The diversity of ICDL courses

Do you remember the first time you used email?

Do you remember first time you used a word processor – maybe it was Word Perfect or Microsoft Word? If you are a bit younger maybe it was Google Docs.

It all seemed quite complicated, it wasn’t it just seemed that way until someone showed you how easy it actually was. The teacher took away your fear, got you started and away you went. Anyone who has ever tried to learn a musical instrument might remember this. You pick out a few notes and imagine yourself playing concert halls and football stadiums.

And then you hit that wall, the wall that any learner reaches when your learning kind of plateaus. You can do so much, you know there’s so much more you could do if you only had the time to practice or get some proper lessons. If only I could learn to do this properly.

None of the standard office applications we use every day were as commonplace 20 years ago. If you did use them, they offered pretty basic functionality but it was enough, it got us started and when the next version arrived with new tricks and shortcuts we weren’t afraid to try them out. We were all experts.

And then it got difficult again. What’s a pivot table? How do I link a database to a spreadsheet? How do add formatting to a whole document not just a section or line or paragraph? And how do I do it quickly?

Our joy and excitement at this new technology starts to diminish, fear creeps back in. What if I’m hacked or phished or get a virus? Is my child safe online? Am I safe online?

With ICDL we don’t just teach people how to use Outlook or Word. We teach them how to stay safe with our Security Essentials and Data Protection courses.

We don’t just help teach the Spreadsheets course we also teach them how to present the data with our Presentations course and how to work together in a group through our Online Collaboration course.

We prepare people for real jobs in IT and online marketing through our ICT Curriculum and digital marketing course.

None of us are truly IT experts anymore, not even IT experts! It is just too broad a field, all of us need to work on our IT skills.

SureSkills and the Irish Computer Society have joined as national partner for ICDL Workforce. For more information about ICDL , click below or email icdl@sureskills.com or call (01) 240 22 77.