The Grande Prairie Council for Lifelong Learning is hosting an iPad/tablet for beginners class in March.
Jennifer Plagata, Ault and Family Literacy Program Manager for the GPCLL says the course is beneficial for anyone new to the digital space, and especially seniors.
“It’s for seniors or anyone actually, newcomers, immigrants who want to learn how to navigate their devices,” she says.
According to Plagata, the course is student-oriented, and while there is a curriculum, much of the teachings are based on requests from the students, and Plagata says the most common request tends to be digital safety.
“With seniors what they want to know about is the safety, and the settings of their devices like online accounts, banking accounts, how to make sure that they don’t get hacked,” she says. “We also include social media and other applications that can enable them to reach out or talk to their family members like Zoom, Skype, and Messenger.”
Plagata adds that plans are in place to partner with the Grande Prairie Golden Age Centre after they reached out to the GPCLL regarding a potential web safety class for their residents.
“They have a lot of clients who have concerns with online safety because they have been hacked a few times so that’s what we’re hoping to fulfill the needs of the community in that way.”
The program is three weeks long and features two, two-hour sessions per week, and interested individuals are encouraged to sign up online on the GPCLL’s website.
