This theoretical paper is concerned with conceptualising a major issue that faces all those concerned with and charged with influencing the future of equity in education-the need for digital agency (DA). The paper offers a rationale for this concern, highlights the importance of the concept and its practices, presents the challenges it brings, some current ways in which practices are tackling these challenges, and considers the theoretical foundation for how it might be addressed further in the future. The paper defines DA, and its three component parts-digital competence, digital confidence, and digital accountability. The paper argues that DA is a fundamental requirement for and through education, that it affects all citizens in a global society, and should be enabled through their ongoing and developing digital practices. The paper concludes with recommendations for different educational groups-including policy makers, practitioners, developers, and researchers.
The present study is an extension of studies that measure pre-service teachers' Technological Pedagogical Content Knowledge (TPACK) confidence. It provides new perspectives on pre-service teachers' TPACK by shifting the focus to concrete concerns and strengths indicated by pre-service teachers. The target group consists of a cohort of firstyear pre-service teachers (N = 86) from a Finnish university. The data used in this study were 86 lesson plans with integrated technology written by first-year pre-service teachers, with a specific section where students outlined their confident and challenging areas in the lesson plan. These sections were analysed quantitatively through the theoretical lens of TPACK. Four TPACK areas were found confident, challenging or both confident and challenging for students. For these first-year pre-service teachers, pedagogical knowledge played the most important role, and the outcomes concretize specific aspects of pedagogical knowledge that can be addressed to develop TPACK in teacher education. The results provide important perspectives on pre-service-teachers' development of TPACK, revealing the important position of pedagogical knowledge and detailed perspectives on how pre-service teachers view their readiness to use ICT in education.
The use of information and communication technology (ICT) is important in today’s higher education. ICT has a central role in the skill set students are expected to master during their studies. The fast development of technology poses both possibilities and challenges for teachers. This paper is part of a larger project aimed at implementing the flipped classroom (FC) model and supporting ICT integration in higher education. In this project, teachers receive systematic support for implementing the FC model. The aim of this paper is to investigate how students assess their teachers’ knowledge of pedagogy, content and technology before and after a course using the FC model. In total, 317 students responded to the pre-post-test surveys. The data were analyzed as a single group and separately for students in different year groups. Results indicate that there are statistically significant differences between the results of the pre- and post-tests. Students assess their teachers content-specific pedagogical skills and technological pedagogical skills in teaching their subject higher after the FC courses. Students also perceived their teachers as having more positive attitudes to using technology in teaching. It was found that the difference was more apparent in second-year and higher students. Students perceived FC positively in general.
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