“Your Data Can Go to Anyone”
Luci Pangrazio, Lourdes Cardozo‐Gaibisso · 2021
The ubiquity of digital devices and mass user platforms has led to exponential growth in personal data generation. While personal data can be usefully employed to personalize and customize digital experiences and interactions, it can also be used to track and profile individuals for a range of purposes. In this chapter, we report on a two-year research project that worked with over 200 primary school students (aged 8–12 years) in Australia and Uruguay with the goal of developing critical data literacies. The project coupled code-based digital methods and participatory design and involved working with teachers and students to develop an innovative pedagogical approach to this complex social problem. Our findings provide valuable insights into children’s understandings of the technical, social, and cultural issues that shape the development of critical data literacies. While some issues are unique to each cultural context, others are common across Australia and Uruguay. These include: insights into the materiality of personal data and how to work with these new “texts” in educational settings, and the increasing need to bring students, teachers and families together as key agents to help reshape the data literacy field. The chapter concludes by considering how educators and researchers might re-imagine the dominant forms of literacy education to include a context-relevant critical data literacy praxis.