Welcome to Digitools...

The new buzzwords in Business Education are INPUT TECHNOLOGIES and DIGITOOLS. DigiTools is short for Digital Communication Tools, a new course being piloted in Washington State that is drawing national attention. This course will be phased in over the next few years and is designed to replace current keyboarding course offerings.

Mission Statement... To ensure a computer literate society, each child must be able to communicate using a variety of digital tools. As the "tools" change, communication skills will be the driver. We need to teach the appropriate use of communication tools as our nation continues to evolve into the Information Age. The traditional Keyboarding class is the perfect home to introduce the new digital input technologies.

Elements in the New Curriculum

  • dictate clearly between 100-160 wpm with 95 percent accuracy directly to the PC
  • handwrite clearly and accurately using a Tablet PC or artist tablet
  • translate language pairs, like English into Spanish, using machine translation
  • type using correct techniques to avoid keyboarding related repetitive stress injuries
  • dictate and handwrite in ways to avoid vocal or handwriting related repetitive injuries
  • use optical character recognition to scan original documents for text and graphics
  • learn word processing and office applications relative to the new input technologies
  • create portable documents using correct formats incorporating Internet applications
  • infuse communication tools into design of web applications

This is the time to let students become a self-motivated learners and infuse the high standards of reading, writing, science and math applications. Teachers have permission to lead creative project-based activities that encourage team building, critical thinking skills and follow timelines that are similar to the real world. Teachers have permission to let go of grading the keyboarding papers and spend more time guiding each student to success. I believe that the students of today are waiting for us to step out of their way so they can embrace technology to become a computer literate user.