Perceptions of digital competence in learning and teaching English in the context of online education

Abstract

Digital competence has become a crucial capability in the learning process, in the working place, and in personal communication. The aim of the article is to explore master students’ perceptions of their digital competence by identifying frequency, expertise, and satisfaction in using information communication technologies (ICT) in their learning process when studying at university and teaching English as a foreign language (EFL) in the context of online education. The sample comprised 49 master students who participated in distant evening classes at a private university in Kazakhstan while working simultaneously as teachers of English in various educational institutions during the day. Master students’ perceptions of digital competence is one of the approaches to reveal the gaps in students’ digital competence development necessary for learning and teaching EFL online. The main research tool for data collection was the online survey allowing the master students to measure their level of digital competence. Evident from the results, the majority of respondents are digitally competent; yet there is a cohort of master students who scored low on ICT skills needed for teaching and admitted the necessity of improvement. Also, according to the findings, the respondents’ frequency, expertise, and satisfaction level by their digital competence needed in the learning is higher than that in teaching. This can also imply that even though the frequency and expertise in using digital technologies for learning contributes to the development of the expertise in using them for conducting their own classes, master students need special training on the use of ICT for pedagogical purposes.

Online teaching strategies for conversational English by university lecturers

“…During observation, the researcher perceived that lecturers were interested in using the videoconferencing strategy for using online teaching as suggested by Alshehri, et al (2020). The finding is congruent with Kassymova, et al (2023) who suggest that online teaching and learning individualise and provide independent learning, studying anytime and anywhere and create attendance possibilities for those who are unable to attend physical classes. However, this claim raises more questions than answers because there could be no need to continue researching strategies for teaching conversational English online.…”

“…However, some lecturers face challenges in using online teaching strategies (Rif, Tan, & Khairuddin, 2023) as they are not adequately trained. Online teaching and learning individualise and provide independent learning, studying anytime and anywhere and create attendance possibilities for those who are unable to attend physical classes (Kassymova, Tulepova & Bekturova, 2023). In this situation, strategies for teaching conversational English online, therefore, are also beneficial (Pustika, 2020) to lecturers and students alike.…”

Information Technology in Foreign Language Distance Teaching to Students of Technical Specialties

“…To implement distance support in addition to the traditional teaching of Foreign Language, modern educational technology implemented in various services are used: databases, portals; digital libraries and dictionaries; information and educational websites (Sveshnikova et al, 2022;Oblova et al, 2020;Kassymova et al, 2023).…”

Using Arduino in Science, Technology, Engineering, and Mathematics (STEM) Education: Bibliometric Analysis

“…A large number of studies have run bibliometric analysis for the terms "Arduino" (García-Tudela and Marín-Marín, 2023;Lopez-Belmonte et al, 2020;Ocak, 2018) while the following studies have conducted bibliometric analysis on STEM (Akhmedova et al, 2023;Ali and Tse, 2023;Delen and Yuksel, 2022;Ha et al, 2020;Jamali et al, 2021;Jumini et al, 2022;Karampelas, 2023;Le Thi Thu et al, 2021;Marín-Marín et al, 2021;Tas and Bolat, 2022), which are carried out as separate studies. To clarify, the scientific method known as bibliometric analysis deals with a large-scale literature database to evaluate the contributions to a field of research, by countries, institutions, authors, and journals.…”