Conference Agenda

The study of Computer Science (CS)/coding in schools has gained renewed interest in recent decades after the early optimism of the late 1970 and 1980s abated because of the rise of interest in the integration of ICT across the curriculum in schools in the 1990s (Brown et al., 2014). This resurgence of interest has since accelerated (Yadyav et al, 2016; Williamson et al, 2019). These initiatives are often in the form of ‘learning to code’ courses or specific CS subjects (Ottestad & Gudmundsdottir, 2018). Analysis by Heintz et al (2016) and Keane and McInerney (2017) suggests that this interest has mainly materialised as standalone subjects on the curriculum rather than being integrated within existing subjects. Williamson et al (2019) argue that such is the level of attention afforded to CS/coding it has become a transnational policy movement. They also remark that despite the relatively quick materialisation of CS/coding in schools as a major policy agenda, the area remains under-researched.

Despite the interest and attention afforded to CS/Coding in schools, the rationales for its introduction vary ranging from explicit economic rationales concerned about national economic competitiveness (Tucker, 2003; McGarr & Johnston, 2020) to broader social and educational justifications aimed at addressing inequalities of opportunity or developing specific cognitive skills for students such as problem solving and analytical skills. These different agendas and rationales are a product of the messiness of the policy making process where multiple stakeholders elbow for influence (Williamson et al, 2019).

When one considers how CS/Coding is materialised in schools, as a stand-alone subject rather than being integrated across the curriculum, it appears to contradict the rationales put forward for its integration in schools. There appears to be a disconnect between the policy rhetoric for a coding for all agenda and how it is ultimately realised in schools as an optional discrete subject.

To explore the rationale for this ‘gap’, this paper explores the recent interest in CS/Coding in schools through the lens of curriculum ideologies (Ross, 2000). Viewing the recent attention in this area as an example of a contemporary curriculum change, this paper aims to undertake a theoretical exploration of the literature surrounding the history of CS/coding in schools using the theoretical lens of curriculum ideologies. It therefore aims to use this historical exploration to help explain past and present rationales for its study in schools. In doing so it aims to highlight the contradictions in current policies.

Computational Thinking (CT) regained interest from researchers, policymakers, and educators in the aftermath of Wing’s (2006) position article where CT was defined as a fundamental skill that “includes a range of mental tools that reflect the breadth of the field of computer science” (p. 33). However, despite the apparent consensus that CT is a crucial skill that has been implemented in school curricula in several countries (Hsu et al., 2019), there is limited consensus as to how CT is defined. Brennan and Resnick’s (2012) definition divides CT into three key dimensions: computational thinking concepts which are understanding fundamental programming concepts like loops, operators, and conditionals; computational practices which are about the processes of thinking and learning; and computational perspectives which are about how the person understand themselves, the connection with others, and the technical world surrounding them and how these understandings evolve. However, Brennan and Resnick’s (2012) understanding of CT is closely connected to the Scratch environment which might introduce constraints to their framework. Based on their review of the state of the field, Grover and Pea (2013) described CT as comprising abstractions and pattern generalizations; systematic processing of information; algorithmic notions of flow of control; structured problem decomposition; conditional logic; efficiency and performance constraint; debugging and systematic error detection; and iterative, recursive, and parallel thinking. Weintrop et al.’s (2016) CT definition focuses on four main categories: data practices, modelling and simulation practices, computational problem-solving practices, and systems thinking practices, aiming at developing a nuanced understanding of CT in mathematics and science. Shute et al. (2017) proposed a model for CT that aimed at being useful between disciplines and instructional settings. They defined “CT as the conceptual foundation required to solve problems effectively and efficiently (i.e., algorithmically, with or without the assistance of computers) with solutions that are reusable in different contexts” (p. 151). Consequently, they understood CT as a logical way of thinking. Further, they categorized CT into decomposition, abstraction, algorithms, debugging, iteration, and generalization.

