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• Published: 11 March 2021

Addressing the digital skills gap for future education

• Joshua A. Jackman   ORCID: orcid.org/0000-0002-1800-8102 1 , 2 ,
• Douglas A. Gentile   ORCID: orcid.org/0000-0002-5934-2860 1 , 3 ,
• Nam-Joon Cho   ORCID: orcid.org/0000-0002-8692-8955 4 &
• Yuhyun Park   ORCID: orcid.org/0000-0001-8991-755X 1  

Nature Human Behaviour volume  5 ,  pages 542–545 ( 2021 ) Cite this article

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The COVID-19 pandemic has caused rushed digitalization of primary and secondary (K12) student education, and cyber-risks such as bullying, technology addiction, and misinformation must be addressed. There is an urgent need to coordinate global efforts for digital skills education and training, which can help students succeed in the digital age while curbing risks and inequality.

The digital world is an indelible part of modern life. For many people, it is the world where we communicate, learn, shop, and entertain ourselves. The digital world has transformative power to connect people across the world.

Nonetheless, the digital world has many challenges. It is associated with a wide range of cyber-threats such as hacking, bullying, identity theft, human trafficking, technology addiction, and privacy invasion, while gaming disorder has been recognized as a medical condition by the World Health Organization (WHO).

The ongoing COVID-19 pandemic has accelerated the widespread digitalization of numerous sectors that were unprepared. One of the most affected groups has been K12 students, many of whom have been forced to switch to online schooling. The rapid transition has been challenging and compounded by issues such as limited digital skills, technology access, inequality, and systemic racism.

We urgently need a globally coordinated response to help students acquire digital skills, which are needed to keep pace with this fast-changing landscape. It is especially important to cultivate digital citizenship along with a broader set of digital skills that can facilitate participation and support students in maximizing opportunities and minimizing risks in the digital world.

Cyber-risk impacts

The impact of the digital world on students began long before the COVID-19 pandemic. The digital world has brought tremendous benefits, but the rate of digital technology advances is far greater than the speed at which we have adapted in terms of education, policies, and culture.

This mismatch has allowed cyber-risks to proliferate among children who are left exposed without adequate preparation or safeguards. To understand the prevalence of cyber-risks worldwide, our team conducted a survey of over 145,000 children and adolescents across 30 countries 1 . The participants were asked questions about their personal experiences with different types of cyber-risks and evaluation metrics were developed based on the frequency of exposure.

Among the survey results, it was found that 60% of 8- to 12-year-old children were exposed to cyber-risks such as cyberbullying, gaming disorder, sexual grooming, and violence (Fig. 1a ). Notably, 45% of children online were affected by cyberbullying, 39% experienced reputational risks, 29% were exposed to violent and sexual content, 28% experienced cyber threats, 17% had risky contacts such as an offline meeting with strangers or sexual contact, 13% were at risk of a gaming disorder, and 7% were at risk of a social media disorder.

a , Percentages of 8- to 12-year-old children in the survey who reported encountering different types of cyber-risks. b , National comparisons in six different assessment categories: cyber-risk prevention, disciplined digital use, digital citizenship, guidance and education, social infrastructure, and digital connectivity. The scores were standardized across the 30 countries included in the Child Online Safety Index, with higher scores indicating better performance. Adapted with permission from ref. 1 , DQ Institute.

The results also showed that countries varied greatly in critical aspects of digital safety and infrastructure (Fig. 1b ). East Asian and Western countries tended to rank higher for child online safety. East Asian countries also tended to score high on cyber-risk prevention, disciplined digital use, digital citizenship, and digital connectivity. On the other hand, Western countries tended to have strong social infrastructure, guidance, and education. These data highlight that nations in all regions of the world have room for improvement and could learn from each other’s best practices—an issue which has gained heightened attention due to COVID-19.

An educational crisis

Over the past year, the global K12 education system has largely moved online, which has influenced student learning performance and wellbeing. Indeed, school closures caused by COVID-19 are estimated to have affected up to over 84% of the world’s student population and continue in many locations worldwide 2 .

As a stopgap measure, many schools started using digital education tools to offer online teaching while students stay at home. These efforts have helped students and teachers interact in a physically safe manner and also spurred renewed interest in educational technology innovation. However, there have been concerns about introducing new forms of digital education so abruptly, especially in terms of learning effectiveness and cybersecurity 3 . Such challenges will likely be addressed over time as school systems, teachers, and students become more familiar with the digital learning environment and online teaching approaches are refined.

Of more immediate concern, the switch to online learning has also deepened the exposure of students to cyber-risks and affected socialization 4 . Online classes are leading students to grow accustomed to spending more time online, blurring the distinction between physical and digital spaces. For example, it has been estimated that children are spending around twice as much time on social media sites and video-sharing platforms as compared to the previous year, and increased screen time is associated with technology addiction and mental health effects 5 , 6 , 7 . In addition to technology addiction, there has also been a rise in cyberbullying that coincides with school closures and the switch to online learning 8 , 9 .

It is imperative to address these growing cyber-risk issues. Even before COVID-19, most students were already suffering from inadequate online safety support and were unprepared to study primarily in the digital world. COVID-19 is a trigger to enact change and help students acquire critically needed digital skills.

Digital skills education

To date, there have been extensive efforts to create digital skills education programs. The Organisation for Economic Cooperation and Development (OECD) Learning Framework 2030 cites digital literacy as a core fundamental competency for future education 10 . However, until recently, there was weak coordination between programs and no globally accepted meaning of concepts such as digital literacy. Hence, the impact of digital skills education programs was limited even while the digitalization of K12 student education accelerates.

To address this issue, the Coalition for Digital Intelligence—comprising the OECD, IEEE Standards Association, and DQ Institute, in association with the World Economic Forum—spearheaded development of the recently approved IEEE Standard for Digital Intelligence (DQ) Framework for Digital Literacy, Skills, and Readiness ( 3527.1-2020 ). This set of internationally accepted standards establishes a common framework to coordinate digital-competency-building efforts worldwide.

These global standards build on the emerging concept of the DQ framework, which describes the collective set of technical, cognitive, meta-cognitive, and socio-emotional competencies that can help individuals thrive in the digital world 1 . While digital intelligence has been previously discussed in terms of human interactions with digital technology 11 and incorporating digital technology into business strategies 12 , the DQ framework focuses on digital skills education across eight competencies, including identity, use, safety, security, emotional intelligence, literacy, communication, and rights, and across three levels of citizenship, creativity, and competitiveness 13 . It was first described in a World Economic Forum article 14 followed by a DQ Institute white paper in 2017 (ref. 15 ).

The DQ framework has been used within the #DQEveryChild digital citizenship educational program to strengthen fundamental digital skills (the first level of the DQ framework) in over 1 million children in more than 80 countries 1 (Fig. 2 ). The program was centred on the DQ World online learning platform, and evaluation of student learning outcomes demonstrated that the competencies are learnable using this program. Numerous government agencies, non-profit organizations, and schools have begun adopting the DQ framework, as demonstrated by successful case study examples in various countries such as Mexico, Turkey, and Thailand.

Over the past decade, the #DQEveryChild educational outreach program was implemented to empower K12 students with digital skills based on the DQ framework. The 1 Billion Digital Skills project is a new call to action for stakeholders to adopt DQ global standards and to co-create a wide range of digital skills education and training programs that address societal needs.

The #DQEveryChild program set an important precedent for enhancing digital skills among students, and we believe that the greatest potential of the DQ framework lies in fostering an innovation ecosystem in which different stakeholders can work together to build and deploy a wide range of digital skills education and training programs that are tailored to specific needs and learning objectives. The newly launched 1 Billion Digital Skills Project, led by the Coalition for Digital Intelligence, embodies this vision and is a call to action for committed stakeholders to work together to empower 1 billion people, especially K12 students, teachers, and parents, with digital skills within 10 years. The project is built on the belief that digital intelligence is a universal human right and can enable the sustainable development of nations with more inclusive growth, wellbeing, and prosperity. To achieve this goal, the project seeks to bring together various stakeholders such as content developers, initiative leaders, academic researchers, and educators to achieve the following objectives:

Build a global network of partners that are committed to developing and implementing digital skills education and training programs based on the DQ global standards and to inspiring cooperation. A recent example is the new partnership between the DQ Institute, Alannah & Madeline Foundation, and Accenture to enable 11- to 14-year-old children in Australia and New Zealand to earn an eSmart Digital Licence that is based on Accenture’s Skills to Succeed and incorporates the eight competencies of the DQ framework.

Develop a program certification system to evaluate digital skills programs and drive alignment with DQ global standards. This system will provide information about what types of competencies are taught in different programs to guide curriculum planning.

Develop microbadge credits that students can earn when they complete learning objectives within certified digital skills programs. The credits can incentivize learning and provide evidence of learning accomplishments, and such approaches can also be extended to teacher training and parent awareness.

Create an online assessment platform where individuals and organizations can measure digital skill levels across competencies based on microbadge credits. The results can provide guidance for developing globally accepted performance standards to evaluate digital skills education and training outcomes as well as to measure the impact of specific initiatives.

Support ongoing improvement of the DQ global standards based on performance outcomes, student and teacher feedback, stakeholder input, and academic research. Further conceptual development of the DQ framework and quotient will strengthen the pedagogy of digital skills education and training programs. There is also a need to develop rigorous methods for evaluating the educational efficacy of different programs to achieve specific learning objectives. Such feedback can also be used to improve programs and to identify best practices within the DQ framework.

Conclusions and outlook

The widespread digitalization of the educational sector is happening now, and we must ensure that this transformation occurs inclusively while stemming the tide of rising inequality. Such outcomes would go a long way towards ensuring sustainable development of the digital economy and its potential to transform the lives of countless individuals through digital skills education. We believe that online learning will play an increasingly important role in the K12 education system. We must do more to support student success in the digital world, and these efforts should focus on empowering students with a core set of digital skills. The digitalization of the education sector is the latest example of broader trends in the global economy as a whole and the efforts we describe here can also be applied to teacher training as well as to workforce training in general. Online and offline options are no longer dichotomies; the digital world is becoming increasingly fused into our daily lives and we must make a concerted effort to ensure that all individuals are supported with digital skills education and training to thrive in this digital age.

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Joshua A. Jackman, Douglas A. Gentile & Yuhyun Park

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Y.P. is the founder and an employee of the DQ Institute, an international think-tank dedicated to setting global standards for digital intelligence education, outreach, and policies. J.A.J., D.A.G., and N.-J.C. are advisors to the DQ Institute.

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Jackman, J.A., Gentile, D.A., Cho, NJ. et al. Addressing the digital skills gap for future education. Nat Hum Behav 5 , 542–545 (2021). https://doi.org/10.1038/s41562-021-01074-z

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Perspective article, the digital transformation of higher education teaching: four pedagogical prescriptions to move active learning pedagogy forward.

• 1 Department of Physiotherapy, Oslo Metropolitan University, Oslo, Norway
• 2 Department of Primary and Secondary Teacher Education, Oslo Metropolitan University, Oslo, Norway

Introduction

Digital learning technologies are expected to reform higher education: The recent Digital Education Action Plan (2021–2027) of the European Commission (EC) states that digital education should facilitate more personalised, flexible, and student-centred teaching ( European Commission, 2021 ). This places great demands on university teachers, whose technological skills have long been considered the most formidable barrier to the digital transformation of higher education ( Børte et al., 2020 ). Meanwhile, the COVID-19 pandemic has resulted in a steep technological learning curve among higher education teachers. Overnight, university teachers were forced to adapt their teaching to a digital, online format to meet the needs of more than 1.5 billion students across the globe who have been affected by COVID-19 restrictions ( UNESCO, 2021 ). Despite a great willingness to change, over a year into the pandemic, the frustration among (university) teachers has become apparent. A United Kingdom survey found that higher education teachers thought that their pedagogical practis had been “reduced to the fulfilment of rudimentary technical functions” and that they played more of a transmissionist pedagogical role ( Watermeyer et al., 2020 ). Taking the perspective of the students, recent survey data from Norwegian higher education shows that, during the pandemic, lack of motivation and sense of loneliness have been an increasing problem among students ( NOKUT the Norwegian Agency for Quality Assurance in Education, 2020 ). From this we learn that a fully digital approach in higher education has limitations both when it comes to pedagogical practices and students’ well-being.

A review of the literature in undergraduate science, engineering, and mathematics courses found that compared with traditional lecturing, active learning in combination with traditional lecturing, increases student performance and is therefore the preferred teaching practice in regular classrooms ( Freeman et al., 2014 ). The same is true for higher education in general, where the literature broadly supports active, collaborative, cooperative, and problem-based teaching approaches ( Prince, 2004 ). Despite this support, the adoption of active learning by higher education teachers has been contested for decades. A widely cited report on United States universities in the early 1990s concluded that the implementation of active student learning was obstructed by the powerful influence of educational tradition and a lack of coordinated institutional actions ( Bonwell and Eison, 1991 ). It has been suggested that to promote active learning, institutions must take a more active role in changing teaching beliefs among academic staff ( Antunes et al., 2021 ).

Despite the high expectations to digital education, a review commissioned by the Norwegian Ministry of Education and Research found that technology was most often used to support traditional teaching and that scholarly approaches that promote active pedagogies are lacking ( Lillejord et al., 2018 ). An updated review by the same group concluded that staff’s professional development is a prerequisite for successful implementation of technologies in active pedagogies ( Børte et al., 2020 ).

Digital education is an umbrella term for various technologies and pedagogical practices in which online learning, distance learning, and blended learning are particularly highlighted in the EC action plan ( European Commission, 2021 ). Blended learning designs combine digital technologies and face-to-face teaching, thus providing opportunities for social interaction between students and between teachers and students. Despite their popularity, the development of pedagogical elements in blended learning designs is anaemic. Perhaps as a result, the use of technology in higher education remains a divisive issue ( Johnson et al., 2012 ; Lillejord et al., 2018 ).

The aim of this paper is to introduce four pedagogical prescriptions to move Active Digital Learning Pedagogy forward, to compile a list of barriers to the implementation of such a pedagogy, and to propose needed institutional actions to accelerate the implementation. Hence, this paper sets out to suggest directions for future empirical research that will add knowledge on which institutional actions are more important. We draw on the higher education literature and the authors’ more than 50 years of teaching experience in health education and teacher education, in which we have conducted research on higher education teaching and supervision, including blended learning approaches. Although most examples provided herein are from Norwegian higher education, we believe that due to the extensive digitalisation of Norwegian society, the Norwegian context constitutes a pioneering and interesting case for other countries.

The Active Digital Learning Pedagogy

The EC’s Digital Education Action Plan emphasises that digital technology is reshaping society and that it should offer personalised, flexible, student-centred, collaborative, and creative learning ( European Commission, 2021 ). However, despite these high ambitions, studies suggest that technology is predominantly used to support existing educational practices ( Damşa et al., 2015 ; Lillejord et al., 2018 ; García del Dujo and Martín-Lucas, 2020 ). Because classroom engagement is found to promote deeper levels of thinking and learning than traditional lectures ( McGlynn, 2005 ), we suggest that the policy aims of digital education outlined in the EC plan can be fully achieved only when integrating digital technologies with active face-to-face learning (as in blended learning).

Active learning is a contested concept. A critical examination of its educational purposes found that it may be unfocused and unsettling, at times leaving students feeling “confused and (temporarily) incompetent” ( Dall’Alba and Bengtsen, 2019 ). On the other hand, it has been shown to increase student performance ( Freeman et al., 2014 ), and a classic review concluded that there is broad support for the core elements of active learning ( Prince, 2004 ).

We draw on the work of Bonwell and Eison, who defined active learning as “instructional activities involving students in doing things and thinking about what they are doing” ( Bonwell and Eison, 1991 ). Building on this and the EC’s initiative to reset education for the digital age, we suggest that Active Digital Learning Pedagogy constitute four rudimentary pedagogical prescriptions on which we will embark below. Table 1 shows how these pedagogical prescriptions (given in the first row) map on to the EC’s list of the advantages of digital technology in higher education.

TABLE 1 . Pedagogical prescriptions for the Active Digital Learning Pedagogy, mapped on the advantages of implementing digital technologies as outlined by the EC.

Student-centredness is a multidimensional concept that encompasses the involvement of students in course decisions (including the selection of content and assessments), in the development of learning skills, and in shaping the (higher education) teacher’s role ( Lemos et al., 2014 ). The concept of student-centred learning has been linked to flexible, experiential, and self-directed learning ( O’Neill and McMahon, 2005 ), which are clearly mapped on to the predicted outcomes of flexibility and creativity achieved through the introduction of digital technologies in higher education ( European Commission, 2021 ). It has been argued that student-centred learning is about spaces that provide students with the opportunity to act upon their learning needs, intentions, and interests ( Blackie et al., 2010 ; Damşa and Lange, 2019 ). To achieve this, students must engage with peers and teachers and work on meaningful tasks and projects, such as group discussions, and student meaning-making ( Teo et al., 2008 ). Digital technologies offer such personalised, collaborative opportunities ( European Commission, 2021 ).

Formative feedback constitutes the next pedagogical prescription on our list. Formative feedback means that learners make sense of information from various sources and that they use the information to enhance their learning strategies while integrating feedback into their learning processes ( Carless and Boud, 2018 ). A literature review identified factors that influence students’ use of teacher feedback: feedback must be specific, detailed, individualised, unauthoritative, and without an extensive use of academic terminology and jargon ( Jonsson, 2012 ). Additionally, one must consider that students may lack strategies for productive use of feedback ( Johansson et al., 2012 ). The five factors and the additional comment remind us that feedback is also about the receiver. A line of research has focused on developing students’ feedback literacy, which entails appreciating feedback processes, developing the capacity to make judgements, managing affect, and taking action to use the feedback ( Carless and Boud, 2018 ). It should also be noted that peer assessment as a formative practice has been found to be effective across a wide range of contexts ( Double et al., 2020 ). However, although various models of formative feedback have been suggested across disciplines, none have been specifically proposed in a digital educational context ( Steen-Utheim and Wittek, 2017 ; Tripodi et al., 2020 ). Besides in-person feedback, digital education offers unique opportunities for instant feedback by integrating it into the software. As an extension of these technological opportunities, we suggest that a collaborative, team-based working environment can offer a possibility of providing formative feedback. The relevance of the social learning environment in digital education is supported by findings showing that being committed to peers, being recognised, and feeling safe are conducive to learning in flipped classroom education ( Steen-Utheim and Foldnes, 2018 ).

Although digital technologies in higher education have the potential to introduce new and more compound learning activities, they may alienate teachers and students from the learning process. The concept of Constructive Alignment arose from the seminal work of John Biggs ( Biggs, 1996 ). “Constructive” refers to constructivism theory, while “Alignment” refers to a principle of curriculum theory emphasising that assessment tasks should be aligned with what is intended to be learned ( Biggs, 1996 ). Alignment is achieved only by ensuring that the language terms used in the learning outcome descriptions are consistent with the educational and assessment methods. In educational interventions (such as those aimed at introducing digital technologies) designed to help students progress from lower-to higher-order learning skills, it is important that assessments reflect not only fact-based knowledge but also in-depth understanding. Although it can be argued that coherence is important for all types of teaching, in our experience, the use of digital technology in teaching without this in mind can easily lead to more fragmented learning processes. Moreover, empirical evidence suggests that teacher training programmes based on these principles result in more student-centred beliefs among participants ( Warriem et al., 2014 ). Although it can be argued that constructive alignment is ideal for all types of teaching, we believe that in digital education, attention can easily be diverted towards the technology itself, thus alienating students from the learning process. We must remember that technology is not pedagogy.

