Hello!  It’s Rebecca, back again!  I hope you enjoyed or learned something new once again from Mikaila, our Business and Career Librarian, who wrote last week’s post about another of our business databases.  For those who haven’t been following this series, I am the Information Literacy Librarian here at the Chester County Library.  (You might recognize me as the librarian with the purple hair!)  Welcome to this series here on our blog where every week (or thereabouts) I’ll be introducing you to one of the library’s databases.  A library database, for those who are unsure, is essentially just an online resource that the library pays for so that you can access it for free with your library card!

This week, rather than writing about a single database, I’d like to write a bit about a couple of databases that include resources covering a single topic – basic computer skills.  I talked about LearningExpress Library already earlier in this blog series, which has a few basic computer courses included in among everything else it offers.  So today I’ll talk about DigitalLearn and PA Online Learning. 

DigitalLearn is a project of the Public Library Association that has free, easy-to-follow tutorials on basic computing, being safe online, job skills, social media, and more.  They’re simple, list their skill level, and show the time it takes to complete upfront.  Some of the relevant learning courses include Navigating a Website, Intro to Email, Introduction to Google Maps, Getting Started with Telehealth, Intro to Facebook, Online Fraud and Scams, Applying for Jobs Online, Cloud Storage, and Using Healthcare.gov to Enroll in Health Insurance.

PA Online Learning is a free growing collection of tutorials on how to use software, social media, and library resources, such as POWER Library.  Tutorials are a nice mix of videos, images, and text and are relatively comprehensive, providing the basics and then building off of those basics as you move through the course.  Some of the relevant learning courses include Computer Basics, First Steps with Digital: iPads and Tablets, Gmail – Email from Google, Google Chrome, Google Search, How to Zoom, Tech Talk: Passwords, LinkedIn – Social Networking for Job Seekers and Professionals, Instagram – Share Your Moments, and Searching for Jobs Online with Indeed.

Find DigitalLearn on our website by going to chescolibraries.org –> Tools and Research –> All CCLS Databases –> D –> DigitalLearn

Find PA Online Learning on our website by going to chescolibraries.org –> Tools and Research –> All CCLS Databases –> P –> PA Online Learning

This post is number fifteen in this databases series!  If you missed the previous installments, you can view them here.