We had many of these age-appropriate discussions  in Barre while working on our document.   In our experience, our technological bent sometimes gets in the way and colors our perspective.  "Multimedia," for example, does not necessarily PowerPoint and an LCD projector.  Drawings, fingerpainting, can make up a multimedia presentation.  We have very young students here going beyond paper and using drawing and pinting programs to tell a story.
"Telecommunications" includes telephone.  Anyone who has had to waste time with a rude and clueless youngster on the phone would agree that training in that area is not a bad idea.

>>Is multimedia and internet fluency a goal we need to spend a
lot of time or money on when we have large percentages of our children who
can't read, write, and cipher? <<

YES!  If they are being used appropriately as tools to help those children better read, write and cipher.  Please do not also fall into the fallacy that technology skils are isolated and self-justifying.  It is our take here in Barre, that they MUST be integrated into the wider curriculum and not treated as a separate curriculum.  That is why we involved grade-level and content area teaches in formulaing our technology GLEs and also why grade-level and content area teachers will deal with their assessment.
Tommy J. Walz
Technology Coordinator
Barre Supervisory Union
120 Ayers St.
Barre, VT 05641
Tel 802-476-5011