Lastly, building on McGlynn. (2005) suggestion of classroom engagement, we suggest that learning should take place in a physical context that facilitates social interaction, variation, and (almost) unlimited digital access. Therefore, flexible infrastructure constitutes the last pedagogical prescription in our list. Our experience of giving far too many lectures in halls with fixed seats has taught us that learning spaces would benefit from flexible furnishing that can allow for different configurations adapted to the purpose at hand. Such flexible learning environments require a basic technological infrastructure.

While taking the EC’s advantages of digital technologies as our point of departure when describing our four proposed pedagogical prerequisites, it should, however, be noted that none of them (the way they are described above) fully capture the “… and thinking about what they are doing” part of the definition put forward by Bonwell and Eison ( Bonwell and Eison, 1991 ). As we read it, the concept of metacognition captures this important aspect. Metacognition was originally referred to as the knowledge about and regulation of one’s cognitive activities in learning processes ( Flavell, 1979 ), while more recent research makes a distinction between metacognitive knowledge and skills revealing ample evidence that metacognitive skills are an important predictor for learning ( Veenman et al., 2006 ). A closer look at the body of research on student-centredness and formative feedback reveals that metacognition is an important feature both in student-centred learning [i.e., Lee and Hannafin (2016)], and when orchestrating formative feedback ( Veenman et al., 2006 ). More research is needed to decide whether learning of metacognitive skills should be put forward as a separate pedagogical prescription in digital education.

The list of pedagogical prescriptions is obviously preliminary, inconclusive and needs to be further developed in a digital educational context. The slow adoption of digital pedagogies to date indicates that several factors in the educational context may hinder the promotion of Active Learning Pedagogy. These barriers are discussed in the next section.

Barriers to an Active Digital Learning Pedagogy

A recent review found that teachers’ conceptions of teaching, lack of digital competence, and added workload are among the barriers to the implementation of technology-supported education in general ( Børte et al., 2020 ). The implementation of Active Digital Learning Pedagogy faces similar obstacles.

Established Teaching Cultures

A survey in Norwegian higher education found that teachers were generally rather positive about digital education but still sceptical of its benefits for their own disciplines ( Kofoed et al., 2019 ). Evidence also suggests that teachers with a student-centred approach are more open to the use of purposeful technological tools in their teaching ( Judson, 2006 ; Ertmer and Ottenbreit-Leftwich, 2010 ). In contrast to these teachers’ more innovative approaches, teachers with a transmissionist focus tend to use technology as a supplementary tool ( Damşa et al., 2015 ). Teachers play a decisive role in the digital transformation of higher education. Their autonomy allows them to choose their own teaching approaches, which in turn influence their contributions to long-term curriculum development. Consequently, teachers’ individual beliefs about teaching and learning are crucially important, as underlined by a recent study on the attitudes of academic staff towards a pedagogic shift to active blended learning. Antunes, Armellini, and Howe (2021) identified four main categories of teachers in higher education: “active innovators,” who believe that change is positive and apply it to their academic practice; “lagging innovators,” who hold positive beliefs but fail to fully implement changes; “sceptical but obliging” teachers, who hold negative beliefs, but their practices are consistent with new approaches; and “sceptical and resistant” teachers, who hold negative beliefs and actively resist integrating new approaches into their practice. Without a significant share of “active innovators,” the pace of pedagogic shifts in higher education will probably remain slow.

Another important but largely ignored point is that tensions can arise between existing teacher-centred cultures and the student-centredness of Active Digital Learning Pedagogy. A study conducted by our group on the experiences of health education teachers participating in blended learning found little evidence that the approach challenged their conceptions of teaching and learning ( Røe et al., 2021 ). However, we suspect that there might be variations according to teachers’ experience, age, and discipline. Evidence shows that experience is an important factor. A Swedish 10-year longitudinal study on teachers providing technology-supported education found that novice teachers initially had more teacher-focused conceptions but exhibited a faster and more profound shift towards student-centred conceptions than more experienced colleagues ( Englund et al., 2017 ).

Lack of Digital Incentives and Legislation for Teachers

Teachers’ practical approaches to teaching tend to be heavily influenced by situational factors, the social teaching environment, and the discipline ( Smeby, 1996 ; Richardson, 2005 ; Lindblom-Ylänne et al., 2006 ). Institutional incentives and regulations can influence teachers’ motivation to reform their teaching. Research shows that a lack of institutional support is the main cause of concern among teachers regarding the implementation of digital education ( Wanner and Palmer, 2015 ). To our knowledge, few universities have developed incentive structures that capture unique aspects of digital education, such as the considerable additional workload in the design phase. Another reason that teachers may disfavour digital teaching is the current lack of clarity regarding digital material ownership. According to Norwegian law, traditional lectures are the property of the teacher, whereas the ownership of video lectures is disputed ( Kielland, 2018 ). Due to this grey area, teachers face uncertainty regarding compensation for the reuse of digital material. We are concerned that this lack of legislation reduces teachers’ motivation to participate in digital reform.

Unequal Status of Education and Research

In higher education, teaching and research are often equated and are considered to have mutual benefits. However, this widely publicised equality between the two is disrupted by structural discrepancies in their descriptions in policy documents. For example, the title of the recent digital strategy for Norwegian higher education reads “Innovative education and excellence in research” ( UNIT, 2021 ). Considering that the lack of scholarly approaches is one of the challenges highlighted in a review of technology-supported education ( Lillejord et al., 2018 ), we believe that excellence and quality in research and educational activities should be given equal weight.

Recent findings suggest that the role of research in education is contested and that teachers’ teaching strategies uncritically draw on their personal preferences ( Brew and Saunders, 2020 ). We are concerned that educational research efforts by teachers, are severely hampered by lack of support from institutional administration for this type of research.

Inflexible Physical Learning Environment

The extent to which the physical infrastructure at higher education institutions is adapted to modern perspectives of how learning should take place is questionable ( Damşa et al., 2015 ; Børte et al., 2020 ). Despite a paucity of relevant research, evidence suggests that innovative, flexibly furnished technological classroom designs have a positive effect on teachers’ choices of educational approaches ( Siegel and Claydon, 2016 ). In our experience, access to flexibly furnished technological classrooms is limited. A reason for this may be that a considerable share of learning spaces is occupied by either lecture theatres or rooms with permanently installed equipment, limiting the applicability of Active Digital Learning Pedagogy.

Acknowledging these barriers, we suggest that a vigorous and more beneficial way forward is to reduce barriers by facilitating the prerequisites for Active Learning Pedagogy. Therefore, we end this section by presenting a list of steps that need to be taken for the “resetting of education and training for the digital age” (as worded in the EC’s Digital Education Action Plan):

• Support student-centred teaching cultures.

• Introduce personalised digital incentive structures.

• Equate the status of research and teaching.

• Redesign the physical infrastructure.

With this list in mind, we propose actions to be taken by higher education institutions.

Needed Institutional Actions

A recent study on active blended learning suggested that institutions aiming to promote large-scale sustainable change should actively promote changes in teaching practices and educational beliefs among teachers ( Antunes et al., 2021 ). The same applies to technological skills. Børte et al. (2020) stress that there is an urgent need for more technological skills among higher education teachers. We strongly support this view. We believe that it is necessary for educational leaders at all levels to encourage reform in teaching, provide opportunities to increase teachers’ technological skills, and confront established beliefs about education, especially those that are not supported by recent research.

It has been suggested that leadership responsibilities are more in the hands of institutional administration than academic leadership ( Damşa et al., 2015 ). Therefore, increased attention to contextual factors may be required. An urgent step to be taken by institutions is to provide incentives for the compensation of teachers for digital development work and guarantee their ownership of video lectures and other digital material created without the direct involvement of institutional support functions. Reuse must be compensated for in a reasonable manner. Although this may be seen as costly in the short term, increased opportunities for the reuse of digital material may produce the opposite outcome. However, to take full advantage of such opportunities, educational leadership and planning across units and programmes are required.

Another issue is that good teaching practices are not being transferred to colleagues, nor do they change practices over time ( Sinclair and Aho, 2018 ). The implementation of Active Learning Pedagogy should adopt a scientific approach, including dissemination in conferences and academic journals. To achieve this, both administrative support functions and educational research networks at institutions must be strengthened.

Good will and ambitious institutional strategies may not be enough. It is imperative that institutions take a holistic approach to educational quality and the design of the physical environment on campuses. In our experience, the design, maintenance, and rebuilding of learning spaces are often the responsibilities of separate institution departments. We believe that learning spaces designed for a particular pedagogy or practical skill should be kept to a minimum. The requirements for spaces suitable for Active Digital Learning Pedagogy should be met. Educational spaces that meet basic technological requirements (e.g., wall-mounted monitors, wireless internet access, and power outlets for laptops) may offer better and longer-term solutions than advanced digital showroom prototypes. Based on observations at our university, pilot digital learning spaces that meet these requirements have become immensely popular with teachers and students, even in after-work hours. We believe that this type of flexibly furnished digital learning spaces is the future.

Concluding Remarks

Significant pedagogical advancements in the use of digital technologies can be achieved only if higher education leaders and teachers pull in the same direction. Active Digital Learning Pedagogy and our suggested preliminary list of pedagogical prerequisites can provide insights into how to “pull” and in what direction. This unstructured literature review, informed by our own experiences as digital innovators, made us realise that the digital transformation of higher education can be far slower than desired, and is even at risk of maintaining at status quo. This is a problem: Higher education students of today are familiar with using digital technologies in their daily life and will increasingly expect educational practices that fully utilise the opportunities offered by digital learning technologies. There is a need for empirical research to investigate how our proposed pedagogical prescriptions for active digital pedagogy can move the digitalisation of higher education forward. In order to facilitate an Active Digital Learning Pedagogy, we propose that institutional actions must be taken.

Data Availability Statement

The original contributions presented in the study are included in the article/Supplementary Material, further inquiries can be directed to the corresponding author.

Author Contributions

YR was responsible for the planning of the paper. YR, SW, and AB participated in the writing of the paper.

Conflict of Interest

The authors declare that the research was conducted in the absence of any commercial or financial relationships that could be construed as a potential conflict of interest.

Publisher’s Note

All claims expressed in this article are solely those of the authors and do not necessarily represent those of their affiliated organizations, or those of the publisher, the editors and the reviewers. Any product that may be evaluated in this article, or claim that may be made by its manufacturer, is not guaranteed or endorsed by the publisher.

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Keywords: digital education, educational technology, pedagogy, blended learning, active learning pedagogy

Citation: Røe Y, Wojniusz S and Bjerke AH (2022) The Digital Transformation of Higher Education Teaching: Four Pedagogical Prescriptions to Move Active Learning Pedagogy Forward. Front. Educ. 6:784701. doi: 10.3389/feduc.2021.784701

Received: 28 September 2021; Accepted: 30 December 2021; Published: 14 January 2022.

Reviewed by:

Copyright © 2022 Røe, Wojniusz and Bjerke. This is an open-access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License (CC BY). The use, distribution or reproduction in other forums is permitted, provided the original author(s) and the copyright owner(s) are credited and that the original publication in this journal is cited, in accordance with accepted academic practice. No use, distribution or reproduction is permitted which does not comply with these terms.

*Correspondence: Yngve Røe, [email protected]

This article is part of the Research Topic

Pedagogical Methods and Technological Resources in Education in Times of Pandemic

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Related Expertise: Education , K–12 Education

Closing the Digital Divide in US Education—for Good

June 03, 2021  By  Sumit Chandra ,  Hannah Hill ,  Tejus Kothari ,  Lane McBride , and  Nithya Vaduganathan

When American K-12 public schools in all 50 states closed their doors in March 2020, the inequities and scale of the digital divide were abruptly unmasked. According to BCG research in 2020, coauthored with Common Sense, roughly 30% of children in grades K-12 (15 million to 16 million students) did not have adequate internet service or e-learning devices to effectively continue their schooling from home. While this is a challenge in every state, the digital divide most acutely affects students from rural and Southern communities. It also disproportionately affects Black, Latinx, and Native American students and those from lower-income households.

When the pandemic struck, many states and districts swiftly mobilized to address the needs of their digitally underserved students, often making use of the emergency funding authorized in March by the Coronavirus Aid, Relief, and Economic Security (CARES) Act. They purchased devices, hot spots, and other resources and partnered with providers to offer sponsored service at no cost to eligible households, among other initiatives. Yet BCG research showed that while these measures were significant, up to 12 million K-12 students nationwide remained inadequately connected at the start of 2021 and more than 75% of these efforts will expire in the next one to three years. Progress in serving these students was hampered by poor broadband mapping data, limitations of infrastructure and supply chains , insufficient marketing and adoption support, and inadequate funding.

Digital Access, Educational Inclusion, and Economic Opportunity

Even as students return to school in person, eliminating the digital divide for good is essential. Lack of access away from the school building contributes to significant curtailment of students’ learning, which translates to income losses that can last throughout their lives. Our research estimates that even when students are learning in the classroom, the lower lifetime income of the cohort of K-12 students caught in the digital divide will result in a $22 billion to $33 billion annual GDP loss. This number is likely to grow as learning at all levels continues to shift to digital platforms and jobs increasingly rely on digital skills.

• K–12 Education
• How COVID-19 Advanced Digital Learning for Lower-Income Populations
• Closing the K–12 Digital Divide in the Age of Distance Learning
• The Economic Case for Bringing Broadband to the Rural US

The lower lifetime income of the current cohort of students caught in the digital divide will result in a $22 billion to $33 billion annual GDP loss.

Closing the digital divide and investing in innovative delivery that leverages digital connectivity is about stimulating step changes in pedagogy—unlocking new ways of learning and teaching students the skills essential to their future, next-generation jobs, and economic growth. With fully connected students and interactive technology tools and data, teachers can hone new models for teaching and learning; for instance, by unlocking more personalized learning pathways for students and analyzing data on learning progressions to tailor practices and enhance curricula.

To close the digital divide for good, we must address the three major barriers to access: affordability, availability, and adoption. Our research found that up to 60% of students without digital access (9 million), especially disconnected Black and urban students, are unable to afford it. Up to 25% (4 million) lack access to readily available and reliable broadband service, a barrier that disproportionately affects rural and Native American students. Finally, up to 40% (6 million) face adoption challenges such as digital literacy and language barriers. Many students face more than one barrier to adoption.

The Long Game for States and Districts

Since the adoption of the CARES Act, Congress has passed two other economic recovery bills: the Coronavirus Response and Relief Supplemental Appropriations Act of 2021 in December 2020 and the American Rescue Plan Act (ARP) in March 2021. This legislation includes additional funding for K-12 education that can be applied to a range of pandemic-related expenses, including distance learning, broadband-specific data collection, infrastructure deployment, service cost support, and other digital inclusion initiatives with a special focus on vulnerable communities. Notably, the ARP budgets more than $7 billion to expand the federal E-Rate connectivity program for schools and libraries to include delivering affordable connectivity directly into students’ homes.

These funds offer a unique opportunity for states and districts to lay the foundation for permanently eliminating the digital divide. Many are already doing so. More than 40 states now have offices dedicated to expanding broadband availability, affordability, and adoption—double the number of just a year ago.

To drive universal access, our analysis of strategies across the US highlights promising practices to replicate going forward.

Repeatable collection of data, with input from internet service providers, will help identify which providers could best service specific households.

• Create replicable data collection processes for needs assessments. Plan for repeatable collection of both student-level needs data through student information systems (SIS) and household-level coverage data, with input from internet service providers, to help inform and target solutions. Wisconsin’s Department of Public Instruction partnered with two education nonprofits and local providers to launch a data governance strategy in less than a month. They rolled out a survey using three SIS vendors serving 98% of schools in the state, and then securely overlaid data from broadband coverage maps to identify which providers could best service specific households.
• Reduce the cost of universal infrastructure deployment . Maximize use of available funds at the federal, state, and local levels for state projects. Decrease upfront investment costs, including lowering middle mile costs (the cost of connecting local internet service networks to the broader internet backbone). Coordinate broadband delivery through relevant frameworks, including “dig-once,” (a policy to reduce the number and scale of excavations for infrastructure), capacity leasing, and municipal network regulations. Consider a portfolio of strategies and technologies, such as satellites and mesh networks, especially in rural areas where fiber deployment may not be financially feasible. In the 1990s, North Dakota used federal funds to aggregate rural carriers into one statewide network. Their effort made rural broadband expansion in remote communities more financially attractive.
• Support affordable solutions with aggregated procurement. Create state- and district-level discounted or no-cost sponsored-service offerings to maximize volume discounts and minimize risk and churn for internet service providers (ISPs). Consider bundling broadband and device access for students. Alabama’s state-led voucher program covered the cost of installation, equipment, and service for up to 450,000 low-income students. The program focused on addressing upfront affordability challenges so that households were best positioned to take over ongoing service fees when the program ended. In addition, awareness and adoption campaigns promoting financial assistance programs—such as Lifeline, the recently launched Emergency Broadband Benefit, and rental assistance programs where broadband is an allowed expenditure—can help expand affordable access for students and the community at large.
• Engage stakeholders to support hard-to-reach families and address nonfinancial adoption barriers . Develop strategies to address barriers such as low digital and technical literacy . Trusted school districts and educators can play a focal role in the community, offering technical support and digital skills training for students, parents, and other residents. Chicago Connected, a multistakeholder partnership with schools and 35 community-based organizations, offers one-on-one assistance to families, including digital literacy training and internet adoption support. The program ensured that the voices of parents and community advocates were integral to the design and implementation process. The program continues to evolve; for example, a project-wide working group was set up to identify the digital literacy resources needed by applicants and participants.

Cross-Sector Stakeholder Strategies

Closing the divide requires strong policy direction and funding from federal, state, and local entities, as well as engagement and ongoing investment from stakeholders across the private and social sectors. The federal government, ISPs, school districts, education nonprofits, and philanthropies all have critical roles to play—individually and collectively.

Closing the divide requires strong policy direction and funding from government entities, as well as engagement and ongoing investment from stakeholders across the private and social sectors.

• Federal, state, and local policies can collectively unlock sustainable funding. This will ensure that there is transparent, affordable pricing for low-income families and support for broader digital inclusion and skill-building programs. These programs should incentivize tech-agnostic investment to establish broadband access where none exists and to expand connectivity where speeds are inadequate for remote learning or cost is a challenge.
• Broadband providers and device manufacturers can establish cost-effective offerings and invest in infrastructure to expand access and improve the quality of connections and devices. They must work jointly with local stakeholders to encourage adoption and support families and students.
• Philanthropies, EdTech companies, and education industry associations are critical catalysts of change and continuous improvement—for example, conducting ongoing research on family and learning needs and amplifying messages for specific groups or unifying them for all groups. The support and advocacy of these education sector players are crucial to inform policy and to stimulate ongoing investment in digitally enabled learning.

The Bigger Picture of the Digital Divide

While our three research reports on the digital divide in the US have focused mainly on K-12 students, it exists at all educational levels, affecting 3 million to 4 million US postsecondary students or about 15% of all students attending four-year private and public colleges and two-year community colleges. In addition, 20 million to 30 million US households that do not have children enrolled in primary or secondary schools cannot afford high-speed internet, do not have access to it in their communities, or have experienced other adoption barriers.

The same technical and economic challenges we found in the US are amplified many times over in countries with the largest populations living in extreme poverty. In India, more than 60% of the country’s 250 million pre-K-12 students do not have access to optimal educational technology in school or at home. During the early days of the pandemic, BCG worked with the National Institution for Transforming India and three state governments to expand connectivity and develop educational content across smartphones, television, and radio.