Tang et al. (2020) argued that an essential difference between the various definitions of CT is whether the definition focuses on CT as programming and computing, and those that focus more on CT as competencies needed in both domain-specific knowledge and general problem-solving. Shute et al. (2017) raised an important issue in their definition of CT, namely the need to define CT across different contexts. Yadav et al. (2022) pointed out the lack of studies that focus on CT in initial teacher education, highlighting the need to develop not necessarily a consensual definition of CT, but rather a working framework that can span both school and teacher education.

Consequently, this study aims to develop a flexible model for CT competencies that can be used across different education levels, by teachers, teacher educators and student teachers. To do this, we investigate the following research questions:

RQ1: What characterizes the definitions and operationalizations of CT used in empirical studies of CT?

RQ2: What are the converging and diverging understandings of CT used in empirical studies of CT?

In our study, we view CT as a ‘boundary object’, drawing on Star and Griesemer (1989). As a boundary object, CT is viewed as an ‘ill-structured’ concept that has resulted in a tug-of-war. However, from a boundary object perspective, it is this very lack of consensus that can contribute to developing a model that is flexible and adaptable in different contexts.

Within the last decade, several national curricula have introduced computational thinking (CT), either through a dedicated subject or integrated within existing subjects (Bocconi et al., 2022) Several reviews of CT highlight the lack of a unified definition e.g. Weintrop et al. (2016) which in turn percolates to a disparity in the assessment of CT. Nevertheless, there is a consensus that CT includes concepts and practices which are foundational in computing and are crucial in a wide range of problem-solving. With the ever-growing use of digital tools in schools and in all kinds of professional practices, it becomes relevant to introduce CT in learning contexts.

CT frameworks vary from more generic to subject-specific. Examples of more generic frameworks are Brennan and Resnick (2012), and Grover and Pea (2013) which overlap on aspects like decomposition, abstraction, algorithms, and debugging. The more subject-specific frameworks relevant to the integration of CT into mathematics and science highlight approaches like formulating problems, gathering and analysing data, and modelling e.g. Weintrop et al. (2016). Integration of CT in curricula will affect the learning processes and, therefore, should have implications for assessment.

Only a few of the CT frameworks are operationalized as assessment frameworks. There are numerous assessment tools, but many are focused on programming practices or as part of a computer science subject. Furthermore, the tools are often automatized providing summative assessment. Many frameworks are targeted towards intervention studies rather than assessment criteria for educators. As CT is a growing educational field, there is a need for a CT framework which can be applied by teachers and inform their design of teaching and assessment. Such guidelines for both teachers and students can be understood as shared learning intentions and criteria (Wiliam, 2011) and measures that may enable educators to evaluate the effectiveness of incorporating CT in curricula (Grover & Pea, 2013).

Discussions regarding the assessment of CT have frequently focused on CT as a generic skill e.g. Román-González et al. (2019) or assessments of students’ programming or computing skills (Tang et al., 2020). There is a need for developing an assessment framework providing formative and summative assessment relevant for integrating CT into subjects (Tang et al., 2020).

CT was included in several subjects in the Norwegian curriculum in 2020. In mathematics, students are introduced to the basic concepts of programming like variables, loops, and conditions. Building on the skills developed in mathematics, the students are expected to use programming in science, arts and crafts, and music. Although the curriculum uses the term programming, it is broadly understood as a concept close to CT. Through programming, the students should explore the subject matter enhancing their learning outcome (Norwegian Directorate for Education and Training, 2019).

The aim of this study is to explore the assessment constructs aligned with the relevant CT definitions and with the subject-matter knowledge. Thus, in this study we raise the following research question:

RQ1: What constructs inform a framework for the assessment of CT?

RQ2: How can a set of CT assessment constructs support practitioners’ teaching and assessment?

