What is ‘good’ digital play?
The third seminar in the Digital Child x ACMI series, ‘The Social Worlds of Children’s Digital Play’, was held on 1 June 2023, with experts presenting four different perspectives of digital play.
“It was a thought-provoking seminar,” said event convener REDI’s Professor Louise Paatsch.
“It brought together different perspectives from teachers, children’s program developers, researchers, and designers of digital displays and exhibitions within community settings regarding the role of the digital in children’s play.”
The seminar presenters included Jacqui Jarvis (Foundation Teacher and Playgroup Leader at St James’ Primary School), Dr Britt Romstad (ACMI’s Executive Director of Experience and Engagement), Dr Fiona Scott (Lecturer and Director of the Literacies and Language Research Cluster at the University of Sheffield), and Laura Stone (Early Childhood Education Producer at the ABC).
“This seminar provided important insights into the affordances and challenges of digital play,” said Professor Paatsch.
“It discussed the importance of moving beyond the technological determinist views of digital technologies being good or bad for children to broadening our understandings of the value and use of digital technologies in children’s diverse social worlds and how these can be embedded into practice.”
The seminar series consists of public-facing events co-hosted by REDI’s Deakin node of the Australian Research Council Centre of Excellence for the Digital Child and the Australian Centre for the Moving Image (ACMI).
View the seminar at the Digital Child YouTube channel.