Although the global pandemic has been extremely disruptive for learning, it has greatly heightened awareness of the longer-term consequences of the digital divide throughout the world and stimulated both governments and the private sector to act. In the US, economic recovery funds, state- and district-level initiatives, and digital access commitments from ISPs have put society on the cusp of what could be a generational milestone—when all students and households have the technology and support they need to succeed. Federal momentum is growing to provide additional funding and support to ensure that this happens. President Biden’s proposed infrastructure plans include billions of dollars to fund initiatives that address racial and social inequities and deliver broadband access to every American.

As leaders in every country anticipate a post-COVID future, this is a unique moment to make transformative investments in K-12 education and beyond. Actions taken today to eliminate systemic inequities and to strengthen the connection between a solid formative education and economic opportunity can advance human well-being for years to come.

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What you need to know about digital learning and transformation of education

Why does unesco consider digital innovation in education important.

Digital technology has become a social necessity to ensure education as a basic human right, especially in a world experiencing more frequent crises and conflicts. During the COVID-19 pandemic, countries without sufficient ICT infrastructure and well-resourced digital learning systems suffered the greatest education disruptions and learning losses. This situation left as many as one third of students around the world without access to learning during the school closures for more than a year. The COVID-19 education disruption clearly revealed the urgent need to ally technologies and human resources to transform schooling models and to build inclusive, open and resilient learning systems. UNESCO supports the use of digital innovation in expanding access to educational opportunities and advancing inclusion, enhancing the relevance and quality of learning, building ICT-enhanced lifelong learning pathways, strengthening education and learning management systems, and monitoring learning processes. To achieve these goals, UNESCO works to develop digital literacy and digital competencies with a focus on teachers and students.

What is UNESCO’s approach to this work?

UNESCO takes a humanistic approach to ensure that technology will be designed to serve people in accordance with internationally agreed human rights frameworks, and that digital technologies will be leveraged as a common good to support the achievement of SDG 4 – Education 2030 and to build shared futures of education beyond 2030. UNESCO promotes digital inclusion to centre most marginalized groups including females, low-income groups, people with disabilities as well as linguistic and cultural minority communities. UNESCO guides international efforts to help countries understand the role that technology can play to accelerate progress toward the education goal, Sustainable Development Goal 4 , as envisioned in the 2015 Qingdao Declaration and the 2017 Qingdao Statement , 2019 Recommendation on Open Educational Resources , 2019 Beijing Consensus on AI and Education , and 2021 UNESCO Strategy on Technological Innovation in Education (2022 - 2025). UNESCO supports its Member States to design, integrate and implement effective national policies and masterplans on digital learning making sure activities on the ground answer the needs of each country and community with a special focus on disadvantaged populations.

The Organization strengthens its observatory function of emergent technological transformations and their implications for education through producing and disseminating knowledge and recognized frameworks, such as Guidelines for ICT in Education Policies and Masterplans , Artificial Intelligence and Education: Guidance for Policy-makers , Guidelines on the Development of Open Educational Resource Policies , the UNESCO ICT Competency Framework for Teachers (ICT-CFT) , K-12 AI curricula: A mapping of government-endorsed AI curricula , and the UNESCO Guidance for teachers on distance learning . It also promote grass-rooted best practices through the UNESCO King Hamad Bin Isa Al-Khalifa Prize for the use of ICT in Education , best practices on OER , best practices in mobile learning and on AI and education . Finally, UNESCO organizes international conferences including Mobile Learning Week and the International Forum on AI and education .

What are Open Educational Resources?

Open Educational Resources (OERs) are teaching, learning or research materials that are freely accessible to everyone. UNESCO supports their development and use, and undertakes work to develop indicators to monitor and evaluate their use and impact, facilitating the creation of national OER policies. UNESCO developed and adopted international consensuses and instruments including The Paris OER Declaration 2012 and UNESCO Recommendation on OER , as well as provides guidelines on the development of OER policies , and provides technical support for Member States to develop strategies on adopting OER . The Organization also cooperates with partners on providing openly available and high-quality reading resources to children in the language they speak at home through the Global Digital Library and Translate a Story campaign .

What is the role of Artificial Intelligence in education and how does UNESCO support it?

Artificial intelligence (AI) has the potential to address many big challenges in education as well as bringing innovation to teaching and learning practices. At the same time, the application of these technologies must be guided by the principles of inclusion and equity. UNESCO supports Member States to harness the potential of AI to achieve the Education 2030 Agenda while using a human-centred approach. It focuses on AI’s role addressing inequalities regarding access to knowledge, research and diversity of cultural expressions to ensure it does not widen technological divides within and between countries. In line with the 2019 Beijing Consensus on Artificial Intelligence and Education and the 2019 International Conference on Artificial Intelligence and Education, UNESCO has developed Artificial Intelligence and Education: Guidance for Policy-makers for practitioners and professionals in policy-making and education communities currently available in the six UN languages.

How does UNESCO work to ensure women and girls are better represented in digital disciplines?

Gender inequalities in access to new technologies impacts the competencies and future professional development of women and girls in digital disciplines, which also leads to gender bias in the development of AI and technological tools. Indeed, women and girls are underrepresented in ICT disciplines, in the ICT sector, and in AI development with 80 per cent of software development created by male-only teams. UNESCO leverages partnerships such as the UNESCO-Huawei Technology Enabled Open Schools for All project to help expose girls to technology early on at the school level, train them for the technological sector and support their studies in AI and new technologies.

Why is technology so important in times of crises like COVID-19?

UNESCO has been working to mitigate the impact of education disruption and school closures. Effective distance learning solutions have allowed teachers and policy-makers to continue with the national lesson plans using the digital and technological resources at hand. In this regard, UNESCO has developed several tools which offer best practices, innovative ideas and recommendations with  Guidance on distance learning and Distance learning solutions .

Beyond the response to the current crisis, the efforts to deploy distance learning at scale across all levels of education provides valuable lessons and may lay the foundation for longer-term goals of building more open, inclusive and flexible education systems after the COVID-19 pandemic has subsided.

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Article contents

Digital culture and qualitative methodologies in education.

• Eliane Schlemmer Eliane Schlemmer Universidade do Vale do Rio dos Sinos - UNISOS
• https://doi.org/10.1093/acrefore/9780190264093.013.508
• Published online: 30 September 2019

From a digital culture perspective, this article has as main objective to assess two contemporary qualitative research methods in the field of education with distinct theoretical orientations: the cartographic method as a way of tracing trajectories in research-intervention with a theoretical basis in the biology of knowledge, enactive cognition and inventive cognition; and the cartographic method as a means of identifying and mapping the controversies linked to the different associations between human and non-human actors with a theoretical basis in actor-network theory (ANT). With their own specificities, both methods have been fruitful in the development of qualitative research in the field of education, in the context of digital culture, and more recently, in the hybrid culture of atopic habitation, mainly because they also relate to equally consistent theories and aspects of human cognition, making it possible to detect traces and clues in the fluid associations between actors enhanced by different digital technologies (DT), including data mining and learning analytics. From the Brazilian perspective on the topic, this article approaches the experience of the cartographic method of research intervention as well as the cartography of controversies as tools for developing qualitative research in education. These different forms of the cartographic method have inspired the construction of didactic-pedagogical experiences based on theoretical approaches linked to cognition, producing inventive methodologies and interventionist pedagogical practices. These methodologies and practices, which will be discussed at length in this article, have been developed and validated by the Research Group in Digital Education at Unisinos University at different levels and in varied educational settings.

• qualitative research
• cartography
• digital culture
• multimodality
• pervasiveness

Introduction

A version of this article in its original language.

A social group’s socialization is made visible by a distinctive way of acting, which develops rituals representing emotions, common values, and norms for coexistence, all of which contribute to constructing a culture. This makes it possible to refer, for example, to a pre-digital, digital, or gamer culture, and, more recently, a hybrid culture in atopic habitation.

Research itself is also embedded in a culture, which is evident in the understanding of what science is and how to do science in different areas of knowledge. This way of doing science, of researching, has faced new challenges and implications arising mainly from exponential digital technological growth.

The production of knowledge, as well as its almost instantaneous dissemination, produces broad access to ever greater amounts of information in a very short time, providing direct interaction with the researcher or research group responsible for a given discovery and/or innovation, as well as the constitution of research networks. This movement, so characteristic of contemporary scientific inquiry, instigates dialogue among fields, allowing distinct areas of knowledge to overlap and establish new research contexts. Thus we have seen the emergence of biomedicine, biotechnology, food engineering, and informatics in digital education/education, among many others, posing new methodological research challenges.

Lopes and Schlemmer ( 2017 ), point out that research in education in the context of digital culture has sought theoretical and methodological references that can support the complexity of knowledge production in this context, provoking dialogue and the problematization of the very theoretical and epistemological field that sustains it, in addition to the simple problematization related to the use of specific digital technologies (DT) and their effects on education. In this sense, theorists such as Pierre Lévy, Manuel Castells, Bruno Latour, Michel Maffesoli, Massimo Di Felice, Lúcia Santaella, and André Lemos, among others, problematize the sociocultural dimension of digital technological development, allowing us to broaden the focus of research into the contexts of emerging digital culture and, according to Schlemmer ( 2018 ), hybrid culture in atopic habitation, as well as to understand how this phenomenon relates to the field of education. It is therefore a matter of researching the broader meanings that these cultures produce in the field of teaching and learning, that is, the broader field of education.

With this context in mind, the following is a presentation of the research we have conducted as part of the Research Group in Digital Education, which highlights some of the concerns, strategies, and theoretical and methodological approaches that we have adopted in our research in the field of education in digital culture, and more recently in the hybrid culture in atopic habitation, which has enabled us to engage in broader and deeper dialogue. The objective is to consider the cartographic method of intervention research so as to highlight the research process, showing how we gradually adopted digital culture research methods before arriving at the cartographic method of intervention research and the cartography of controversies, which are discussed at length in this article.

From Digital Culture to Hybrid Culture in Atopic Habitation: Challenges for Qualitative Research in Education

In the field of research on education and digital culture in Brazil, Schlemmer, Lopes, and Molina ( 2012 ) outline some epistemological and methodological challenges on experiments in providing guidance by master’s and doctoral students in education. These challenges involve the construction of research objects and problems in the field of education and digital culture in DT contexts, including virtual learning environments, digital social media, and 3D digital virtual worlds. The authors propose rethinking the term virtual as a demarcation of an epistemological and methodological frontier in the ethnographic research of education and digital culture. They argue that the term digital would be more appropriate in distinguishing this border. They also suggest that the term netnography would be the most appropriate in a theoretical-methodological ethnographic research design in education and digital culture.

With this perspective, Lopes, Schlemmer, and Molina ( 2014b ) present some approaches to developing research and new procedures involving the use of applications (apps) and mobile devices (netbooks, tablets, and smartphones) in ethnographic research based on the project “Escola aumentada: Cartografia digital e mobilidade para a aprendizagem e a cidadania.” For the authors, the development of mobile technologies, geolocation (GPS and locative media), and distributed online databases (cloud computing) created new possibilities for the production of records and interactions in ethnographic research. While the diversity of digital records (text, photo, audio, and video) coupled with indexing and tagging mechanisms (tags, hashtags, geotags, etc.) opens up new possibilities for research, it also requires participants to understand the relevant syntax and new technological procedures for the production, recording, and sharing of information. Some programs and applications for desktop and mobile devices such as NVivo and Evernote, among others, can facilitate this process, contributing to the planning and organization of such production. The authors also refer to participatory research methodologies capable of involving researchers and subjects in the production and analysis of data. The current technological context, they note, can consolidate a new scenario in the field of research in which scholars and subjects act as co-producers of knowledge. In this sense, cartography mediated by digital devices emerges as a rich methodological possibility, involving social actors in the context of local problems. This engagement is a necessary condition for the production of meaning through the shared and mediated use of DT in the process of knowledge construction. This scenario can reconfigure both the research itself and the contract between researchers and subjects, since action and participation become instances of authorship from which all sides speak and produce.

Expanding their experimentation along with the discussion over the cartographic method, Lopes, Schlemmer, and Molina ( 2014a ) carried out an early attempt to map actions linked to a digital inclusion program—Província de São Pedro (PSP)—to distribute netbooks and tablets to teachers and students, initially prioritizing schools in cities participating in the Territories of Peace Program (Programa Territórios de Paz, PTP) to address the following research problem: What is the reasoning for linking an educational program of digital inclusion to a public safety program? The objective of the research was to understand the ties between such programs. Thus, the authors present digital cartography as a methodological proposition for online research and indicate the digital map of culture in Rio Grande do Sul (RS) and digital cartography as technological possibilities to promote greater connectivity between such programs.

Schlemmer and Lopes ( 2016 ) and Schlemmer ( 2016a ) also analyze the potential of the method to inspire new practices in line with the need to understand the phenomenon of learning in all its complexity—social, political, cognitive, affective, and technological—precisely because of its interventionist nature. In this context, the authors present a theoretical, methodological, and technological experiment developed in higher education and inspired by the cartographic method as a way of monitoring and evaluating learning in gamified processes and games from an interventionist perspective developed in a hybrid, multimodal, pervasive, and ubiquitous context.

Lopes and Schlemmer ( 2017 ) problematize the ethical, epistemological, and methodological aspects related to the field of education in digital culture, reflecting on how ethics can dialogue with the choices scholars make when conducting research. The authors present the paths adopted in two surveys conducted between 2010 and 2015 with a state public school in the metropolitan region of Porto Alegre participating in government programs for digital inclusion. Founded on the intervention research cartographic method, they present some of the results of discussions with teachers and students, based on the experience of producing and publishing information on the Internet. They problematize the ethical dilemma of research intervention based on the idea of technological appropriation, as a process that is established from the changes of practices that take place in contexts of analogical school culture and digital culture. They discuss and propose, based on the results of the research, overcoming the ethical dilemma of children and young students participating in surveys involving the publication of online content and the fears regarding media exposure—namely, the production and access to inappropriate content—and inattention in the classroom.

This research demonstrates that the cartographic method has been relevant, especially when the research tries to understand phenomena related to learning in the digital culture or, more recently, in the hybrid culture in an atopic habitation. Associated with this perspective, in the digital technological context are systems of data mining and learning analytics that make it possible to more effectively follow the tracks left by the subjects in the different spaces in which they interact.

Hybrid, in this context, refers to the mix between different elements resulting in a new element composed of the previous ones. For Latour ( 1994 ), the hybrid consists of multiple matrices, mixtures of nature and culture, which is therefore contrary to the separation between culture/nature, human/non human, among other things.

By atopic habitation, Di Felice ( 2009 ) refers to a relationship, a form of communication, characterized by the network interactions between different human and non human collectives, digital and territorial technologies. Atopic habitation “is thus the transient and fluid hybridization of bodies, technologies and landscapes, and as the advent of a new typology of ecosystem, neither organic, nor inorganic, nor static, nor delimitable, but informative and immaterial” (p. 291).

Thus, according to Schlemmer ( 2013 , 2014 , 2015 , 2016a , 2016b , 2016c , 2017 ), the hybrid is understood to be a mixture of space (geographic and digital), presence (physical and digital), technologies (analogue and digital), and culture (pre-digital and digital). It is in this context that the term multimodal is used, which includes the different imbricated educational modalities: the presential-physical modality and online modality and, while online, being able to combine elements of electronic learning, mobile learning, pervasive learning, ubiquitous learning, immersive learning, gamification learning, and game-based learning.

When scholars refer to hybridism in atopic habitation, in multimodality, pervasiveness, and ubiquity, they mean actions and interactions between human actors (HA) and non-human actors (NHA), in geographic and digital spaces, in interactions of different cultures (digital and pre-digital), constituting inseparable networks linking interconnected natures, techniques, and cultures. This suggests that a new understanding of culture and society may be emerging, one that embraces coexistence, co-engendering, mutual respect, solidarity, and the recognition of the other as a legitimate interlocutor. Thus, it is worth seeking to understand what these changes might mean in the area of education and, by extension, for research in education.

It is in this context that two contemporary methodological approaches are presented and discussed within the scope of qualitative research in education, linked to specific theoretical orientations.

The Cartographic Method of Research Intervention in Relation to Cognition Sciences

The cartographic method of intervention research is based on the cartographic method proposed by Deleuze and Guattari ( 1995 ). This method has been developed in Brazil by Kastrup ( 2007 , 2008 ), Passos, Kastrup, and Escóssia ( 2009 ), and Passos, Kastrup, and Tedesco ( 2014 ) as a means of interventionist research.

According to Passos et al. ( 2009 ), this approach originated from concerns about research methodology, which requires more open and, at the same time, inventive procedures. Thus, the theme of cartography emerged as a methodological issue in the face of impasses in cognition research, developed by the research group Cognição e Subjetividades. 1 The method began taking shape when the members of the research group questioned the assumption that knowledge means representing or recognizing reality by configuring the importance of the binomial cognition/creation and calling for a more detailed investigation process into the temporal dimension of knowledge production processes. Thus, the authors defined the concept of cognition as creative, autopoietic (Humberto Maturana and Francisco Varela, 2001 ), or enactive (Francisco Varela, 1988 ).

Maturana and Rezepka ( 2000 ) suggest that the way people attribute meaning and learn has a distinctly human quality, since people are autonomous and autopoietic, in congruence with the environment in which they are inserted. This congruence can cause disturbances in the structure of human beings, promoting learning processes insofar as the structure self-produces to compensate for the disturbance. Thus, for Maturana ( 1993a , 1993b ), learning is the act of transforming within a particular environment of recurrent interactions, and happens as the behavior of an organism varies during its ontogenesis in a manner congruent with the variations of the environment (Maturana, 1998 ). Therefore, when I refer to a medium or a hybrid, it means that the congruence of the subject with this environment causes disruptions in the structure of this subject, which allows him or her to attribute meanings that originate from the action and interaction in that space, thus promoting learning processes as the structure reproduces itself to compensate for the disturbance, and in so doing, compounds its ontogeny.

The process of cognition consists of creating a range of behaviors through conduct within a field of interactions. Knowledge, from this perspective, is not simply representation, but implies a permanent interpretation of action. For Varela ( 1990 ), interpretation and knowledge are emergent (in the sense of emerging) results of action or acting in the world. Thus, greater capacity for cognition consists, to a large extent, of asking the pertinent questions that arise at every moment of our life. These are not predefined but rather enactive: they emerge from action in the world, the relevant aspect being what our common sense deems appropriate within a given context. Thus, knower and what is known, subject and object, determine each other and arise simultaneously. The enactive orientation proposes an intermediate way of transcending both extremes: subject and object define each other and are correlative.

The central point of cognition for Maturana and Varela ( 1997 ) is its ability to elicit meaning: knowledge is not predetermined or established a priori, but implicit in regular processes of cognitive activities themselves. In this way, cognition is not the representation of a world that exists independently, but rather the “production” of a world through the process of living, the “continuous coincidence of our being, our doing and our knowing” (p. 20).

According to Passos ( 2015 ), “to know is to enter a structural coupling with the environment, to interact” (p. 85). However, the understanding of interaction changes in this perspective because it no longer assumes the preexistence of the two terms (organism and environment, subject and object) that interact. To interact in this perspective means to construct oneself and the environment, being, therefore, the “act of knowing reality, an act of affirmation of self, self-surrendering, of autopoiesis. By redefining the cognitive act, its representational sense disappears” (p. 86). In this way, transgression lies in imbuing knowledge with pragmatic value that makes it a performative act, in which to know is to do and vice versa. This delegitimizes the understanding of knowledge through transparency or indifference of the cognitive act: “The whole act of knowing is a form of engagement in the world, of commitment to the world that constitutes itself in this act” (p. 86).