Formative and summative assessment are related and they play an important role in students learning (Wiliam, 2011). CT is complex and therefore it is recommended to develop rich and complementary systems of assessment (Grover, 2017; Román-González et al., 2019). To create the framework, we draw on a literature review, teacher interviews as well as on classroom observations. The framework is furthermore tested in close collaboration with teachers.

The use of technology in education has been a topic of interest for policymakers for many years, as is alleged to have significantly benefits for the learning experience for students. With the rapid implementation of digital technology in education in recent years, there has been a focus on the role of teacher qualifications in preparing students for a digital society and utilise the potential of a datafyed and digitised education system. The teacher is commonly portrayed to play a critical role in integrating technology into classroom and ensuring that students can effectively use it to learn and acquire new skills.

The focus has been on providing teachers with the necessary training and professional development to effectively integrate technology into their teaching practice. A common means of achieving such qualifications is the development of teachers’ professional digital competence often presented as qualification framework. While the incorporation of technology in education and the professional development of teachers is often presented as a depoliticized and objective improvement project, this paper critically analyses the conception of a digitally competent teacher as constructed in this policy. It argues that the conceptualization of a digitally competent teacher is not a neutral, apolitical construct, but rather one that is shaped by the political, economic, and social context in which it is developed. The study examines the ways in which the problematisation of teachers need for digitally competent is used to justify certain policy decisions and how the definition of digital competency is used to shape the role of teachers. By taking a critical perspective, this study aims to uncover the veiled power dynamics and potential consequences of these policies on teachers and the education system.

This paper conducts a critical analysis of the Norwegian Professional Digital Competence Framework for Teachers (the ‘PDC framework’) using Bacchi's (2009) ‘What's the problem represented to be?’ approach. The WPR approach involves analysing policy documents to uncover the underlying assumptions and policy imagination that shape the problem representation and subsequent solutions proposed in the document. In this case, the analysis aims to uncover the assumptions and representations of digital competency for teachers as constructed in the PDC framework, and the potential consequences of these representations on the role of teachers and the education system in Norway. The paper's focus is on the PDC framework as it is a governing the development and implementation of technology in education and the professional development of teachers in Norway.

This paper argues that the PDC framework is used as a policy instrument to stabilize and legitimize the use of digital technologies in the classroom. The PDC framework is informed by a sociotechnical imaginary that digital technology is the driving force for pedagogical development and that teachers are deficient when facing a digitized education. The paper discusses the potential consequences of the PDC framework on the role of teachers and the education system in Norway. Specifically, it argues that the PDC framework may lead to an unintended process of de-professionalization, in which teachers' autonomy is weakened. This is because the framework reinforces the idea that digital technology having inherent powers that teacher needs to use in the classroom, and that they need to be trained and regulated to do so. As a result, teachers may be less able to exercise autonomy and make decisions about how to use technology to support student learning, ultimately weakening their professional status.

Today's society has experimented major changes due to the incorporation of digital technology into everyday life, especially in recent times, and schools have not remained oblivious to these changes (Barberá-Gregori and Suárez-Guerrero, 2021; Zhao et al., 2021). The inclusion of technological media does not replace non-digital media, but they can be a great complement to teaching strategies. In this framework, the inclusion of digital technology in initial teacher education is necessary (Delgado-García and Toscano, 2021). In addition, senior teachers need to renew their teaching practices to incorporate digital media, in an integral way, in the teaching/learning processes (Barberá-Gregori and Suárez-Guerrero, 2021; Cabero-Almenara and Palacios, 2020; Gudmundsdottir and Hatlevik, 2018). The DigCompEdu Report (Redecker, 2017) is the scientific reference framework guiding education and training policies in European Union countries.

