2digi has been a three-year project created after seeing a need in Finnish language centres to assist language teachers in their transition from an analogue world to a digital one. We wanted to focus on how this transition can be managed pedagogically and offer teachers concrete help for themselves and their students.
The project was divided into three stages that you can see from the flowchart below.
Stage One focused on providing teachers with background knowledge they need: what is digital literacy in a language centre environment? What added value does a digital approach give? How can we evaluate as teachers our present skill level in digital matters?
Stage Two created two parallel frameworks to guide teachers and students to see where they are in terms of their digital skills for their teaching both in and outside the classroom. For teachers and planners we created ‘pedagogy with a twist’ – help and guidance to create a digital portfolio. For students, we created a self-evaluation questionnaire to gauge their digital skills in realtion to their language learning.
Stage Three offers more concrete help for teachers by providing a wide range of ready-made for use.
Sources and inspiration for Teacher and Student Self-Evaluations
Jisc (2012) https://digitalcapability.jisc.ac.uk/what-is-digital-capability/
STAGE 1 Provide background knowledge: reflection on digital skills
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- Negotiate a definition of DL for teachers in the LC environment
- Discuss and present the pedagogical underpinnings to and added value of digitalization
- Identify the digital skills/knowledge teachers may need now and in the future: a self-evaluation questionnaire
STAGE 2 Create concrete help for teachers and students
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- A digital portfolio: creating a link for teachers between the self-evaluation questionnaire and continued digital development
- A self-evaluation questionnaire for assessing our students’ digital capabilities
STAGE 3 Create concrete help for teachers and students: resources
Create resources at three different levels:
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- Lesson level: one activity used in individual lessons. Example: exercises, materials.
- Course level: a set of activities that can form part of a longer course and be developed over a period of time. Example: assessment, digital CVs etc.
- Process level: developing digital skills over a longer period of time: Example: ethics, digital working life skills.
LEGACY
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- Create and maintain a website as a resource and reference point for all teachers
- Produce a set of guidelines for digital development in language centres
- Lobby for local support in our LCs and create a network of 2digi counsellors
- Write research articles