An important element that marks the difference between the enactive approach and any form of biological constructivism or neo-Kantianism is the emphasis on codetermination. In this context, the understanding that conduct is potentially unpredictable marks a departure from the theoretical approach of Maturana and Varela, from other behaviorist and Piagetian approaches.

In this perspective, according to Passos et al. ( 2009 ), subject and object—the poles of cognoscence—are outcomes of cognitive activity rather than conditions. By broadening the concept of cognition and understanding it as linked to creation, the production of knowledge pragmatically and reciprocally shapes the self and the cognitive domain such that cognitive practice engenders subjectivity, overcoming an understanding of dependence of a cognitive subject and a given world, understood as invariant fundamentals. Understanding of cognition as an act of creation brings with it “the problem of the ethical commitment of the cognitive act to the created reality. Production of knowledge, production of subjectivity” (p. 13). The methodological problem is set as follows: “How to study the plane of reality production? What method allows us to follow these processes?” (p. 13). Instead of rules to be applied in the method, the authors offer clues to guide the researcher, since it is not always possible to predetermine every methodological procedure: “The clues that guide the cartographer are like references that contribute to maintaining an attitude of openness to what is happening and of calibrating the course of the research—the meta-hodos of research” (p. 13).

Initially, eight points were proposed to guide the practice of the cartographic method. These were not laid out in hierarchical order but as a rhizome (based on Deleuze & Guattari, 1995 ), referring to each other and forming a set of connections and references to order, develop, and collectivize the cartographer’s experience.

According to Passos et al. ( 2009 ), cartography is an intervention research method (point 1) that aims to track the process, through clues, guiding the course of the research, without establishing a linear path to an end. In this way, it considers the effects of the research process on the research object, the researcher, and the results, and does not simply represent an object: “Cartography seeks to ensure the accuracy of the method without giving up the unpredictability of the process of knowledge production, which is a positive requirement of the ad hoc investigation process” (Kastrup, 2007 , p. 19). What sets it apart from other approaches is the focus on the process and not the end result. With the aim of tracking the process (point 3), clues may arise, which might help to describe, discuss, and, above all, to collect the experience of the cartographer.

In this sense, the cartographer needs to keep in mind that the action of researching his object in motion constitutes a practice in which his path establishes links with the participants inserted into the context of what is being investigated. This composition of agency between heterogeneous actors is expressed by Barros and Kastrup ( 2009 ), drawing from Caiafa ( 2007 ). For these authors, agency implies a relationship of cooperation, a kind of sympathy, which, in addition to a simple feeling of esteem, refers to a composition of bodies implying mutual affection that enable the ethnographer to effectively “enter into relationship with the heterogeneous ones that surround it, to act with them, to write with them” (Barros & Kastrup, 2009 , p. 57).

According to Passos et al. ( 2009 ), cartography as a methodological orientation needs to be articulated using three ideas that make up a plan of action or a research plan: transversality, implication, and the dissolution of the observer’s point of view (point 6). In traditional third- and first-person methodologies, there is always the imposition of a point of view capable of representing or signifying the object at hand. There must be an observer, which implies the “subject–object separation or duality, as well as the imposition of an interpretative reference frame separate from experience” (Passos & Eirado, 2009 , p. 121). These authors discuss the work of Varela, Thompson, and Rosch ( 2003 ), who point out that third-person methodology does not work when studying cognition or the mind, because there is a circularity between knowledge and the known world that is fundamental but often overlooked. This is more evident in studies of cognition because it is not possible to separate the structure that is known from the experience of knowing. This understanding of cognitive experience as its own creation, that is, of both the known object and the subject it knows, which occurs in circular motion, is called “enactive action or approach, modulating the notion of autopoiesis formulated by Maturana and Varela in the 1970s” (Passos & Eirado, 2009 , p. 121).

For Passos and Eirado ( 2009 ), the biology of knowledge, autopoiesis, accepts the challenge of thinking without a foundation, since third-person methodology needs to be complemented by first-person methodology. Woven together, these make it possible to penetrate the circularity that arises in the experience of acquiring knowledge. The cartographer has to avoid merely seeking solutions and testing hypotheses, for “he does not take the self as an object, but the self-emergence processes as the destabilization of the points of view that collapse the experience in the (‘internal’) self” (p. 123). He must inhabit the experience without being bound by any point of view, his main task being to dissolve the observer’s point of view without neglecting observation. Enaction assumes that all experience emerges from experimentation, since it does not refer to what is already a given but rather the emergence of change. Data does not exist a priori, waiting to be gathered, instead, it is constituted in the experience itself. In this way, it is up to the cartographer to accompany this emergence of himself and the world in the experience, and for this it is imperative to be immersed and never immune to the process.

Kastrup and Barros ( 2009 ) argue that the method is not a research model developed through clues, strategies, and procedures. The procedures are embodied in apparatuses (dispositif) that perform important and distinct functions in the operation of cartography. 2 Grounded in Deleuze’s work, they understand apparatuses as “machines that make it possible to see and speak,” composed of lines of visibility, enunciation, force, and subjectification. These apparatuses are aligned with the process of creation, and the work of the researcher-cartographer is to unravel these lines and monitor their effects. The purpose of the apparatus involves three movement functions (point 4): reference (more or less regular apparatus, in which repetition and variation are articulated); explicitation (research territory to be explored, explicitation of the lines that participate in the ongoing production process, inseparable dimensions, research and intervention); and transformation production (“transformation of the relations between the elements/lines/affective, cognitive, institutional, micro and macropolitical vectors, activating movements and sustaining processes of production” [Kastrup & Barros, 2009 , p. 80]). Cartography can produce and transform the reality to be analyzed. In this way, mapping implies intervention.

The cartographer, the person using the cartographic method, does so through “cartographic attention.” Cartographic attention (point 2), according to Kastrup ( 2007 , p. 15), is based on Freud’s concept of “free-floating attention” and Bergson’s concept of “attentive recognition.” It is concentrated and open with four varieties (movements): tracing, touch, landing, and attentive recognition. The cartographer’s work begins with tracing , which involves scanning/sweeping the field, an overview with open and unfocused attention. It is a broader look at something that touches it, beyond the search for information. Touch triggers the selection process, the first meaning, the first analysis performed on the selection process. It is characterized by a quick sense of focus on attention, when something touches, it draws attention, causing it to become alert, but that does not yet define what the cartographer will focus on. The movement that refers to a defined point of attention and focus is the landing , which is to stop, zoom in, choose/define, and indicate that the selected element needs to be inspected more closely for analysis. That is, “the landing gesture indicates that the perception, whether it is visual, auditory or otherwise, makes a stop and the field closes in a kind of zoom. A new territory is formed, the field of observation is reconfigured” (Kastrup, 2009 , p. 43). The fourth and final movement is of Bergson’s attentive recognition , characterized by an investigative attitude about the landing, to which the cartographer’s attention is drawn. It represents analysis itself.

The cartographer’s objective is to map a territory that he/she did not previously inhabit (point 7), to understand the planes of power (point 5)—a moving plane of the reality of things at work in it—and to produce knowledge over the course of research, which involves attention and, with it, the very creation of the field of observation (Escóssia & Tedesco, 2009 ).

Because it is a form of intervention research, the analysis occurs in the process, in the movement of cartography, which makes it possible to carry out the intervention while the process is taking place. Thus, Escóssia and Tedesco ( 2009 ) point to the double direction of the nature of cartography: as a knowledge process that is not restricted to describing or classifying the formal contours of the objects of the world, but in tracing the movement itself that animates them, and as a practice of intervention, where access to the plane of power implies inhabiting it, so that the acts of the cartographer, also a collective of forces, participate and intervene in the changes and in the transformations that occur.

This inhabiting of an existential territory is significantly different from the “application of a theory or the execution of a prescriptive methodological planning, since it implies receiving and being welcomed in the difference that is expressed between the terms of the relation: subject and object, researcher and researched, I and the world” (Alvarez & Passos, 2009 , p. 148). In cartography, one does not “separate theory and practice, spaces of reflection and action. To know, to act and to inhabit a territory are no longer experiences distant from each other” (p. 149).

As far as the cartographic method of research intervention is concerned, where the data are produced Passos and Barros ( 2009 ) emphasize the question of narrativity, that is, it is always narratives that we deal with, being that sometimes the research participants also are cartographers. What each one says, what the situation says implies taking a position in a certain narrativity politics (point 8). 3 This narrative position (ethos of research) is embedded in other policies that are at stake, such as research policies, subjectivity, or cognitive policies. So all production of knowledge comes from an implicitly political position. According to the authors, narrativity politics refers to the position we take in facing the world and ourselves. In this way, “the knowledge we express about ourselves and the world is not only a theoretical problem, but a policy-related problem” (Passos & Barros, 2009 , p. 151).

According to Passos and Barros ( 2009 ), narrativity politics involves two methods and two ways of speaking—extensivism and intensivism—and also two narrative procedures: redundancy (“organizing what in this case is abundance, generating a circulation of meaning that reinforces the clarity of the case, its unity and identity” [p. 158]) and disassembly (“extracting from the larger case the agitation of microcases as microstruggles brought into the scene” [p.161]). In this dismantling process, three characteristics stand out: (1) the procedure to narrate the “case” is due to an increase in the coefficient of deterritorialization; (2) “everything is political”; and (3) everything acquires collective value.

Continuing their elaboration of the eight points of the cartographic method, Passos et al. ( 2014 ) cite thinkers besides Deleuze, Guattari, Maturana, and Varela, introducing Latour, among others, into the discussion regarding the research experience. According to Passos et al. ( 2014 ), the “importance of the research experience points to its inscription on the plane of powers, which constitutes the production plan of both knowledge and known reality” (p. 8). Researchers are immersed in the experience, which distances the cartographic method from other approaches guided by processes such as the “collection,” processing, and analysis of the data, taken as information. In this way, the cartographic method is based on inventive cognition and creative cognition, thus differentiating itself from the idea of the representation of a preexisting world. Therefore, “the cartographic method is not defined by the procedures it adopts, but it is an activity guided by a directive of a nature that is not strictly epistemological, but ethical-aesthetic-political” (p. 9).

Kastrup, Tedesco, and Passos ( 2015 ) point out that the cartographic method is compatible and can be used alongside different techniques, strategies, and research approaches, among them interviews, data analysis, and qualitative or quantitative strategies. In this way, the method is fluid, distinct from methodological models guided by the assumptions of representation. However, research that investigates the experience of research itself must make clear the “firm position of the cartographer with regard to the guideline of research: access/production of the plane of powers that responds to the creation/transformation of experience” (p. 9).

Inventive cognition emerges from the biology of knowledge (Maturana and Varela), of enunciative cognition (Varela), and includes elements of Bergson, Nietzsche, Foucault, Deleuze, and Guattari. According to Kastrup ( 2015 ), thinking stems from stimuli that make you think and does not happen spontaneously, from nothing. The stimuli are, therefore, forces of the present, of a world in movement and accelerated transformation constituting “the unique ground of emergence of thought and novelty” (p. 96). This understanding differs from that held by those who understand cognition from a perspective that Maturana and Varela ( 2001 ) call environmentalist (a realistic assumption of a given world), which “does not allow us to think about the invention of the world itself and above all the world in transformation” (p. 96). Thus, Kastrup ( 2015 ) seeks to understand the “shifts of cognition in the contemporary,” from the encounter of two intercessors for the psychology of cognition: (a) Maturana and Varela, who promote the idea of the biology of knowledge (autopoiesis), by refusing the model of representation and promoting the understanding of cognition as an invention of oneself and of the world; and (b) Deleuze and Guattari, who focus on the transformations currently taking place in cognition. To this understanding, the author adds that, in order to be able to understand the new ways of knowing and living emerging today, it is necessary to affirm the present as a movement of virtualization of currently constituted cognitive forms. The conditions of cognition have in themselves tension between constituted forms and forces of instability: “Forces of the present, which problematize the old forms, placing cognition on the route of experimentation” (Kastrup, 2015 , p. 97).

In this context, Kastrup ( 2015 ) refers to DTs, stating that they cannot be understood as mere objects or as solutions to old problems but as a basis “for creating new problems, new relationships with information, in time, with space, with oneself and with others” (p. 97). 4 Thus, the relation between the constituted forms and the present is not of rupture or of discontinuity, but of coexistence, the conditions of cognition being polytemporal and not invariant or historical. The problem of cognitive functioning is in how the present can provoke “cracks in historical strata, in old mental habits, in established structural couplings and produce novelty,” in addition to understanding it as historically produced. “It is the living gift that coexists with the history of structural couplings. Through this notion, Varela introduces in the studies of cognition the possibility of thinking it into becoming, becoming that makes the history bifurcate” (pp. 98–99).

In the biology of knowledge, with the concept of autopoiesis, Varela resignifies the understanding of learning by, in approaching the problem, placing the actor as the prototypical apprentice. Learning is not, as previous theories proposed, adapting to a given environment, or obtaining knowledge, but experimentation, invention of self and the world. The invention of a work of art is correlated with the production of the artist him or herself. As a novelty comes a theory of action, since for Maturana and Varela the living system is a constantly moving cognitive system in a process of permanent self-production, that is, autopoietic, which can be understood, according to Kastrup ( 2015 ), by the formula BE = DO = KNOW. 5 In this sense, the functioning of the living being is confused with the process of self-creation; according to Varela ( 1990 , p. 99), “doing is ontological.” Understanding cognition as action or practice leads to its permanent modification and not to invariant structures. In addition to the logic of action, cognition refers to flows in conduct (Maturana & Mpodozis, 1992 , p. 18).

Paradoxically, according to Kastrup ( 2015 ), what ensures the flow of the conduct is precisely the crack, the break, the notion of breakdown, described in Varela ( 1990 ) and Varela, Thompson, and Rosch ( 2003 ), as perturbation, a “problematization” of the structures of the living, ranging from engagements with the world, without it being possible to determine a principle that guides this drift toward the pursuit of a superior equilibrium. Breakdowns are the source of the autonomous and creative side of living cognition and arise as a theoretical-scientific formulation for an understanding of cognition that is not restricted to solving problems but is, first of all, the invention of problems. Thus, Varela ( 1990 ) explains the rooting of cognition in the “concrete,” dealing with earlier conceptions that approach cognition from the point of view of logic, general mechanisms, or representation, grouped under the denomination of “abstract” approaches to cognition (p. 102). The breakdown is a cognitive activity that happens in the immediate present and in that concrete actually lives. This “concrete” for Varela ( 1990 ) is not a step for something different, but how we arrived and where we are.

In the perspective of reconciling cognition with concrete Varela presents the notion of enaction (actuation), previously explained. For Kastrup ( 2015 ), this notion refers first to an embodied cognition distinct from the understanding of cognition as a mental process, for it is “tributary to action, resulting from experiences that are not mentally inscribed, but in the body” (p. 103). It is an action guided by local sensory processes and not by the perception of objects or forms. These sensorimotor attachments are not separate from the lived cognition (biological, psychological, and cultural couplings). Thus, the embodiment of knowledge implies social couplings, including linguistic ones, so that the body, in addition to a biological entity, is able to register and mark itself historically and culturally.

In order to exemplify the concept of enaction, linked to the embodiment of knowledge, Varela et al. ( 2003 ) refer to learning a musical instrument, where the musician is taken as a prototype of the learner. In this process of learning, initially the body functions are commanded by the mind, because the process begins with a representation, with symbolic instructions. However, to learn to play an instrument is not to follow rules, and learning truly only happens “when the symbolic relation is transformed into direct coupling of the body with the instrument, eliminating the intermediary of representation” (p. 103). That is, therein is the enaction, actuation, incarnation, or embodiment of knowledge. Thus, for the author, cognition begins to function outside the register of representation, in direct coupling with the matter that the world provides. To learn is not to adapt to the musical instrument, but to act with it. Thus, the notion of acting refers to a collective dimension that appears in the body, at the same time as it indicates the participation of the body in the configuration of the world that is shared by the collective.

This understanding of coupling as agency allows Kastrup ( 2015 ) to move forward in a second sense of the notion of acting— cognition as invention of a world—constructed in the interface between Varela’s cognitive studies and Deleuze and Guattari’s subjectivity production, from whom it takes the concept of agency as “direct communication, without mediation of representation” (p. 104). Communication without subordination, hierarchy, or determinism does not operate by causality, but by reciprocal implication between movements, processes, or heterogeneous flows, by double capture. According to the authors still referring to the learning of a musical instrument, agency refers to the production of a complex apprentice–instrument unit, which produces a process of reciprocal differentiation. The mechanical relationship occurs between previous elements (having the same elements and the same relationships, we will have the same product behavior repeated in the same way) whereas machinic agency, on the other hand, connects flows or processes and creates forms.

Kastrup ( 2015 ) uses again the example of learning a musical instrument to demonstrate that if we understand flute learning, for example, as a machinic agency, “learning is eliminating distances, because one learns between mouth and flute, learns in the middle, on the surface of its coupling, outside the field of representation” (p. 104). That is to say, in this adaptation with the medium, “the blowing motion is able to interact with the arrangement of the instrument and at the same time generate the sound and the apprentice” (p. 105). Thus, coupling should be thought of as a machinic agency or a product of learning, a creative activity always focused on becoming and not a mechanical representation or repetition. This understanding puts an end to the supposed determinism of the object or the environment. The best learner is the one who permanently creates a relationship with the instrument, incessantly reinventing himself as a musician.

The best student, for Kastrup ( 2015 ), is not the one who approaches the world through crystallized habits, but who can always remain in the process of learning, which can also be understood as permanent unlearning. That is, learn is to experience incessantly in order to evade the control of representation, preventing crystallized habits from forming, that is, be alert to continuous variations and rapid resonances, implying, at the same time, a certain lack of attention to the practical schemes of recognition.

Bergson ( 1934 ) theorizes this relation between certain attention and correlative inattention. For this author, there is a pragmatic, utilitarian life that assures learning while solving problems, but there is also an additional attention, which is attention to duration, which ensures learning as the invention of problems.

In this context, it is fundamental to consider that the contemporary world has provoked the emergence of new forms of subjectivity, mainly by the ceaseless and almost omnipresent presence of all kinds of DT, which has accelerated processes of transformation and innovation in the ways of living and engaging, which are more and more open and in flux. In this whirlwind of uncertainty, subjectivity is called upon to reconfigure itself and must learn to deal with breakdowns, with the disturbances that present themselves. On the other hand, this same reality, coupled with the online approach to the most diverse cultures, according to Kastrup ( 2015 ), reveals the precariousness of any supposed foundation that can be provided by the world (p. 108), that is, if we are affected on all sides by disturbances of all nature, solutions are not assured. Therefore, if we want to create new ways of knowing and living, we must invent a world, for learning to live in a world without fundamentals is to invent it by living, remembering that invention of self cannot be achieved without the invention of a related world.

If interpretation and knowledge are emergent results (in the sense of emerging) of action in the world or acting, when spaces are hybrid, multimodal, pervasive, and ubiquitous, and dwelling is atopical, what are the relevant issues that emerge concerning the action and performance of the subjects in these spaces? How do meanings emerge? What world do we produce and invent?

