Introducing the ICT Essentials Suite
Certification Partners is committed to a vision of preparing students at earlier ages for the careers they will encounter in the future. We have educated more than 1 million high school and adult students in computer standards and technologies, and we have awarded more than 160,000 professional job-role certifications in IT skills.
Now we have applied our years of IT training and certification experience to create a new technology education series designed specifically for middle school students (grades 5 through 8) to provide them with the technology skills necessary for success in their academic and career endeavors.
This new series is called Information & Communication Technology Essentials, or the ICT Essentials suite.
The ICT Essentials suite consists of 10 courses in digital technologies:
ICT Computing Essentials — Fundamentals of computing, including computer system components, their functions and interactions, basic network concepts, connectivity methods, storage, memory, and input and output devices.
ICT Web Design Essentials — Design and creation of basic Web sites, including Web page elements, page layout, use of color, graphical user interface (GUI) tools, integration of multimedia, HTML coding, navigation and site publishing.
ICT Cyber-Security Essentials — Challenges and solutions of cyber-security, including Internet and social media safety, cyber-ethics, and network vulnerabilities and threats. Also includes topics especially relevant to middle and high-school students, such as cyber-bullying, best practices, and risk mitigation for young or new users of communications media.
ICT Word-Processing Essentials — Word processing and document manipulation, including document creation and design, layout and formatting, fonts, styles, image use, tables, numbered/bulleted lists, pagination, and document publishing.
ICT Database Essentials — Fundamentals of using relational databases, including row and field structure, data types, tables, queries, data import/export mechanisms, and basic Structured Query Language (SQL) statements for managing and manipulating data and creating reports.
ICT Communications Essentials — Fundamentals of effective communications in a technological society, including information search methodologies, e-mail clients, SMS text messaging, Skype, wikis and social media.
ICT Programming & Logic Essentials — Basics of programming languages, including Boolean concepts, truth tables, logic, program structure, pseudo-code, iterative statements and syntax rules.
ICT Multimedia Essentials — Design and creation of digital slide presentations, including formatting basics, slide transitions, animation, timing, titling, and integration of images, graphics, audio/video and other compatible files.
ICT Spreadsheet Essentials — Fundamentals of spreadsheet applications, including layout, text entry and formatting, numerics, currency and percentage values, cell value editing and manipulation, common spreadsheet functions, arithmetic formulas, conditional formatting, chart creation, and data protection.
ICT Gaming Essentials — Fundamentals of interactive computer game creation, including design process, criteria and constraint identification, content research, storyboard creation, program flow modeling, program code creation, and result evaluation and modification practices.
Each ICT Essentials course has been designed with the flexibility to be delivered as a stand-alone unit of instruction or integrated into your program’s existing curriculum. And at the end of each ICT Essentials course, students have the opportunity to earn an ICT Digital Tool Certificate by passing a qualifying certificate exam, proving mastery of the ICT Essentials topic and building a foundation for the professional certifications they can earn from CIW in the future.