In this context, the use of digital media is considered from a didactic-pedagogical perspective and in a professional educational context (Cabero-Almenara and Palacios, 2020) rather than from a technological point of view. So, teachers who are not proficient in ICT are at a disadvantage in many learning situations and areas compared to those who are, and there is a mismatch between teacher and student (Arenas, 2016). Being competent in the use of technology as a medium for the teaching/learning process entails a critical attitude in didactic planning and in the selection of digital resources in accordance with the context and the characteristics and needs of the students. It is necessary to focus on how the cultural, affective and spiritual aspects of individuals and groups interact with digital technology (Castañeda and Selwyn, 2018). Schools have to face the challenge of teaching in a society that is changing at dizzying speeds and, therefore, can no longer or should no longer reproduce the teaching practices of previous years and decades (Cabero-Almenara and Valencia-Ortiz, 2019; Engen, 2019). In this sense, digital technology makes it possible to address classroom diversity from an inclusive perspective, considering the different paces and levels of curricular competence of all students, enabling new learning scenarios and different opportunities for interaction (Cámara et al., 2017).

The inclusion of ICT in classrooms and educational centres implies that students are the protagonists of their development and learning process, which may sometimes require changes in attitudes and roles between teachers and students (Méndez and Delgado, 2016). Along the same lines, changes are necessary in relation to the didactic planning of the classroom and the organisation of the centre (Méndez and Delgado, 2016) from a critical perspective, reflecting on the why of the changes, why, how, how, who, where and when. In other words, the use of digital technology in the teaching-learning process implies a deep reflection on the teaching practice itself, as well as the context, culture and resources of the centre, promoting participation and interaction between students and teachers, without forgetting the families and the educational community (Méndez and Delgado, 2016; Vigo-Arrazola and Dieste-Gracia, 2019).

The general objective of our study is to find out about the training in the use of digital media of teachers in schools with special difficulties.

The specific objectives are:

• To identify who organises the training received on digital media.

• To describe the main thematic cores addressed in this training.

• To find out the teachers' assessment of the training resources used to develop their educational practices with digital media.

Information and Communication Technology (ICT) may fit into a spectrum of instructional approaches. There is an ongoing debate about pedagogical practices that provide an optimum basis for learning. Many educationalists have been promoting learner-centred learning environments which stimulate pupils to engage in active knowledge construction (Jonassen et al., 1999). Others have challenged this constructivist approach by pointing out that guided instruction is much more efficient and effective (Kirschner et al., 2006). Klahr and Nigam (2004) found that many more young children learned from direct instruction than from discovery learning. Cronjé (2006) and Aylward and Cronjé (2022) argued that constructivist approaches and behaviourist approaches to teaching and learning should not be regarded as opposite to each other, but should be considered as two dimensions that should be plotted as orthogonal, resulting in a four-quadrant matrix of learning paradigms. Apart from these paradigms, other topics are of interest with regard to the use of ICT in education, e.g. addressing ICT literacy (Wu et al., 2022), and the use of ICT in assessment.

At the teacher level, the teacher’s pedagogical competences are a significant predictor of the teacher’s use of ICT in education (Liu et al., 2017; Petko, 2012; Suárez-Rodríguez et al., 2018). Cheng et al. (2021) found that teachers’ competence beliefs moderated the effect of traditional pedagogical beliefs on technology integration.

Studies have shown that significant differences between schools may arise with respect to the nature and frequency of ICT use. Vanderlinde et al. (2014) found that 14 percent of the variance in ICT use by teachers was due to differences between schools, and pointed at teachers’ ICT competences, teachers’ developmental educational beliefs, ICT professional development, and the school’s ICT vision and policy as relevant factors at the school level. Inan and Lowther (2010) concluded that ICT integration by teachers is a complex process that is influenced by teacher characteristics as well as by the teachers’ perception of the school environment. Teachers’ beliefs and readiness appeared to be positively affected by three school-level factors: the availability of computers, technical support, and overall support. Chou et al. (2019) concluded that an organisation’s innovation climate is significantly related with innovative teaching using ICT. Eickelmann (2011) found that the role of the principal is crucial in schools that are successful in implementing ICT.