The Cartographic Method as a Means of Identifying and Mapping Controversies and Actor–Network Theory

Recently, actor–network theory (ANT), developed by Latour, Law, and Callon, also recognized subject–object codetermination by emphasizing the participation of non-humans—objects and quasi-objects—in social relations, thus presenting itself as an alternative to the binaries of modernity by eschewing a compartmentalized view of reality. 6

In this perspective, ANT (Latour, 2012 ) provides a new understanding of what is social, presenting the idea that humans establish a social network not only to interact with other people, but with non human elements as well. According to the author, the social is not simply made up of people, but also machines, animals, texts, money, architecture, laboratories, institutions, among other elements. By the principle of connectivity, everything is linked in a network, with multiple inputs, which is always in continuous movement and open to new elements. For the author, social refers to the network of HA and NHA, where the actor is any person, thing, (quasi-)object, or institution that produces agency, that is, something with the ability to produce effects on the network (although indirectly), of being actant. The understanding of agency, therefore, is related to the human and non human actors (actants), similarly, who participate in the actions and provoke transformations in the network, in movement. Thus, in ANT, or sociology of associations, the non human is no longer considered only as an artifact, whose meaning is attributed by the human, but as having agency, because it participates in actions in everyday situations and causes transformations. Non human actors also shape events in the creation of meanings, acting in the reflective and symbolic sphere.

In this context, network is understood from the perspective of a rhizome (based on Deleuze & Guattari, 1995 ), that is, seen as something alive, changeable—as flows, circulations, alliances, and movements of a series of animate and inanimate elements—and not as fixed to a set of actors. It refers to transformations, translations, displacements, therefore, quite distinct from the traditional understanding of a network as a form or structure. The network is the associative movement that forms the social, being rather an instrument of analysis or its object. The actor–network binomial perspective proposes that the actor never acts alone. In acting, it is influenced (constituted) by the networks in which it has connections and, at the same time, it can represent these networks, as well as influence them. In this way, it is never quite clear who is acting. The actor is, at the same time, the builder and receiver of the networks.

For Latour ( 2012 ), the social has no predefined locus, but is understood as provisional, performative, as processes of aggregations, associations, and reassociations between HA and NHA. In order to understand the social, which, therefore, is not what explains but rather what needs to be explained, the author recommends that the actors be followed in their associations and reassociations (cartography). I understand, therefore, that nowadays these associations and reassociations are increasingly constituted in nomadic movements, in an atopic habitation that takes place in hybrid, multimodal, pervasive, and ubiquitous spaces. 7

With regard to science, Latour ( 2016 ) says that every idea only proceeds from multiple deviations and compositions. It is the attribution of science to understand this process and not only the result. For this, it is necessary to retrace the entire chain of deviations and compositions, and what matters in this process is what emerges and forms in the course of the process of composition and deviations of courses of action. Linked to this question, Latour ( 2016 ) in the second letter of Cogitamus, raises the problem of method: How is it possible to analyze deviations and compositions if, in general, they are invisible?

In this context, the concept of proof becomes the protagonist, because, according to the author, it is at the moment of proof that the blunting of deviations and compositions is revealed. This evidence, although there are other forms of evidence, materializes in the panel: everything works well, until it stops working. This is more pedagogical form of expression of proof. The computer, initially understood as a technical object, is now presented as a sociotechnical project: “From simple, my computer has become multiple; of unified, has become disunited; it immediately became mediate; of fast, it became slow” (Latour, 2016 , p. 47). The network, or part of it, with the different elements that together kept it working, now fails, becoming visible. It is at this moment that it is necessary to analyze the links, the relationships, the networks that integrate it.

This perspective, presented by Latour ( 2016 ), although linked to the method he calls “cartography of controversies,” could also be linked to the cartographic method of intervention research, proposed by Kastrup ( 2007 , 2008 ), Passos et al. ( 2009 ), and Passos, Kastrup, and Tedesco ( 2014 ).

While Latour ( 2016 ) refers to pane and understood as a proof, bringing sociotechnical network analysis (HA and ANH) to the context; we could think from the point of view of the subject’s cognition (HA) as a cognitive imbalance (Piaget) or as a breakdown (Varela) understood as a proof, later assumed by Kastrup, Tedesco, and Passos ( 2015 ) from the perspective of the inventive cognition.

With regard to the interactions that take place in this sociotechnical network, the deviations and compositions are visible by the traces that the different actants produce in the movement of associations, which can be accompanied by “another” sociotechnical network formed by HA (teachers) and NHA (mining and data-based systems and learning analytics), providing elements that allow us to trace the cosmogram and understand the process under construction.

Turning to the question of the pane for Latour ( 2016 )—in the context of a sociotechnical network; cognitive imbalance for Piaget and breakdown for Varela—in the context of cognition; a process of investigation begins, so that the initial indetermination begins to be deciphered, the source of the disturbance is found, and a problem is revealed progressively. 8 Hypotheses and solutions are tested and verified, until the problem is solved.

In the case of the computer (NHA), in the context of sociotechnical network (formed by HA and NHA), the pane is repaired and put back to use. In the case of cognition, what in the comprehension of Varela ( 1990 ) and Kastrup, Tedesco, and Passos ( 2015 ) refers to an enactuated, self-engendered process of agency, caused by a breakdown, takes knowledge to a superior equilibrium, not in the perspective of problem-solving but, above all, in the invention of problems. It is not the result, but the process by which the result is achieved. In a way, this is related to the concept of debugging, a result of a metacognitive process (Piaget, 1976 , 1978a , 1978b , 1995 ) that is necessary for computational thinking, which was very present in research related to language programming in the 1980s and 1990s.

From the proof concept, Latour ( 2016 ), in his third letter in Cogitamus, goes on to discuss scientific controversies, stating that the statements pass between two poles: radical doubt and unquestionable certainty: “At the beginning of the exercise, the statement floats; in the end, one must find it solidly anchored in a precise landscape . . .” (p. 81). According to the author, this is where the importance of controversies lies.

The term controversy, according to Latour ( 2016 ), “designates all possible positions, ranging from absolute doubt . . . to indisputable certainty” (p. 79). The word “controversy” describes a shared uncertainty about aspects of science and/or technology that are not yet stabilized. It occurs when there is a disagreement between the actors, that is, “when actors discover that they cannot ignore each other and controversies end when actors manage to work out the solid commitment to live together” (Venturini, 2010 , p. 260). The cartography of controversies consists in mapping the actions of human and non human actors involved in contemporary sociotechnical questions, without, however, assuming an a priori frame or an order to be followed. In this context, according to Latour ( 2012 ), the Actor-Network Theory (ANT) achieves a better understanding of the order after the actors explain all the controversies in which they were involved, that is, “We [social scientists] will not try to discipline, to frame you [the actors] in our categories; we will allow them to stick to their own worlds and only then will we ask for their explanation of how they were established” (p. 44). It is not up to the analyst to define and order the social, but rather to the actors present in the context. If the goal is to restore order, it is best to go through the associations, tracing the connections between the controversies themselves. The pursuit of order, rigor, and pattern is by no means abandoned, just repositioned one step further in the form of abstraction, so that actors can unfold their own and various cosmos, no matter how irrational they may seem.

Latour ( 2012 ) notes that it is possible to trace stronger relationships and discover more revealing patterns when we find a way to record the links between unstable and mutable frames of reference rather than trying to stabilize one. What makes one expand, relate, compare, and organize is what one has to describe. The important thing is not to stop the flow of controversy, because if the actors do not act, they will leave no clues: “No clue, no information, no description—and therefore no conversation” (p. 217). It is in the flow of controversies that one has to find the “firm ground: on shifting sands. Contrary to what is commonly said, relativism is a way of floating in the data, not plunging into it” (p. 46).

The main idea is to give visibility to the different understandings about situations, movements, representativities, influences, and interests. For this, it is necessary to explore, visualize polemics, the movement of action and motion, that is, where mediation flows (Lemos, 2013 ). Controversies are those spaces of dialogue, conflict, negotiation, and action, which the actors reveal by leaving traces.

For Latour ( 2016 ), mapping a controversy is learning to locate all these movements. This implies following the statements from doubts permeated by intermediate states (rumor, opinion, idea, proposition), pros and cons, until they become the

final result, where clear and well-defined inscriptions are evident. However, with the condition of taking it in its motion, and not frozen in an object. Remembering that nothing is definitive, both techniques and sciences do not exist by the simple force of inertia. To exist is to always be in that front line. What we now understand as a certain statement is only the final stage of a controversy and in no way its beginning. (Latour, 2016 , pp. 80–81)

Latour ( 2016 ) states that the two extremes must be considered: fact and opinion, which correspond to two moments in the controversy. Accompanying the controversies is then to describe the ways in which the actors construct and modify the evidence.

Venturini ( 2012 , p. 800) proposes a script to subsidize the creation of cartographies of controversies, which is summarized by Lemos ( 2013 , p. 118): (1) to define the best possible controversy; (2) observe, describe, and maintain that the object is controversial; (3) identify whether the controversy is: cold/hot, present/past, secret/public, difficult to access/accessible, limited/unlimited; (4) apply the lenses to the collection of information (gather statements, opinions, read the specialized literature); (5) identify human and non human actants and sketch the network that connects them; (6) identify cosmogram, ideologies, and worldviews. The cartographer must then identify the representativity, influence, and interest of the actors in the networks.

If there is evidence, Latour ( 2016 ) proposes that two conditions are imposed on the analysis: (1) that it comes from the actors, and (2) that it results from joint activity, therefore, not more than a cogito, but a Cogitamus.

In this context, the author refers to the new passage from the infinite world (modern and post-scientific revolution) to the complicated multiverse or pluriverse, term coined by William James. Thus, if there is no radical discontinuity, the meaning of the word revolution changes. Latour ( 2016 ), based on Sloterdijk, stresses that it is not a matter of revolution or emancipation, but of explicitness, since “history never breaks with the past, but permanently makes more and more explicit with which we have to learn to live, elements that will be compatible or incompatible with existing ones” (p. 115). Thus, the author inaugurates a new “epistemological policy,” in which the researcher’s function is to describe “the agency of all beings that a particular culture links with practical forms of life” (p. 166). This refers to a movement of associations between the different parties participating in a controversy, which can be represented by what the author calls a cosmogram. In order to retract the different parties, Latour ( 2016 ) proposes the description of the associations of convenience, coexistence, opposition, and exclusion between HA and NHA, whose conditions of existence become explicit in the course of the trials submitted by the disputes: “to become sensitive to these lists of associations and logical duels without resorting to the distinction between the rational and the irrational, the modern and the archaic, the systematic and the unsystematic” (Latour, 2016 , pp. 116–117).

Mapping the cosmograms means working with the movement, with the agency distribution drawing of mobility, unlike the paradigm, which works with frames (stabilized theoretical framework). When designing a cosmogram, the analyst does not need to resort to structures, systems, or frames, which limit or even render unviable the monitoring of the connections in formation in the sociotechnical networks. He needs to go through the network, follow the actants in their associations, identifying the controversies, their different visions or world versions (multiverses or pluriverses), showing how the whole world (a complicated and complex pluriverse), a cosmos, reveals itself, emerges, and reconfigures itself in the confrontation of ontologies.

It is within the scope of interactions that occur in this sociotechnical network that the different actants (human and non human) produce traces in the movement of associations. These traces, in the scope of education research, can be accompanied by another sociotechnical network formed by HA (teachers-researchers) and NHA (diverse systems, including those based on mining and data and learning analytics) which, when mapped, provide elements that make it possible to draw the cosmogram (diagram of mediations, motion, mobility), a multiverse, and understand the process under construction—the movement of these associations happening. The aim is to map the controversies: “the study of innovations and controversies is one of the first privileged places where objects can be held longer as visible, disseminated and recognized mediators before they become invisible, non-social intermediaries” (Latour, 2012 , p. 120).

It is important to consider that for Latour ( 1994 ), the logic of thinking of the sciences is vitiated by a need for purification by division, which results in exclusion. According to Melo ( 2011 ), this logic, in a way, freezes the possibility of transformation, because it does not consider the continuous mixture, which produces hybrids incessantly and indefinitely. Instead of imposing one part(s) on another, replacing one or the other(s), as the modern project intended, the parts become the contact with heterogeneous versions, through the adjustment of hybrid practices and interests, through which these parties receive from each other the chance of mutual transformation (Despret, 2002 ). TAR presents the notion of hybrids and generalized symmetry.

It is possible to bring elements of this vision presented by Latour to reflect on the question of culture, since it is not a question of dividing, of classifying, into analogical (pre-digital) culture, digital culture, or cyberculture, or, but to consider the mixture, that is to say, the hybrids that are produced in that mixture, which is resignified and transformed in that coexistence.

Conclusion: Education Qualitative Research in the Hybrid and Multimodal Culture Context in an Atopic Dwelling

Both methods, the cartographic method of intervention research and the cartography of controversies, with their specificities, have proved robust for the development of qualitative research in the field of education, in the context of digital culture and hybrid culture in an atopic dwelling, mainly because they are also related to equally consistent and contemporary theories in terms of human cognition aspects, enabling us to track the traces and clues in the mobility of associations between actants, which are enhanced by different Digital Technologies (DT), including data mining and learning analytics.

These methods have been used in the research developed by the Grupo de Pesquisa Educação Digital (GPe-dU Unisinos/CNPq), in which I am involved at the Universidade do Vale do Rio dos Sinos (UNISINOS), since 2010 . In particular, the cartographic method of intervention research, as well as being appropriate as a research method, has been investigated for its potency with regard to the development of new methodologies and pedagogical practices, due to its interventionist characteristic in accompanying the process (along the course), aligned with the need to understand the phenomenon of learning in its complexity—social, political, cognitive, affective, and technological (Schlemmer, Lopes, & Molina, 2012 ), in contexts of hybridism, multimodality, pervasiveness, and ubiquity. Its power to accompany learning processes has also been investigated as well as the possibility of it being appropriated by teachers and students in their own learning pathways.

Among the research projects that have used the cartographic method of intervention research are: “Escola aumentada: Cartografias digitais para as aprendizagens e a cidadania,” “Gamificação em Espaços de Convivência Híbridos e Multimodais: Uma experiência no ensino superior,” and “Gamificação em Espaços de Convivência Híbridos e Multimodais: A educação na cultura digital.” Under different approaches and in varying contexts, research explores the perspectives of hybridism, multimodality, pervasiveness, and ubiquity, as well as cartographic attention. It was in the context of these projects that the cartographic method of intervention research began to become the object of study, inspiring studies carried out on the formation and qualification of teachers and students (Lopes & Schlemmer, 2017 ; Lopes & Valentini, 2012 ; Schlemmer, 2014 , 2015 ; Schlemmer & Lopes, 2016 ) in the scope of elementary education, graduation in pedagogy and digital games, post-graduation stricto sensu , and continuing teacher training. Our focus has been to explore some elements related to the hybrid, multimodal, pervasive, and ubiquitous culture and the new regimes of action, participation, and socialization of experience.

In the context of elementary education schools, we have outlined some experiences involving cartography with the support of digital media, geolocation, and digital marking (quick response [QR] codes), to provoke experiences of local mapping of people, objects, and places in the public space. In the undergraduate, and graduate continuing teacher education context, as well as in elementary school, we also designed inventive methodologies and pedagogical interventionist, aggregative, and gammatical practices with a cartographic bent, mainly the cartographer attention through the four movements (tracing, touching, landing and attentive recognition) , linked to elements of gamification, with the support of digital media, geolocation, digital coding (QR codes), and augmented reality, in order to provoke learning experiences in a hybrid, multimodal, pervasive, and ubiquitous context. According to Schlemmer and Lopes ( 2016 ), unlike classic cartography (mapping), the idea was to provoke aesthetic and/or informational experiences for the production of meanings about our environment in the case of schools, and on the concepts present in undergraduate and undergraduate academic activities in the case of higher education. The purpose of these experiments is to activate sensibility and cognition as functions of intelligence, as well as registration and sharing as functions of sociability.

Schlemmer ( 2018 ) states that inspiration in the cartographic method of intervention research to develop inventive methodologies and interventionist, aggregative, and gamified pedagogical practices comes from the following elements:

the intervention research perspective, and, during the development of games and gamified processes, at different times, both the teacher and the subjects themselves act as interventionist mediators

the idea of working with learning as an invention of problems (“supplementary” attention, duration, attentive recognition of a context), besides learning how to solve problems (attention to pragmatic utilitarian life)

the proposal to follow the course

the clue metaphor

movements of the cartographer’s attention (tracing, touching, landing, and attentive recognition).

In the context of tracks, according to Schlemmer ( 2018 ), the proposal is to work with the concept of geographic tracks (local/specific points in the community/city), live tracks (people from local community who hold certain knowledge necessary for the development of the missions), online tracks (specialists that do not belong to the local community, but that can appear in video), as characters in Mixed Reality (MR) or in Augmented Reality (AR) (iotized objects).

In the scope of a cartographer’s attention movements, tracing is characterized by the exploration/scanning of the field—in the case of this research, geographic and online spaces in search of clues (information) to understand the processes; the touch triggers the selection process which consists, in this case from Schlemmer ( 2016a , 2017 ), in the selection of geographic clues, online clues, and live clues, to direct the research; and landing refers to stopping, zooming in on lanes, choice/definition, and attentive recognition in the perception of the global context.

The metaphor of the clue, as well as the changing focus of the cartographer’s attention, can also serve as inspiration to understand the composition of tracks, as well as the progression itself in the context of a game or gamified process—gaining achievements—at the same time as achievements can be understood as skills for the own gameplay and sociability. 9

It is important to point out that as a result of this process the inventive methodology |Gamified Learning Processes (GLP) is created (Schlemmer, 2018 ).

The Grupo de Pesquisa em Educação Digital (GPe-dU) has also investigated and developed theoretical, methodological, and technological experiences inspired by the cartographic method of research, as methodology for the monitoring and evaluation of learning in games and gamified processes from an interventionist perspective and developed in a hybrid, multimodal, pervasive, and ubiquitous context. According to Schlemmer and Lopes ( 2016 ) and Schlemmer ( 2016a ) such contexts are more easily subject to the pulverization of the spaces of participation and registration and, therefore, can hinder the exercise of teaching and of the discourse regarding both pedagogical mediation and the evaluation. Thus, the proposal developed by the authors, inspired by the cartographic method of intervention research as a methodology of monitoring and evaluation, allows accompanying the subjects in their different learning pathways, involving analogue technologies and DT, physical and online face-to-face interactions to develop their own missions and projects that, from the perspective of bring your own device (BYOD), can extend beyond the time set for formal education. The fact that the subject possesses a mobile device and is connected creates conditions of possibility for him or her to remain engaged in the process, regardless of time and space. Thus, the processes of monitoring and evaluation can, at different times, be “situated” and still intertwined. By means of clues, designed and planned to provide the hybridization of analogue and digital spaces, it is possible to establish a multimodal context, which is desirable when talking about immersion, agency, and engagement.

More specifically, with regard to the movements proposed by Kastrup ( 2007 , 2008 ) and others in the cartographic method, the development of gamification and game experiments allowed us to evaluate the power of the method and the inadequacies we perceive in our own experience of building the game or gamification. The question that seemed to us most challenging was to guarantee the unpredictability and rhizomatic opening of the cartographic method and attention. If we work from a perspective of “use of” rather than inventiveness, the design of phases of a gamified game or process, for example, which was designed by someone to be “applied” in education or simply played by players, cannot always guarantee the rhizomatic opening that underlies the two proposals of methods previously carried out, because it has a limited context and whose control is not complete developed in the field reconfiguration of the students learning. The possible reconfigurations take place in the circular or linear dimension of success itself when completing the missions. In this sense, an a priori objective always seems limited from the point of view of cartography, but not limiting from the point of view of learning. What is learned opens possibilities, but in the dynamics of the game these are not necessarily unpredictable, since it is a condition that games advance in phases.

