are addressed. So technology, technological solutions and using technology could be part of the solution to the problem that technology is creating. You know, it's it's about a balanced approach. Ben, you were talking about this activity you did with your students where they measure was it soil and something. OK, with an activity you did with your students around the something in the soil or anyway. No, I mean, so much of my practice at the moment uses digital technology to understand sustainability issues better, to understand by the way, you have a lot of citizen science projects also doing a similar thing, you know, creating awareness and motivating or activating the population. And which is all really good stuff. And then that's it's facilitated by technology. Exactly. You know, so there is that balance. And I hope it came through. Well, maybe we were airing on the side of negativity today to make a point. But maybe just now to say that we both have really strong believers in the potential power of technology to do good things and to solve these problems as well as be part of the problem. That makes sense. Yeah. Thank you very much, Chris. Thanks. Thanks, Wolfgang, for your input. Thanks for jumping in. It is, yeah, we've looked ticked over time, but that's all right. I think I haven't seen any other questions coming in. Last chance for questions. I think it's it's I was just mentioning before in the in the sort of, you know, as we were chatting just before the session started in Moodle Academy, you know, these webinars that we that we run, a lot of them are quite specific, quite pointed, quite technical. So it's really great to have, you know, guys like you on and just cover some some broader broader subjects, which obviously massively important to everyone. And we don't always take the time or whether we don't get the chance. We don't always take the time to just properly talk about them, think about them, get some new ideas. So yeah, look, thanks to thanks to both of you for jumping in today and presenting. And thanks to yourself, Richard, for the invite to come along and for Mary as well, for helping us get settled in on this today. We really appreciate it. And just to reiterate, anybody who would like to talk to us about this in a formal informal like research way or teaching way, we are we're really, really interested in this area. We're not precious about, you know, ownership of anything we want to talk more about this. We want to connect with people we'd love to do some research and some collaborative teaching, et cetera, all of the above in this space. So do get in touch. But a question for Richard, somebody did ask there to keep the conversation going with the needed to duck out. I wouldn't know how to get in touch with them. Nikki Kearns there. Yes, I will. We've got her name here. So let's we'll be able to get her, you know, I'll get your people to talk to her people and we will make sure that we put you guys in touch. Absolutely. So yeah, again, thank you. And if you have enjoyed this session, we'd love you to consider getting involved further and help Moodle Academy grow by contributing to our development. 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You can take the are you ready for the MEC quiz and one of our certified service providers will support you through the certification process. So that is that is it for today. It's been great. Thanks again to Peter and Peter and Ben. I hope you've all found this session interesting and we will see you around in Moodle Academy courses and in our upcoming webinars again soon. Thank you so much and we'll see you next time.