The focus of the present study is on ICT-related pedagogical practices in primary schools, on factors that influence these practices, on the expected future use of ICT in classes and on professional development needs, as perceived by teachers. In addition, school level factors are addressed. The research questions are as follows:

1) What types of ICT-related pedagogical practices are applied by teachers in primary schools?

2) What factors at the teacher level are linked to a high frequency of ICT use in classes?

3) What factors at the school level are linked to a high frequency of ICT use in classes?

4) What do teachers expect with respect to their future use of ICT in classes?

5) What are teachers’ professional development needs in order to be ready for future ICT use?

The role of teachers in the digital transformation of education is recognized as a very important and complex holistic phenomenon (Ertmer & Ottenbreit-Leftwich, 2010; Wohlfart & Wagner, 2022). But which factors promote the lasting implementation of digital tools by teachers? Research shows that successful integration of existing or new digital tools depends on knowledge of and access to, as well as time to explore them (Tondeur et al., 2012). Teachers’ willingness and ability to integrate technology is also influenced by their attitudes or personal fears (Njiku, 2022; Wilson et al., 2020), and exposure to a student-centered constructivist pedagogical approach during teacher education can have a positive effect on digital literacy development and integration of digital tools in teaching practice (Chai et al., 2013). Contrary to the study results, we are far from an exhaustive integration of digital tools in formal education. The International Computer and Information Literacy Study 2018 (ICILS) shows that around 49 % of teachers used digital tools on a day-to-day basis and highlights considerable differences in the availability of technological infrastructure and conditions for professional learning across countries (Fraillon et al., 2019). With the outbreak of the Covid-19 pandemic in 2020, teachers no longer had the liberty to choose whether to incorporate digital tools into their teaching, as the circumstances made this inevitable (Wohlfart et al., 2021). Within the past three years, schools were forced to adapt and re-adapt to varying situations to fulfil their educational mission. Teachers are central in this environment and especially affected by this process of digital transformation, which makes their experiences particularly interesting and relevant. Current research, however, has often relied on one point of data collection. These studies therefore struggle in explaining individual dependencies in transformation processes. With our study, we aim to better understand how the past years have affected the experience with digital tools in the context of teaching. Analogously, we examine whether the Covid-19 pandemic has thereby led to a sustainable transformation of teachers’ acceptance and usage of digital tools.

Our study is based on an extended version of Davis’ (1986) widely accepted technology acceptance model (TAM). The core of the model consists of the variables perceived usefulness and perceived ease-of-use. In addition, the model describes the variable attitude towards using as a direct product of the former two variables in explaining user motivation for usage of a certain technology. Notwithstanding, these three core variables fail to fully explain the actual use of technologies. This is due to the influence of an array of external factors that determine user acceptance. Previous research has discussed and highlighted in detail the interaction and relevance of considering further external variables such as subjective standards (perception of how important the use of technology is to other people) or self-efficacy (one’s own ability to deal with technology) (Burton-Jones & Hubona, 2006; Lee et al., 2003). To gather a better understanding of the actual use of digital tools in teaching, we apply a refined TAM (Teo et al., 2008) as well as previous research to conduct and analyze longitudinal interviews with secondary schools’ teachers from Germany. Our study examines the following research questions:

How has teachers’ acceptance and usage of digital tools developed across time since the outbreak of the Covid-19 pandemic?

Which factors influence a lasting integration of digital tools in teaching?

Trying to define and label what people do with digital technologies has always been an interesting area to address. A literature review of this topic goes beyond the classic definition of digital natives proposed by Presky (2012), and it includes the work of Blank and Groselj (2014), who indicate that the use of Internet could be organized in three dimensions: amount of use, variety of different uses and types of use. The type or purpose of use is highly relevant nowadays due to the autonomous use of Internet available on laptops and smartphones. This is especially significant for student teachers, who as many other university students, take personal decisions about how to use technologies with several purposes, not only in activities related to learning and teaching (Cerda et al., 2022b).