The clue metaphor to the tracks conception, according to Schlemmer and Lopes ( 2016 ), was inspiring for game designers or gamification, but, to become inspirational to gaming, we identified the need for players to leave “traces” which may become clues for other players. An interesting strategy would be to insert notebooks as an object/item that loads and can be left somewhere—as in some online and offline role-playing games—into the dynamics of the game or gamification. Another strategy would be to insert HA and/or bots equipped with AI to record and report events, producing clues for the route of the tracks to grow and insert, at continuously, new challenges based on the reconfiguration of the field of knowledge produced by the players themselves. This perspective of valuing, in the context of game or gamification, ways of recording and sharing personal narratives (dynamic clue production) would be an interesting possibility for both teachers and students to map their learning processes—after all, mapping, from the perspective here presented, is a means to track processes.

In this case, it seems important to consider that it is necessary to invest in game dynamics that strengthen and value the narratives of the players (as in the case of Role Playing Game [RPG] or, better still, to work at the level of inventiveness, in which the entire process of the conception and development of the game or gamification is co-constructed by the learning subjects themselves).

It is important to mention that, in the case of the researches we develop, because they are situated within the scope of enactive and inventive cognition, the creation of the game or process is a result of a co-creation process between and with the learning subjects themselves, where the teacher acts as an interventionist, conducting pedagogical mediation. Thus, everything that composes the game or gamified process—from the pre-concept, concept, and development; what is implied in the definition of mechanics and dynamics; to being able to include tracks and progression—are defined by the subjects themselves who, therefore, extrapolate the perspective of knowledge as representation and learning as problem-solving, working on the level of knowledge as interpretation and learning through the invention of problems, from the notion of the rhizome, which is at the base of the development of both the cartographic method of intervention research, as well as the cartography of the controversies. This approach is qualitatively different from the traditional approaches found in games or gamified processes, where the subjects are only users, players, whose learning is by solving problems and their evolution by linear stages or phases.

Most recently, the projects “The City as a Learning Space: Games and Gamification in the Constitution of Hybrid, Multimodal, Pervasive and Ubiquitous Spaces for the Development of Citizenship,” and “The City as a Learning Space: Education for Citizenship in Hybrid, Multimodal, Pervasive and Ubiquitous Contexts,” also developed on the basis of the cartographic method of intervention research, we have more appropriately called the cartography of controversies, in order to better understand, in addition to what occurs at the micro level (enative and inventive cognition), the associations that occur between HA and NHA, which may be due to convenience, coexistence, opposition, and exclusion. These associations also evidence planes of forces and, therefore, political expression of cognition, in the sense that “knowing involves a position in relation to the world and itself, an attitude, an ethos” (Kastrup, Tedesco, & Passos, 2015 , p. 12). These associations can be evidenced in a cosmogram, which makes it possible to draw the distribution of the agency, the diagram of the mediations, in short, the design of the movement, its formation. In this way, the cosmogram works with the empirical and in motion, unlike the paradigm that works with the frame, with the theoretical framework stabilized with the model as structure.

Schlemmer and Lopes ( 2016 ) and Schlemmer ( 2018 ) emphasize that the proposal does not consist in a transposition of the method or methods, but rather an experimentation with the logic behind them, as well as some of its elements, which are linked to others, in this case, present in games, gamification, and PAGs, allowing us to develop inventive methodologies and pedagogical interventionist, aggregative, and gamified practices in the educational context.

Thus, relating the cartographic method of controversies and, consequently, elements present in the ANT with the cartographic method of intervention research and with the perspective of enactive cognition, in its two senses of action—corporate cognition and inventive cognition—allows us to understand that the process of invention or innovation, both in development and research, advances from multiple breakdowns, deviations, compositions, associations, and reassociations that occur in the empirical movement. In this way, understanding an invention, an innovation, implies tracking the traces and retracing the whole network of deviations and compositions, associations and reassociations that constitute the path.

From this context questions that inspire future investigations arise:

How can Latour’s concept of symmetry or flat ontology, in which HA and NHA are on the same plane (which eliminates the anthropocentric view of cognition), contribute to research in education?

How can the Latour cosmogram contribute to the intervention research cartographic method as a means of understanding the paths made by the different actors, as well as the controversies established in a network?

How can the intervention research cartographic method, comprising cognition as the invention of problems, associated with the cartography of controversies, be part of the methodology to help us understand the place of the human in the context of intelligent cities?

To sum up, “we go, we hear, we learn, we practice, we become competent, we change our minds. Very simple indeed: this is called research. Good research always produces copious new descriptions . . . There is no in-formation, just trans-formation” (Latour, 2012 , pp. 212–216).

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1. A group composed of researchers from the Universidade Federal Fluminense and Universidade Federal do Rio de Janeiro.

2. The idea of an apparatus (dispositif) is based on Foucault ( 1979 ), who understood it as a decidedly heterogeneous agglomeration involving discourses, institutions, architectural organizations, regulatory decisions, laws, administrative measures, scientific statements, and philosophical, moral, and philanthropic propositions. In short, the apparatus is made up of that which is said and unsaid. The apparatus is the network that can be established among these elements (p. 244). The relationship among these elements indicates the existence of change of positions and modification of functions. An apparatus always responds to an urgent need, made clear by its strategic or dominant function.

3. Passos, Kastrup, and Escóssia ( 2009 ) understand politics in a broad sense as the form of human activity that, linked to power, relates to subjects, articulating them according to rules or norms that are not necessarily only legal in nature. Politics is also done through local arrangements, that is, micro relations, indicating this micropolitical dimension of power relations (Foucault, 1979 ).

4. See conception of non human actor, present in Latour’s ANT.

5. It is important to emphasize that the perspective of “doing and understanding” is also described as a theory in the work of Jean Piaget ( 1978a ). It is, however, necessary to establish differences and similarities.

6. ANT emerged from an interdisciplinary perspective, with contributions from different areas, and is still defining itself as a methodological tool.

7. The author of this article.

8. In the sense put forth by Dewey ( 1938 ) and taken up by Latour ( 2016 ).

9. In gamer lingo, achievements are goals that a subject can complete during the game. They can be explicit or secret, that is, that the subject discovers during the process of play.

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Impacts of digital technologies on education and factors influencing schools' digital capacity and transformation: A literature review

Stella timotheou.

1 CYENS Center of Excellence & Cyprus University of Technology (Cyprus Interaction Lab), Cyprus, CYENS Center of Excellence & Cyprus University of Technology, Nicosia-Limassol, Cyprus

Ourania Miliou

Yiannis dimitriadis.

2 Universidad de Valladolid (UVA), Spain, Valladolid, Spain

Sara Villagrá Sobrino

Nikoleta giannoutsou, romina cachia.

3 JRC - Joint Research Centre of the European Commission, Seville, Spain

Alejandra Martínez Monés

Andri ioannou, associated data.

Data sharing not applicable to this article as no datasets were generated or analysed during the current study.

Digital technologies have brought changes to the nature and scope of education and led education systems worldwide to adopt strategies and policies for ICT integration. The latter brought about issues regarding the quality of teaching and learning with ICTs, especially concerning the understanding, adaptation, and design of the education systems in accordance with current technological trends. These issues were emphasized during the recent COVID-19 pandemic that accelerated the use of digital technologies in education, generating questions regarding digitalization in schools. Specifically, many schools demonstrated a lack of experience and low digital capacity, which resulted in widening gaps, inequalities, and learning losses. Such results have engendered the need for schools to learn and build upon the experience to enhance their digital capacity and preparedness, increase their digitalization levels, and achieve a successful digital transformation. Given that the integration of digital technologies is a complex and continuous process that impacts different actors within the school ecosystem, there is a need to show how these impacts are interconnected and identify the factors that can encourage an effective and efficient change in the school environments. For this purpose, we conducted a non-systematic literature review. The results of the literature review were organized thematically based on the evidence presented about the impact of digital technology on education and the factors that affect the schools’ digital capacity and digital transformation. The findings suggest that ICT integration in schools impacts more than just students’ performance; it affects several other school-related aspects and stakeholders, too. Furthermore, various factors affect the impact of digital technologies on education. These factors are interconnected and play a vital role in the digital transformation process. The study results shed light on how ICTs can positively contribute to the digital transformation of schools and which factors should be considered for schools to achieve effective and efficient change.

Introduction

Digital technologies have brought changes to the nature and scope of education. Versatile and disruptive technological innovations, such as smart devices, the Internet of Things (IoT), artificial intelligence (AI), augmented reality (AR) and virtual reality (VR), blockchain, and software applications have opened up new opportunities for advancing teaching and learning (Gaol & Prasolova-Førland, 2021 ; OECD, 2021 ). Hence, in recent years, education systems worldwide have increased their investment in the integration of information and communication technology (ICT) (Fernández-Gutiérrez et al., 2020 ; Lawrence & Tar, 2018 ) and prioritized their educational agendas to adapt strategies or policies around ICT integration (European Commission, 2019 ). The latter brought about issues regarding the quality of teaching and learning with ICTs (Bates, 2015 ), especially concerning the understanding, adaptation, and design of education systems in accordance with current technological trends (Balyer & Öz, 2018 ). Studies have shown that despite the investment made in the integration of technology in schools, the results have not been promising, and the intended outcomes have not yet been achieved (Delgado et al., 2015 ; Lawrence & Tar, 2018 ). These issues were exacerbated during the COVID-19 pandemic, which forced teaching across education levels to move online (Daniel, 2020 ). Online teaching accelerated the use of digital technologies generating questions regarding the process, the nature, the extent, and the effectiveness of digitalization in schools (Cachia et al., 2021 ; König et al., 2020 ). Specifically, many schools demonstrated a lack of experience and low digital capacity, which resulted in widening gaps, inequalities, and learning losses (Blaskó et al., 2021 ; Di Pietro et al, 2020 ). Such results have engendered the need for schools to learn and build upon the experience in order to enhance their digital capacity (European Commission, 2020 ) and increase their digitalization levels (Costa et al., 2021 ). Digitalization offers possibilities for fundamental improvement in schools (OECD, 2021 ; Rott & Marouane, 2018 ) and touches many aspects of a school’s development (Delcker & Ifenthaler, 2021 ) . However, it is a complex process that requires large-scale transformative changes beyond the technical aspects of technology and infrastructure (Pettersson, 2021 ). Namely, digitalization refers to “ a series of deep and coordinated culture, workforce, and technology shifts and operating models ” (Brooks & McCormack, 2020 , p. 3) that brings cultural, organizational, and operational change through the integration of digital technologies (JISC, 2020 ). A successful digital transformation requires that schools increase their digital capacity levels, establishing the necessary “ culture, policies, infrastructure as well as digital competence of students and staff to support the effective integration of technology in teaching and learning practices ” (Costa et al, 2021 , p.163).

Given that the integration of digital technologies is a complex and continuous process that impacts different actors within the school ecosystem (Eng, 2005 ), there is a need to show how the different elements of the impact are interconnected and to identify the factors that can encourage an effective and efficient change in the school environment. To address the issues outlined above, we formulated the following research questions:

a) What is the impact of digital technologies on education?

b) Which factors might affect a school’s digital capacity and transformation?

In the present investigation, we conducted a non-systematic literature review of publications pertaining to the impact of digital technologies on education and the factors that affect a school’s digital capacity and transformation. The results of the literature review were organized thematically based on the evidence presented about the impact of digital technology on education and the factors which affect the schools’ digital capacity and digital transformation.

Methodology

The non-systematic literature review presented herein covers the main theories and research published over the past 17 years on the topic. It is based on meta-analyses and review papers found in scholarly, peer-reviewed content databases and other key studies and reports related to the concepts studied (e.g., digitalization, digital capacity) from professional and international bodies (e.g., the OECD). We searched the Scopus database, which indexes various online journals in the education sector with an international scope, to collect peer-reviewed academic papers. Furthermore, we used an all-inclusive Google Scholar search to include relevant key terms or to include studies found in the reference list of the peer-reviewed papers, and other key studies and reports related to the concepts studied by professional and international bodies. Lastly, we gathered sources from the Publications Office of the European Union ( https://op.europa.eu/en/home ); namely, documents that refer to policies related to digital transformation in education.

Regarding search terms, we first searched resources on the impact of digital technologies on education by performing the following search queries: “impact” OR “effects” AND “digital technologies” AND “education”, “impact” OR “effects” AND “ICT” AND “education”. We further refined our results by adding the terms “meta-analysis” and “review” or by adjusting the search options based on the features of each database to avoid collecting individual studies that would provide limited contributions to a particular domain. We relied on meta-analyses and review studies as these consider the findings of multiple studies to offer a more comprehensive view of the research in a given area (Schuele & Justice, 2006 ). Specifically, meta-analysis studies provided quantitative evidence based on statistically verifiable results regarding the impact of educational interventions that integrate digital technologies in school classrooms (Higgins et al., 2012 ; Tolani-Brown et al., 2011 ).

However, quantitative data does not offer explanations for the challenges or difficulties experienced during ICT integration in learning and teaching (Tolani-Brown et al., 2011 ). To fill this gap, we analyzed literature reviews and gathered in-depth qualitative evidence of the benefits and implications of technology integration in schools. In the analysis presented herein, we also included policy documents and reports from professional and international bodies and governmental reports, which offered useful explanations of the key concepts of this study and provided recent evidence on digital capacity and transformation in education along with policy recommendations. The inclusion and exclusion criteria that were considered in this study are presented in Table ​ Table1 1 .

Inclusion and exclusion criteria for the selection of resources on the impact of digital technologies on education

To ensure a reliable extraction of information from each study and assist the research synthesis we selected the study characteristics of interest (impact) and constructed coding forms. First, an overview of the synthesis was provided by the principal investigator who described the processes of coding, data entry, and data management. The coders followed the same set of instructions but worked independently. To ensure a common understanding of the process between coders, a sample of ten studies was tested. The results were compared, and the discrepancies were identified and resolved. Additionally, to ensure an efficient coding process, all coders participated in group meetings to discuss additions, deletions, and modifications (Stock, 1994 ). Due to the methodological diversity of the studied documents we began to synthesize the literature review findings based on similar study designs. Specifically, most of the meta-analysis studies were grouped in one category due to the quantitative nature of the measured impact. These studies tended to refer to student achievement (Hattie et al., 2014 ). Then, we organized the themes of the qualitative studies in several impact categories. Lastly, we synthesized both review and meta-analysis data across the categories. In order to establish a collective understanding of the concept of impact, we referred to a previous impact study by Balanskat ( 2009 ) which investigated the impact of technology in primary schools. In this context, the impact had a more specific ICT-related meaning and was described as “ a significant influence or effect of ICT on the measured or perceived quality of (parts of) education ” (Balanskat, 2009 , p. 9). In the study presented herein, the main impacts are in relation to learning and learners, teaching, and teachers, as well as other key stakeholders who are directly or indirectly connected to the school unit.

The study’s results identified multiple dimensions of the impact of digital technologies on students’ knowledge, skills, and attitudes; on equality, inclusion, and social integration; on teachers’ professional and teaching practices; and on other school-related aspects and stakeholders. The data analysis indicated various factors that might affect the schools’ digital capacity and transformation, such as digital competencies, the teachers’ personal characteristics and professional development, as well as the school’s leadership and management, administration, infrastructure, etc. The impacts and factors found in the literature review are presented below.

Impacts of digital technologies on students’ knowledge, skills, attitudes, and emotions

The impact of ICT use on students’ knowledge, skills, and attitudes has been investigated early in the literature. Eng ( 2005 ) found a small positive effect between ICT use and students' learning. Specifically, the author reported that access to computer-assisted instruction (CAI) programs in simulation or tutorial modes—used to supplement rather than substitute instruction – could enhance student learning. The author reported studies showing that teachers acknowledged the benefits of ICT on pupils with special educational needs; however, the impact of ICT on students' attainment was unclear. Balanskat et al. ( 2006 ) found a statistically significant positive association between ICT use and higher student achievement in primary and secondary education. The authors also reported improvements in the performance of low-achieving pupils. The use of ICT resulted in further positive gains for students, namely increased attention, engagement, motivation, communication and process skills, teamwork, and gains related to their behaviour towards learning. Evidence from qualitative studies showed that teachers, students, and parents recognized the positive impact of ICT on students' learning regardless of their competence level (strong/weak students). Punie et al. ( 2006 ) documented studies that showed positive results of ICT-based learning for supporting low-achieving pupils and young people with complex lives outside the education system. Liao et al. ( 2007 ) reported moderate positive effects of computer application instruction (CAI, computer simulations, and web-based learning) over traditional instruction on primary school student's achievement. Similarly, Tamim et al. ( 2011 ) reported small to moderate positive effects between the use of computer technology (CAI, ICT, simulations, computer-based instruction, digital and hypermedia) and student achievement in formal face-to-face classrooms compared to classrooms that did not use technology. Jewitt et al., ( 2011 ) found that the use of learning platforms (LPs) (virtual learning environments, management information systems, communication technologies, and information- and resource-sharing technologies) in schools allowed primary and secondary students to access a wider variety of quality learning resources, engage in independent and personalized learning, and conduct self- and peer-review; LPs also provide opportunities for teacher assessment and feedback. Similar findings were reported by Fu ( 2013 ), who documented a list of benefits and opportunities of ICT use. According to the author, the use of ICTs helps students access digital information and course content effectively and efficiently, supports student-centered and self-directed learning, as well as the development of a creative learning environment where more opportunities for critical thinking skills are offered, and promotes collaborative learning in a distance-learning environment. Higgins et al. ( 2012 ) found consistent but small positive associations between the use of technology and learning outcomes of school-age learners (5–18-year-olds) in studies linking the provision and use of technology with attainment. Additionally, Chauhan ( 2017 ) reported a medium positive effect of technology on the learning effectiveness of primary school students compared to students who followed traditional learning instruction.

The rise of mobile technologies and hardware devices instigated investigations into their impact on teaching and learning. Sung et al. ( 2016 ) reported a moderate effect on students' performance from the use of mobile devices in the classroom compared to the use of desktop computers or the non-use of mobile devices. Schmid et al. ( 2014 ) reported medium–low to low positive effects of technology integration (e.g., CAI, ICTs) in the classroom on students' achievement and attitude compared to not using technology or using technology to varying degrees. Tamim et al. ( 2015 ) found a low statistically significant effect of the use of tablets and other smart devices in educational contexts on students' achievement outcomes. The authors suggested that tablets offered additional advantages to students; namely, they reported improvements in students’ notetaking, organizational and communication skills, and creativity. Zheng et al. ( 2016 ) reported a small positive effect of one-to-one laptop programs on students’ academic achievement across subject areas. Additional reported benefits included student-centered, individualized, and project-based learning enhanced learner engagement and enthusiasm. Additionally, the authors found that students using one-to-one laptop programs tended to use technology more frequently than in non-laptop classrooms, and as a result, they developed a range of skills (e.g., information skills, media skills, technology skills, organizational skills). Haßler et al. ( 2016 ) found that most interventions that included the use of tablets across the curriculum reported positive learning outcomes. However, from 23 studies, five reported no differences, and two reported a negative effect on students' learning outcomes. Similar results were indicated by Kalati and Kim ( 2022 ) who investigated the effect of touchscreen technologies on young students’ learning. Specifically, from 53 studies, 34 advocated positive effects of touchscreen devices on children’s learning, 17 obtained mixed findings and two studies reported negative effects.

More recently, approaches that refer to the impact of gamification with the use of digital technologies on teaching and learning were also explored. A review by Pan et al. ( 2022 ) that examined the role of learning games in fostering mathematics education in K-12 settings, reported that gameplay improved students’ performance. Integration of digital games in teaching was also found as a promising pedagogical practice in STEM education that could lead to increased learning gains (Martinez et al., 2022 ; Wang et al., 2022 ). However, although Talan et al. ( 2020 ) reported a medium effect of the use of educational games (both digital and non-digital) on academic achievement, the effect of non-digital games was higher.

