Technology and Treatment

The Nature of Counselor Technological Literacy

So what is technological literacy as it pertains to counselors? Many people have written on the subject of technological literacy. Technological literacy may be seen as having knowledge and abilities to select and apply appropriate technologies in a given context. There are three components to technological literacy: the technology of making things, the technology of organization, and, the technology of using information. Applying a Delphi technique to opinions expressed by experts, Croft evolved a panel of characteristics of a technologically literate student. Those are abilities to make decisions about technology; possession of basic literacy skills required to solve technology problems; ability to make wise decisions about uses of technology; ability to apply knowledge, tools, and skills for the benefit of society; and ability to describe the basic technology systems of society.

A theme among various attempts to define technological literacy is that technology has evolved to become a powerful medium—not only a set of high-tech tools. If technology functioned merely as a set of tools, the problem of advancing technological literacy would not be so challenging. But technology has become more than a set of devices to be picked up and used when a person decides he or she needs them. [Page 412]It has become a required medium that mediates experience in most aspects of peoples' lives. Broadly speaking, technological literacy, then, can be described as the intellectual processes, abilities, and dispositions needed for individuals to understand the link between technology, themselves, and society in general. Technological literacy is concerned with developing one's awareness of how technology is related to the broader social system and how technological systems cannot be fully separated from the political, cultural, and economic frameworks that shape them.

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