The Chilean education system has a long tradition of integrating digital technologies in initial teacher education (Brun & Hinostroza, 2014). However, remote learning due to COVID-19 lockdown forced even more the adoption of digital technologies use. As in other countries, the commonly called “emergency remote teaching period” at higher education institutions represented, for professors and students, an immeasurable spent of energy in order to take concrete advantages of the potential that digital technologies offer (Sum & Oancea, 2022). The academic community demanded, from technology specialists, effective solutions to the challenge that remote teaching represented. Concerning student teachers, they had to deal with the enforced use of digital technologies for academic purposes in paralell with other personal purposes of uses of these tools.

Although the relevance of the topic, a few research has been done on understanding the implicit contribution in the development of digital competences during the emergency remote teaching period. Research of digital competences has mainly followed the development of generic digital competences (Carretero et al., 2017; Ferrari, 2013) and digital competences for educators (Redecker, 2017). In the case of student teachers, a few research has considered both frameworks (Reisoglu & Cebi, 2020). In Chile, several studies have replicated this trend, separating both frameworks, mainly due to the fact that not all the universities that deliver degrees in education have strong policies to explicitly promote computer literacy, general digital competences or digital competences for educators (Tapia et al., 2020).

The goal of this study is twofold. First, to compare the level of academic use of digital technologies between student teachers with limited experience in remote learning with those who spent four academic semesters learning in that academic environment. Second, to analyse the effect of interaction among variables related to academic digital competences (periods of measurement, sex, number of years in the student teacher program). The results of this study showed relevant information to better understand how the virtual learning experience supported the development of digital competences in student teachers during the COVID-19 lockdown.

The accelerating rise and widespread adaptation of digital technology in private and business sectors has led to a European consensus in regards to the necessity of the regular integration of technology in educational settings in order to enhance learning in general and prepare students for a competent use of digital technology (Peña-López, 2015). Due to the COVID-19 pandemic, the process has been accelerated even more – especially in European regions (Helm, Huber & Loisinger, 2021). One coping strategy that was adapted broadly in most educational institutions in Europe and beyond was emergency remote teaching (ERT), which shifted presence learning to online learning (Bozkurt & Sharma, 2020). The implementation of ERT in European regions proved to be rather diverse, e.g., with Portugal even using their television channels to cope with the pandemic (Seabra et al., 2021). In higher education, this shift towards online learning has proven to be emotionally challenging for learners – especially for pre-service teachers, with technology attitudes as primary influences (Schneider et al., 2021).

Referring to the elaboration of Tellegen et al. (1999) on the Circumplex Model of Affect, in which positive activation comprises positively valued states such as “enthusiastic” and negative activation comprises negative valued states such as “distressed”, emotional challenge arises either due to a decline in positive activation or an incline in negative activation as changes in emotional state. On a behavioral level, positive activation entails approaching behavior and negative activation avoidant behavior (Watson, 1999). Provided that attitudes are dispositions to respond favorably or unfavorably towards something (Ajzen, 2005), technology attitudes are closely related to positive and negative activation in the context of using technology. Therefore, the emotional state after ERT and the perception of their study experience in the transition away from ERT is expected to change in a more positive or negative direction depending on the underlying attitudes.

A more general approach to a person’s relationship with technology is due to the construct technology commitment. Neyer et al. (2012) conceptualize technology commitment as three dimensional: technology acceptance (referring to the technology attitudes from the Technology Acceptance Model), technology competence (operationalized by the anxiety to use technology), and technology control (as in the specifically technology related locus of control construct). Extensive research across the globe shows that technology commitment predicts the use of technology (Scherer et al., 2019) and emotional state whilst frequently using it (Händel et al., 2020; Schneider et al., 2021). Recent research indicates that the relationship between technology commitment and emotional state differs between clusters of technology commitment for in-service teachers (Pozas et al., 2022). Thus, it remains to be examined if this also holds for pre-service teachers. In summary, the following research questions will be addressed in this contribution:

1. What technology commitment profiles exist among pre-service teachers?
2. How do their emotional states whilst and after ERT differ in comparison?