Over the last two years, the effects of more advanced technologies on teaching and learning were also investigated. Garzón and Acevedo ( 2019 ) found that AR applications had a medium effect on students' learning outcomes compared to traditional lectures. Similarly, Garzón et al. ( 2020 ) showed that AR had a medium impact on students' learning gains. VR applications integrated into various subjects were also found to have a moderate effect on students’ learning compared to control conditions (traditional classes, e.g., lectures, textbooks, and multimedia use, e.g., images, videos, animation, CAI) (Chen et al., 2022b ). Villena-Taranilla et al. ( 2022 ) noted the moderate effect of VR technologies on students’ learning when these were applied in STEM disciplines. In the same meta-analysis, Villena-Taranilla et al. ( 2022 ) highlighted the role of immersive VR, since its effect on students’ learning was greater (at a high level) across educational levels (K-6) compared to semi-immersive and non-immersive integrations. In another meta-analysis study, the effect size of the immersive VR was small and significantly differentiated across educational levels (Coban et al., 2022 ). The impact of AI on education was investigated by Su and Yang ( 2022 ) and Su et al. ( 2022 ), who showed that this technology significantly improved students’ understanding of AI computer science and machine learning concepts.

It is worth noting that the vast majority of studies referred to learning gains in specific subjects. Specifically, several studies examined the impact of digital technologies on students’ literacy skills and reported positive effects on language learning (Balanskat et al., 2006 ; Grgurović et al., 2013 ; Friedel et al., 2013 ; Zheng et al., 2016 ; Chen et al., 2022b ; Savva et al., 2022 ). Also, several studies documented positive effects on specific language learning areas, namely foreign language learning (Kao, 2014 ), writing (Higgins et al., 2012 ; Wen & Walters, 2022 ; Zheng et al., 2016 ), as well as reading and comprehension (Cheung & Slavin, 2011 ; Liao et al., 2007 ; Schwabe et al., 2022 ). ICTs were also found to have a positive impact on students' performance in STEM (science, technology, engineering, and mathematics) disciplines (Arztmann et al., 2022 ; Bado, 2022 ; Villena-Taranilla et al., 2022 ; Wang et al., 2022 ). Specifically, a number of studies reported positive impacts on students’ achievement in mathematics (Balanskat et al., 2006 ; Hillmayr et al., 2020 ; Li & Ma, 2010 ; Pan et al., 2022 ; Ran et al., 2022 ; Verschaffel et al., 2019 ; Zheng et al., 2016 ). Furthermore, studies documented positive effects of ICTs on science learning (Balanskat et al., 2006 ; Liao et al., 2007 ; Zheng et al., 2016 ; Hillmayr et al., 2020 ; Kalemkuş & Kalemkuş, 2022 ; Lei et al., 2022a ). Çelik ( 2022 ) also noted that computer simulations can help students understand learning concepts related to science. Furthermore, some studies documented that the use of ICTs had a positive impact on students’ achievement in other subjects, such as geography, history, music, and arts (Chauhan, 2017 ; Condie & Munro, 2007 ), and design and technology (Balanskat et al., 2006 ).

More specific positive learning gains were reported in a number of skills, e.g., problem-solving skills and pattern exploration skills (Higgins et al., 2012 ), metacognitive learning outcomes (Verschaffel et al., 2019 ), literacy skills, computational thinking skills, emotion control skills, and collaborative inquiry skills (Lu et al., 2022 ; Su & Yang, 2022 ; Su et al., 2022 ). Additionally, several investigations have reported benefits from the use of ICT on students’ creativity (Fielding & Murcia, 2022 ; Liu et al., 2022 ; Quah & Ng, 2022 ). Lastly, digital technologies were also found to be beneficial for enhancing students’ lifelong learning skills (Haleem et al., 2022 ).

Apart from gaining knowledge and skills, studies also reported improvement in motivation and interest in mathematics (Higgins et. al., 2019 ; Fadda et al., 2022 ) and increased positive achievement emotions towards several subjects during interventions using educational games (Lei et al., 2022a ). Chen et al. ( 2022a ) also reported a small but positive effect of digital health approaches in bullying and cyberbullying interventions with K-12 students, demonstrating that technology-based approaches can help reduce bullying and related consequences by providing emotional support, empowerment, and change of attitude. In their meta-review study, Su et al. ( 2022 ) also documented that AI technologies effectively strengthened students’ attitudes towards learning. In another meta-analysis, Arztmann et al. ( 2022 ) reported positive effects of digital games on motivation and behaviour towards STEM subjects.

Impacts of digital technologies on equality, inclusion and social integration

Although most of the reviewed studies focused on the impact of ICTs on students’ knowledge, skills, and attitudes, reports were also made on other aspects in the school context, such as equality, inclusion, and social integration. Condie and Munro ( 2007 ) documented research interventions investigating how ICT can support pupils with additional or special educational needs. While those interventions were relatively small scale and mostly based on qualitative data, their findings indicated that the use of ICTs enabled the development of communication, participation, and self-esteem. A recent meta-analysis (Baragash et al., 2022 ) with 119 participants with different disabilities, reported a significant overall effect size of AR on their functional skills acquisition. Koh’s meta-analysis ( 2022 ) also revealed that students with intellectual and developmental disabilities improved their competence and performance when they used digital games in the lessons.

Istenic Starcic and Bagon ( 2014 ) found that the role of ICT in inclusion and the design of pedagogical and technological interventions was not sufficiently explored in educational interventions with people with special needs; however, some benefits of ICT use were found in students’ social integration. The issue of gender and technology use was mentioned in a small number of studies. Zheng et al. ( 2016 ) reported a statistically significant positive interaction between one-to-one laptop programs and gender. Specifically, the results showed that girls and boys alike benefitted from the laptop program, but the effect on girls’ achievement was smaller than that on boys’. Along the same lines, Arztmann et al. ( 2022 ) reported no difference in the impact of game-based learning between boys and girls, arguing that boys and girls equally benefited from game-based interventions in STEM domains. However, results from a systematic review by Cussó-Calabuig et al. ( 2018 ) found limited and low-quality evidence on the effects of intensive use of computers on gender differences in computer anxiety, self-efficacy, and self-confidence. Based on their view, intensive use of computers can reduce gender differences in some areas and not in others, depending on contextual and implementation factors.

Impacts of digital technologies on teachers’ professional and teaching practices

Various research studies have explored the impact of ICT on teachers’ instructional practices and student assessment. Friedel et al. ( 2013 ) found that the use of mobile devices by students enabled teachers to successfully deliver content (e.g., mobile serious games), provide scaffolding, and facilitate synchronous collaborative learning. The integration of digital games in teaching and learning activities also gave teachers the opportunity to study and apply various pedagogical practices (Bado, 2022 ). Specifically, Bado ( 2022 ) found that teachers who implemented instructional activities in three stages (pre-game, game, and post-game) maximized students’ learning outcomes and engagement. For instance, during the pre-game stage, teachers focused on lectures and gameplay training, at the game stage teachers provided scaffolding on content, addressed technical issues, and managed the classroom activities. During the post-game stage, teachers organized activities for debriefing to ensure that the gameplay had indeed enhanced students’ learning outcomes.

Furthermore, ICT can increase efficiency in lesson planning and preparation by offering possibilities for a more collaborative approach among teachers. The sharing of curriculum plans and the analysis of students’ data led to clearer target settings and improvements in reporting to parents (Balanskat et al., 2006 ).

Additionally, the use and application of digital technologies in teaching and learning were found to enhance teachers’ digital competence. Balanskat et al. ( 2006 ) documented studies that revealed that the use of digital technologies in education had a positive effect on teachers’ basic ICT skills. The greatest impact was found on teachers with enough experience in integrating ICTs in their teaching and/or who had recently participated in development courses for the pedagogical use of technologies in teaching. Punie et al. ( 2006 ) reported that the provision of fully equipped multimedia portable computers and the development of online teacher communities had positive impacts on teachers’ confidence and competence in the use of ICTs.

Moreover, online assessment via ICTs benefits instruction. In particular, online assessments support the digitalization of students’ work and related logistics, allow teachers to gather immediate feedback and readjust to new objectives, and support the improvement of the technical quality of tests by providing more accurate results. Additionally, the capabilities of ICTs (e.g., interactive media, simulations) create new potential methods of testing specific skills, such as problem-solving and problem-processing skills, meta-cognitive skills, creativity and communication skills, and the ability to work productively in groups (Punie et al., 2006 ).

Impacts of digital technologies on other school-related aspects and stakeholders

There is evidence that the effective use of ICTs and the data transmission offered by broadband connections help improve administration (Balanskat et al., 2006 ). Specifically, ICTs have been found to provide better management systems to schools that have data gathering procedures in place. Condie and Munro ( 2007 ) reported impacts from the use of ICTs in schools in the following areas: attendance monitoring, assessment records, reporting to parents, financial management, creation of repositories for learning resources, and sharing of information amongst staff. Such data can be used strategically for self-evaluation and monitoring purposes which in turn can result in school improvements. Additionally, they reported that online access to other people with similar roles helped to reduce headteachers’ isolation by offering them opportunities to share insights into the use of ICT in learning and teaching and how it could be used to support school improvement. Furthermore, ICTs provided more efficient and successful examination management procedures, namely less time-consuming reporting processes compared to paper-based examinations and smooth communications between schools and examination authorities through electronic data exchange (Punie et al., 2006 ).

Zheng et al. ( 2016 ) reported that the use of ICTs improved home-school relationships. Additionally, Escueta et al. ( 2017 ) reported several ICT programs that had improved the flow of information from the school to parents. Particularly, they documented that the use of ICTs (learning management systems, emails, dedicated websites, mobile phones) allowed for personalized and customized information exchange between schools and parents, such as attendance records, upcoming class assignments, school events, and students’ grades, which generated positive results on students’ learning outcomes and attainment. Such information exchange between schools and families prompted parents to encourage their children to put more effort into their schoolwork.

The above findings suggest that the impact of ICT integration in schools goes beyond students’ performance in school subjects. Specifically, it affects a number of school-related aspects, such as equality and social integration, professional and teaching practices, and diverse stakeholders. In Table ​ Table2, 2 , we summarize the different impacts of digital technologies on school stakeholders based on the literature review, while in Table ​ Table3 3 we organized the tools/platforms and practices/policies addressed in the meta-analyses, literature reviews, EU reports, and international bodies included in the manuscript.

The impact of digital technologies on schools’ stakeholders based on the literature review

Tools/platforms and practices/policies addressed in the meta-analyses, literature reviews, EU reports, and international bodies included in the manuscript

Additionally, based on the results of the literature review, there are many types of digital technologies with different affordances (see, for example, studies on VR vs Immersive VR), which evolve over time (e.g. starting from CAIs in 2005 to Augmented and Virtual reality 2020). Furthermore, these technologies are linked to different pedagogies and policy initiatives, which are critical factors in the study of impact. Table ​ Table3 3 summarizes the different tools and practices that have been used to examine the impact of digital technologies on education since 2005 based on the review results.

Factors that affect the integration of digital technologies

Although the analysis of the literature review demonstrated different impacts of the use of digital technology on education, several authors highlighted the importance of various factors, besides the technology itself, that affect this impact. For example, Liao et al. ( 2007 ) suggested that future studies should carefully investigate which factors contribute to positive outcomes by clarifying the exact relationship between computer applications and learning. Additionally, Haßler et al., ( 2016 ) suggested that the neutral findings regarding the impact of tablets on students learning outcomes in some of the studies included in their review should encourage educators, school leaders, and school officials to further investigate the potential of such devices in teaching and learning. Several other researchers suggested that a number of variables play a significant role in the impact of ICTs on students’ learning that could be attributed to the school context, teaching practices and professional development, the curriculum, and learners’ characteristics (Underwood, 2009 ; Tamim et al., 2011 ; Higgins et al., 2012 ; Archer et al., 2014 ; Sung et al., 2016 ; Haßler et al., 2016 ; Chauhan, 2017 ; Lee et al., 2020 ; Tang et al., 2022 ).

Digital competencies

One of the most common challenges reported in studies that utilized digital tools in the classroom was the lack of students’ skills on how to use them. Fu ( 2013 ) found that students’ lack of technical skills is a barrier to the effective use of ICT in the classroom. Tamim et al. ( 2015 ) reported that students faced challenges when using tablets and smart mobile devices, associated with the technical issues or expertise needed for their use and the distracting nature of the devices and highlighted the need for teachers’ professional development. Higgins et al. ( 2012 ) reported that skills training about the use of digital technologies is essential for learners to fully exploit the benefits of instruction.

Delgado et al. ( 2015 ), meanwhile, reported studies that showed a strong positive association between teachers’ computer skills and students’ use of computers. Teachers’ lack of ICT skills and familiarization with technologies can become a constraint to the effective use of technology in the classroom (Balanskat et al., 2006 ; Delgado et al., 2015 ).

It is worth noting that the way teachers are introduced to ICTs affects the impact of digital technologies on education. Previous studies have shown that teachers may avoid using digital technologies due to limited digital skills (Balanskat, 2006 ), or they prefer applying “safe” technologies, namely technologies that their own teachers used and with which they are familiar (Condie & Munro, 2007 ). In this regard, the provision of digital skills training and exposure to new digital tools might encourage teachers to apply various technologies in their lessons (Condie & Munro, 2007 ). Apart from digital competence, technical support in the school setting has also been shown to affect teachers’ use of technology in their classrooms (Delgado et al., 2015 ). Ferrari et al. ( 2011 ) found that while teachers’ use of ICT is high, 75% stated that they needed more institutional support and a shift in the mindset of educational actors to achieve more innovative teaching practices. The provision of support can reduce time and effort as well as cognitive constraints, which could cause limited ICT integration in the school lessons by teachers (Escueta et al., 2017 ).

Teachers’ personal characteristics, training approaches, and professional development

Teachers’ personal characteristics and professional development affect the impact of digital technologies on education. Specifically, Cheok and Wong ( 2015 ) found that teachers’ personal characteristics (e.g., anxiety, self-efficacy) are associated with their satisfaction and engagement with technology. Bingimlas ( 2009 ) reported that lack of confidence, resistance to change, and negative attitudes in using new technologies in teaching are significant determinants of teachers’ levels of engagement in ICT. The same author reported that the provision of technical support, motivation support (e.g., awards, sufficient time for planning), and training on how technologies can benefit teaching and learning can eliminate the above barriers to ICT integration. Archer et al. ( 2014 ) found that comfort levels in using technology are an important predictor of technology integration and argued that it is essential to provide teachers with appropriate training and ongoing support until they are comfortable with using ICTs in the classroom. Hillmayr et al. ( 2020 ) documented that training teachers on ICT had an important effecton students’ learning.

According to Balanskat et al. ( 2006 ), the impact of ICTs on students’ learning is highly dependent on the teachers’ capacity to efficiently exploit their application for pedagogical purposes. Results obtained from the Teaching and Learning International Survey (TALIS) (OECD, 2021 ) revealed that although schools are open to innovative practices and have the capacity to adopt them, only 39% of teachers in the European Union reported that they are well or very well prepared to use digital technologies for teaching. Li and Ma ( 2010 ) and Hardman ( 2019 ) showed that the positive effect of technology on students’ achievement depends on the pedagogical practices used by teachers. Schmid et al. ( 2014 ) reported that learning was best supported when students were engaged in active, meaningful activities with the use of technological tools that provided cognitive support. Tamim et al. ( 2015 ) compared two different pedagogical uses of tablets and found a significant moderate effect when the devices were used in a student-centered context and approach rather than within teacher-led environments. Similarly, Garzón and Acevedo ( 2019 ) and Garzón et al. ( 2020 ) reported that the positive results from the integration of AR applications could be attributed to the existence of different variables which could influence AR interventions (e.g., pedagogical approach, learning environment, and duration of the intervention). Additionally, Garzón et al. ( 2020 ) suggested that the pedagogical resources that teachers used to complement their lectures and the pedagogical approaches they applied were crucial to the effective integration of AR on students’ learning gains. Garzón and Acevedo ( 2019 ) also emphasized that the success of a technology-enhanced intervention is based on both the technology per se and its characteristics and on the pedagogical strategies teachers choose to implement. For instance, their results indicated that the collaborative learning approach had the highest impact on students’ learning gains among other approaches (e.g., inquiry-based learning, situated learning, or project-based learning). Ran et al. ( 2022 ) also found that the use of technology to design collaborative and communicative environments showed the largest moderator effects among the other approaches.

Hattie ( 2008 ) reported that the effective use of computers is associated with training teachers in using computers as a teaching and learning tool. Zheng et al. ( 2016 ) noted that in addition to the strategies teachers adopt in teaching, ongoing professional development is also vital in ensuring the success of technology implementation programs. Sung et al. ( 2016 ) found that research on the use of mobile devices to support learning tends to report that the insufficient preparation of teachers is a major obstacle in implementing effective mobile learning programs in schools. Friedel et al. ( 2013 ) found that providing training and support to teachers increased the positive impact of the interventions on students’ learning gains. Trucano ( 2005 ) argued that positive impacts occur when digital technologies are used to enhance teachers’ existing pedagogical philosophies. Higgins et al. ( 2012 ) found that the types of technologies used and how they are used could also affect students’ learning. The authors suggested that training and professional development of teachers that focuses on the effective pedagogical use of technology to support teaching and learning is an important component of successful instructional approaches (Higgins et al., 2012 ). Archer et al. ( 2014 ) found that studies that reported ICT interventions during which teachers received training and support had moderate positive effects on students’ learning outcomes, which were significantly higher than studies where little or no detail about training and support was mentioned. Fu ( 2013 ) reported that the lack of teachers’ knowledge and skills on the technical and instructional aspects of ICT use in the classroom, in-service training, pedagogy support, technical and financial support, as well as the lack of teachers’ motivation and encouragement to integrate ICT on their teaching were significant barriers to the integration of ICT in education.

School leadership and management

Management and leadership are important cornerstones in the digital transformation process (Pihir et al., 2018 ). Zheng et al. ( 2016 ) documented leadership among the factors positively affecting the successful implementation of technology integration in schools. Strong leadership, strategic planning, and systematic integration of digital technologies are prerequisites for the digital transformation of education systems (Ređep, 2021 ). Management and leadership play a significant role in formulating policies that are translated into practice and ensure that developments in ICT become embedded into the life of the school and in the experiences of staff and pupils (Condie & Munro, 2007 ). Policy support and leadership must include the provision of an overall vision for the use of digital technologies in education, guidance for students and parents, logistical support, as well as teacher training (Conrads et al., 2017 ). Unless there is a commitment throughout the school, with accountability for progress at key points, it is unlikely for ICT integration to be sustained or become part of the culture (Condie & Munro, 2007 ). To achieve this, principals need to adopt and promote a whole-institution strategy and build a strong mutual support system that enables the school’s technological maturity (European Commission, 2019 ). In this context, school culture plays an essential role in shaping the mindsets and beliefs of school actors towards successful technology integration. Condie and Munro ( 2007 ) emphasized the importance of the principal’s enthusiasm and work as a source of inspiration for the school staff and the students to cultivate a culture of innovation and establish sustainable digital change. Specifically, school leaders need to create conditions in which the school staff is empowered to experiment and take risks with technology (Elkordy & Lovinelli, 2020 ).

In order for leaders to achieve the above, it is important to develop capacities for learning and leading, advocating professional learning, and creating support systems and structures (European Commission, 2019 ). Digital technology integration in education systems can be challenging and leadership needs guidance to achieve it. Such guidance can be introduced through the adoption of new methods and techniques in strategic planning for the integration of digital technologies (Ređep, 2021 ). Even though the role of leaders is vital, the relevant training offered to them has so far been inadequate. Specifically, only a third of the education systems in Europe have put in place national strategies that explicitly refer to the training of school principals (European Commission, 2019 , p. 16).

Connectivity, infrastructure, and government and other support

The effective integration of digital technologies across levels of education presupposes the development of infrastructure, the provision of digital content, and the selection of proper resources (Voogt et al., 2013 ). Particularly, a high-quality broadband connection in the school increases the quality and quantity of educational activities. There is evidence that ICT increases and formalizes cooperative planning between teachers and cooperation with managers, which in turn has a positive impact on teaching practices (Balanskat et al., 2006 ). Additionally, ICT resources, including software and hardware, increase the likelihood of teachers integrating technology into the curriculum to enhance their teaching practices (Delgado et al., 2015 ). For example, Zheng et al. ( 2016 ) found that the use of one-on-one laptop programs resulted in positive changes in teaching and learning, which would not have been accomplished without the infrastructure and technical support provided to teachers. Delgado et al. ( 2015 ) reported that limited access to technology (insufficient computers, peripherals, and software) and lack of technical support are important barriers to ICT integration. Access to infrastructure refers not only to the availability of technology in a school but also to the provision of a proper amount and the right types of technology in locations where teachers and students can use them. Effective technical support is a central element of the whole-school strategy for ICT (Underwood, 2009 ). Bingimlas ( 2009 ) reported that lack of technical support in the classroom and whole-school resources (e.g., failing to connect to the Internet, printers not printing, malfunctioning computers, and working on old computers) are significant barriers that discourage the use of ICT by teachers. Moreover, poor quality and inadequate hardware maintenance, and unsuitable educational software may discourage teachers from using ICTs (Balanskat et al., 2006 ; Bingimlas, 2009 ).

Government support can also impact the integration of ICTs in teaching. Specifically, Balanskat et al. ( 2006 ) reported that government interventions and training programs increased teachers’ enthusiasm and positive attitudes towards ICT and led to the routine use of embedded ICT.

Lastly, another important factor affecting digital transformation is the development and quality assurance of digital learning resources. Such resources can be support textbooks and related materials or resources that focus on specific subjects or parts of the curriculum. Policies on the provision of digital learning resources are essential for schools and can be achieved through various actions. For example, some countries are financing web portals that become repositories, enabling teachers to share resources or create their own. Additionally, they may offer e-learning opportunities or other services linked to digital education. In other cases, specific agencies of projects have also been set up to develop digital resources (Eurydice, 2019 ).

Administration and digital data management

The digital transformation of schools involves organizational improvements at the level of internal workflows, communication between the different stakeholders, and potential for collaboration. Vuorikari et al. ( 2020 ) presented evidence that digital technologies supported the automation of administrative practices in schools and reduced the administration’s workload. There is evidence that digital data affects the production of knowledge about schools and has the power to transform how schooling takes place. Specifically, Sellar ( 2015 ) reported that data infrastructure in education is developing due to the demand for “ information about student outcomes, teacher quality, school performance, and adult skills, associated with policy efforts to increase human capital and productivity practices ” (p. 771). In this regard, practices, such as datafication which refers to the “ translation of information about all kinds of things and processes into quantified formats” have become essential for decision-making based on accountability reports about the school’s quality. The data could be turned into deep insights about education or training incorporating ICTs. For example, measuring students’ online engagement with the learning material and drawing meaningful conclusions can allow teachers to improve their educational interventions (Vuorikari et al., 2020 ).

Students’ socioeconomic background and family support

Research show that the active engagement of parents in the school and their support for the school’s work can make a difference to their children’s attitudes towards learning and, as a result, their achievement (Hattie, 2008 ). In recent years, digital technologies have been used for more effective communication between school and family (Escueta et al., 2017 ). The European Commission ( 2020 ) presented data from a Eurostat survey regarding the use of computers by students during the pandemic. The data showed that younger pupils needed additional support and guidance from parents and the challenges were greater for families in which parents had lower levels of education and little to no digital skills.

In this regard, the socio-economic background of the learners and their socio-cultural environment also affect educational achievements (Punie et al., 2006 ). Trucano documented that the use of computers at home positively influenced students’ confidence and resulted in more frequent use at school, compared to students who had no home access (Trucano, 2005 ). In this sense, the socio-economic background affects the access to computers at home (OECD, 2015 ) which in turn influences the experience of ICT, an important factor for school achievement (Punie et al., 2006 ; Underwood, 2009 ). Furthermore, parents from different socio-economic backgrounds may have different abilities and availability to support their children in their learning process (Di Pietro et al., 2020 ).

Schools’ socioeconomic context and emergency situations

The socio-economic context of the school is closely related to a school’s digital transformation. For example, schools in disadvantaged, rural, or deprived areas are likely to lack the digital capacity and infrastructure required to adapt to the use of digital technologies during emergency periods, such as the COVID-19 pandemic (Di Pietro et al., 2020 ). Data collected from school principals confirmed that in several countries, there is a rural/urban divide in connectivity (OECD, 2015 ).

Emergency periods also affect the digitalization of schools. The COVID-19 pandemic led to the closure of schools and forced them to seek appropriate and connective ways to keep working on the curriculum (Di Pietro et al., 2020 ). The sudden large-scale shift to distance and online teaching and learning also presented challenges around quality and equity in education, such as the risk of increased inequalities in learning, digital, and social, as well as teachers facing difficulties coping with this demanding situation (European Commission, 2020 ).

Looking at the findings of the above studies, we can conclude that the impact of digital technologies on education is influenced by various actors and touches many aspects of the school ecosystem. Figure  1 summarizes the factors affecting the digital technologies’ impact on school stakeholders based on the findings from the literature review.

Factors that affect the impact of ICTs on education

The findings revealed that the use of digital technologies in education affects a variety of actors within a school’s ecosystem. First, we observed that as technologies evolve, so does the interest of the research community to apply them to school settings. Figure  2 summarizes the trends identified in current research around the impact of digital technologies on schools’ digital capacity and transformation as found in the present study. Starting as early as 2005, when computers, simulations, and interactive boards were the most commonly applied tools in school interventions (e.g., Eng, 2005 ; Liao et al., 2007 ; Moran et al., 2008 ; Tamim et al., 2011 ), moving towards the use of learning platforms (Jewitt et al., 2011 ), then to the use of mobile devices and digital games (e.g., Tamim et al., 2015 ; Sung et al., 2016 ; Talan et al., 2020 ), as well as e-books (e.g., Savva et al., 2022 ), to the more recent advanced technologies, such as AR and VR applications (e.g., Garzón & Acevedo, 2019 ; Garzón et al., 2020 ; Kalemkuş & Kalemkuş, 2022 ), or robotics and AI (e.g., Su & Yang, 2022 ; Su et al., 2022 ). As this evolution shows, digital technologies are a concept in flux with different affordances and characteristics. Additionally, from an instructional perspective, there has been a growing interest in different modes and models of content delivery such as online, blended, and hybrid modes (e.g., Cheok & Wong, 2015 ; Kazu & Yalçin, 2022 ; Ulum, 2022 ). This is an indication that the value of technologies to support teaching and learning as well as other school-related practices is increasingly recognized by the research and school community. The impact results from the literature review indicate that ICT integration on students’ learning outcomes has effects that are small (Coban et al., 2022 ; Eng, 2005 ; Higgins et al., 2012 ; Schmid et al., 2014 ; Tamim et al., 2015 ; Zheng et al., 2016 ) to moderate (Garzón & Acevedo, 2019 ; Garzón et al., 2020 ; Liao et al., 2007 ; Sung et al., 2016 ; Talan et al., 2020 ; Wen & Walters, 2022 ). That said, a number of recent studies have reported high effect sizes (e.g., Kazu & Yalçin, 2022 ).

Current work and trends in the study of the impact of digital technologies on schools’ digital capacity

Based on these findings, several authors have suggested that the impact of technology on education depends on several variables and not on the technology per se (Tamim et al., 2011 ; Higgins et al., 2012 ; Archer et al., 2014 ; Sung et al., 2016 ; Haßler et al., 2016 ; Chauhan, 2017 ; Lee et al., 2020 ; Lei et al., 2022a ). While the impact of ICTs on student achievement has been thoroughly investigated by researchers, other aspects related to school life that are also affected by ICTs, such as equality, inclusion, and social integration have received less attention. Further analysis of the literature review has revealed a greater investment in ICT interventions to support learning and teaching in the core subjects of literacy and STEM disciplines, especially mathematics, and science. These were the most common subjects studied in the reviewed papers often drawing on national testing results, while studies that investigated other subject areas, such as social studies, were limited (Chauhan, 2017 ; Condie & Munro, 2007 ). As such, research is still lacking impact studies that focus on the effects of ICTs on a range of curriculum subjects.

The qualitative research provided additional information about the impact of digital technologies on education, documenting positive effects and giving more details about implications, recommendations, and future research directions. Specifically, the findings regarding the role of ICTs in supporting learning highlight the importance of teachers’ instructional practice and the learning context in the use of technologies and consequently their impact on instruction (Çelik, 2022 ; Schmid et al., 2014 ; Tamim et al., 2015 ). The review also provided useful insights regarding the various factors that affect the impact of digital technologies on education. These factors are interconnected and play a vital role in the transformation process. Specifically, these factors include a) digital competencies; b) teachers’ personal characteristics and professional development; c) school leadership and management; d) connectivity, infrastructure, and government support; e) administration and data management practices; f) students’ socio-economic background and family support and g) the socioeconomic context of the school and emergency situations. It is worth noting that we observed factors that affect the integration of ICTs in education but may also be affected by it. For example, the frequent use of ICTs and the use of laptops by students for instructional purposes positively affect the development of digital competencies (Zheng et al., 2016 ) and at the same time, the digital competencies affect the use of ICTs (Fu, 2013 ; Higgins et al., 2012 ). As a result, the impact of digital technologies should be explored more as an enabler of desirable and new practices and not merely as a catalyst that improves the output of the education process i.e. namely student attainment.

Conclusions

Digital technologies offer immense potential for fundamental improvement in schools. However, investment in ICT infrastructure and professional development to improve school education are yet to provide fruitful results. Digital transformation is a complex process that requires large-scale transformative changes that presuppose digital capacity and preparedness. To achieve such changes, all actors within the school’s ecosystem need to share a common vision regarding the integration of ICTs in education and work towards achieving this goal. Our literature review, which synthesized quantitative and qualitative data from a list of meta-analyses and review studies, provided useful insights into the impact of ICTs on different school stakeholders and showed that the impact of digital technologies touches upon many different aspects of school life, which are often overlooked when the focus is on student achievement as the final output of education. Furthermore, the concept of digital technologies is a concept in flux as technologies are not only different among them calling for different uses in the educational practice but they also change through time. Additionally, we opened a forum for discussion regarding the factors that affect a school’s digital capacity and transformation. We hope that our study will inform policy, practice, and research and result in a paradigm shift towards more holistic approaches in impact and assessment studies.

Study limitations and future directions

We presented a review of the study of digital technologies' impact on education and factors influencing schools’ digital capacity and transformation. The study results were based on a non-systematic literature review grounded on the acquisition of documentation in specific databases. Future studies should investigate more databases to corroborate and enhance our results. Moreover, search queries could be enhanced with key terms that could provide additional insights about the integration of ICTs in education, such as “policies and strategies for ICT integration in education”. Also, the study drew information from meta-analyses and literature reviews to acquire evidence about the effects of ICT integration in schools. Such evidence was mostly based on the general conclusions of the studies. It is worth mentioning that, we located individual studies which showed different, such as negative or neutral results. Thus, further insights are needed about the impact of ICTs on education and the factors influencing the impact. Furthermore, the nature of the studies included in meta-analyses and reviews is different as they are based on different research methodologies and data gathering processes. For instance, in a meta-analysis, the impact among the studies investigated is measured in a particular way, depending on policy or research targets (e.g., results from national examinations, pre-/post-tests). Meanwhile, in literature reviews, qualitative studies offer additional insights and detail based on self-reports and research opinions on several different aspects and stakeholders who could affect and be affected by ICT integration. As a result, it was challenging to draw causal relationships between so many interrelating variables.

Despite the challenges mentioned above, this study envisaged examining school units as ecosystems that consist of several actors by bringing together several variables from different research epistemologies to provide an understanding of the integration of ICTs. However, the use of other tools and methodologies and models for evaluation of the impact of digital technologies on education could give more detailed data and more accurate results. For instance, self-reflection tools, like SELFIE—developed on the DigCompOrg framework- (Kampylis et al., 2015 ; Bocconi & Lightfoot, 2021 ) can help capture a school’s digital capacity and better assess the impact of ICTs on education. Furthermore, the development of a theory of change could be a good approach for documenting the impact of digital technologies on education. Specifically, theories of change are models used for the evaluation of interventions and their impact; they are developed to describe how interventions will work and give the desired outcomes (Mayne, 2015 ). Theory of change as a methodological approach has also been used by researchers to develop models for evaluation in the field of education (e.g., Aromatario et al., 2019 ; Chapman & Sammons, 2013 ; De Silva et al., 2014 ).

We also propose that future studies aim at similar investigations by applying more holistic approaches for impact assessment that can provide in-depth data about the impact of digital technologies on education. For instance, future studies could focus on different research questions about the technologies that are used during the interventions or the way the implementation takes place (e.g., What methodologies are used for documenting impact? How are experimental studies implemented? How can teachers be taken into account and trained on the technology and its functions? What are the elements of an appropriate and successful implementation? How is the whole intervention designed? On which learning theories is the technology implementation based?).

Future research could also focus on assessing the impact of digital technologies on various other subjects since there is a scarcity of research related to particular subjects, such as geography, history, arts, music, and design and technology. More research should also be done about the impact of ICTs on skills, emotions, and attitudes, and on equality, inclusion, social interaction, and special needs education. There is also a need for more research about the impact of ICTs on administration, management, digitalization, and home-school relationships. Additionally, although new forms of teaching and learning with the use of ICTs (e.g., blended, hybrid, and online learning) have initiated several investigations in mainstream classrooms, only a few studies have measured their impact on students’ learning. Additionally, our review did not document any study about the impact of flipped classrooms on K-12 education. Regarding teaching and learning approaches, it is worth noting that studies referred to STEM or STEAM did not investigate the impact of STEM/STEAM as an interdisciplinary approach to learning but only investigated the impact of ICTs on learning in each domain as a separate subject (science, technology, engineering, arts, mathematics). Hence, we propose future research to also investigate the impact of the STEM/STEAM approach on education. The impact of emerging technologies on education, such as AR, VR, robotics, and AI has also been investigated recently, but more work needs to be done.

Finally, we propose that future studies could focus on the way in which specific factors, e.g., infrastructure and government support, school leadership and management, students’ and teachers’ digital competencies, approaches teachers utilize in the teaching and learning (e.g., blended, online and hybrid learning, flipped classrooms, STEM/STEAM approach, project-based learning, inquiry-based learning), affect the impact of digital technologies on education. We hope that future studies will give detailed insights into the concept of schools’ digital transformation through further investigation of impacts and factors which influence digital capacity and transformation based on the results and the recommendations of the present study.

Acknowledgements

This project has received funding under Grant Agreement No Ref Ares (2021) 339036 7483039 as well as funding from the European Union’s Horizon 2020 Research and Innovation Program under Grant Agreement No 739578 and the Government of the Republic of Cyprus through the Deputy Ministry of Research, Innovation and Digital Policy. The UVa co-authors would like also to acknowledge funding from the European Regional Development Fund and the National Research Agency of the Spanish Ministry of Science and Innovation, under project grant PID2020-112584RB-C32.

Data availability statement

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Technology/Media Use in Early Childhood Education: Publication Trends in the U.S. from 2013 to 2022

• Published: 24 May 2024

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• Boh Young Lee   ORCID: orcid.org/0000-0002-9675-8216 1  

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This paper examines the research publication trends in the United States regarding the use of technology and media with or for young children (infants, toddlers, and preschoolers) from 2013 to 2022 after the joint National Association for the Education of Young Children (NAEYC) and Fred Rogers Center (FRC) position statement was released in 2012 to indicate areas for further exploration. Articles were carefully selected with predetermined exclusion criteria within three chosen databases that cover professional and scholarly peer-reviewed journals in a variety of areas in education. The final 124 articles were analyzed and categorized with predefined categories: publication year, type of article participants, methodology, research setting, purpose(s) of study.

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To measure effectiveness, researchers have traditionally used randomized controlled trials (RCTs) as the gold standard. However, this methodology is time-consuming, expensive, and yields results only after a long period of time. We need to consider the value additional methods of measurement can provide to authentically evaluate edtech tools at a pace that will support districts with these decisions now.

District leaders have fewer dollars to move forward with edtech products, and they deserve access to quality information about the potential impact an edtech tool can have on their community. Mixed-methods, correlational, and quasi-experimental research can provide a reasonable turnaround time to support decision-making that incorporates evidence.

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RCTs are well-designed research studies that may offer causal findings. RCTs offer the promise of determining whether an edtech tool directly increases student learning or not. Originating from the medical field where researchers determine if a medicine has an intended outcome for patients, RCTs offer a promise of being able to pinpoint a cause. However, there are several challenges to implementing this model for edtech research:

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• Metrics of success: Unlike medicine which typically cures a singular disease, metrics of success for edtech tools can be extremely varied. Improved testing scores, educator satisfaction, or even rate of adoption can all be considered as an indication of success. 
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To accomplish this goal, researchers need to elevate the status of qualitative research in edtech by always using mixed methods when evaluating the effectiveness of an edtech tool. This will allow us to ask much more nuanced questions. For example, rather than asking, “Did a tool work?” we can ask, “Why did a tool not work for all students?” With qualitative data, such as student focus groups and classroom observations, we can learn deeper insights such as students of color sharing that they did not feel represented in the math problems used by the product, which often led them to feel disengaged with the learning. 

The question we must ask is whether a tool has created a greater sense of community for students or further alienated learners.

To authentically measure the effectiveness of edtech tools, skilled learning scientists at Digital Promise have collaborated with multiple organizations and a variety of practitioners including district leaders. As a result, Digital Promise has launched the Evidence-Based Edtech product certification as a way to operationalize this effort. The certification welcomes submitted studies that consider correlational, quasi-experimental, and randomized controlled trials research, and require findings to be fully reported, whether positive or negative, and disaggregated by learner subpopulations. 

Our goal is to assess the quality of research that falls outside of ESSA Tier 1, which exclusively represents RCTs. We aim to support education leaders with information about the reliability of evidence that vendors share and increase the amount of evidence available to the field by recognizing the quality of non-RCT edtech research. 

The Evidence-Based Edtech product certification enables Digital Promise to evaluate the reliability of the product’s evidence basis, along with an evaluation of the product’s theory of change. Our assessors also evaluate the quality and relevance of learning sciences research used to drive specific and distinct design decisions within a product and ensure the product’s research basis is easily accessible to the public. 

Most importantly, the Evidence-Based Edtech product certification allows those who select and purchase edtech to know with confidence that a product has been vetted through the learning science lens. Our team has worked with district leaders to develop these district resources to support the integration of evidence into edtech evaluation and decision-making. 

District leaders have fewer dollars to move forward with edtech products, and they deserve access to quality information about the potential impact an edtech tool can have on their community. Mixed-methods, correlational, and quasi-experimental research can provide a reasonable turnaround time to support decision-making that incorporates evidence. Evidence, too, can help justify decisions to teachers, school boards, and communities as district leaders have to make significant cuts to the number of tools available across their district. 

Sierra Noakes is the Director of Edtech Evaluation and Contracting at Digital Promise. 

Kip Glazer is Principal at Mountain View High School.

Pati Ruiz is the Senior Director of Edtech and Emerging Technologies at Digital Promise.

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