The main objective of the research to be presented is to understand the interplay between technology commitment, emotional state and the study perspective of pre-service teachers in order to provide proper grounds for European practitioners to properly support pre-service teachers throughout their course of studies in a digital world.

To examine the research questions and to contribute to the main objective, data from a cohort study design is used in which a sample of pre-service teachers is enrolled in a teacher education (TE) program in Rhineland-Palatinate (Germany) and monitored. The monitoring project (TrigiKOM’MON) started in 2019 and is ongoing for the observation of digital competences and attitudes over the course of their Bachelor of Education (approximate monitoring time frame of 2.5 years for each cohort).

Higher Education (HE) has a key responsibility in addressing the grand sustainability challenges of our time and higher educational institutions (HEIs) are looking for ways to reduce their carbon footprints (Helmers et al, 2021) as well as taking measures for adaptation to mitigate the impact of natural disasters (Mackey et al., 2012). During the COVID-19 pandemic, most HEIs made a rapid transition to, so-called, emergency remote teaching (Marinoni et al., 2020). This transition revealed deficiencies in existing infrastructure and the availability of devices for online learning, and teacher training (Marinoni et al., 2020; UNESCO, 2021). The rapid transition to online learning showed the direction higher education (HE) can take to adapt and increase their resilience when confronted with disastrous situations (Mackey et al., 2012). A blended learning design, allowing for both on and offline forms of instruction and learning, not only provides opportunities to be resilient but has an additional positive spin-off in that it may also contribute to sustainability by lowering the carbon emissions of students commuting to campus (Versteijlen et al., 2017). According to Caird et al. (2015), distance-based HE teaching models (distance, online) achieve carbon reductions of 83 per cent in comparison with on-campus models (in-class, ICT-enhanced), largely due to student commuting.

When designing a blended learning configuration the considerations underlying a student’s decision to commute to campus should be considered. It seems that students make reasoned choices that depend on their attitude toward the learning activities they are supposed to attend in line with the Theory of Planned Behaviour (Ajzen & Madden, 1986; Versteijlen et al., 2021). During the COVID-19 pandemic, students experienced the transition implications to emergency remote teaching, probably affecting their attitude towards online learning and commuting to the HEI. Van Wee et al. (2019) assume that such a trigger may cause an attitude change in what students know (i.e. cognitive process), feel (i.e. affective process) or do (i.e. behavioural process).

While there seem to be benefits of blended learning in realizing both resilience and a lower carbon footprint, which many HEIs aspire to, a key assumption is that a blended learning study programme should maintain, or ideally improve, educational quality. Blended learning needs a pedagogical approach that acknowledges that blended learning is more than a fusion of online and in-class learning and teaching (Garrison & Vaughan, 2008; Laurillard, 2013). Nortvig et al.(2018) stated, that factors such as, “educator presence in online settings, interactions between students, teachers and content, and deliberate connections between online and offline activities and between campus-related and practice-related activities” (Nortvig et al., 2018, p. 53) are indicators for good education.

The objective of this research is to develop and evaluate pedagogical design principles for, what we will call, a sustainable blended learning study programme and to evaluate students' travel behaviour as a result. The term ‘sustainable’ points to an efficient educational organisation that reduces student commute to and from campus to two days per week while not compromising educational quality. Since government restrictions due to the COVID-19 pandemic changed the blend to mainly online education, we included in the objective the impact of COVID-19 restrictions on the student’s attitude regarding online learning and educational travel.

This objective is achieved by answering the following research questions:

RQ1. How did the design team experience developing a sustainable blended learning study programme?

RQ2. How do students and lecturers evaluate learning and teaching during the implementation of the blended learning design?

RQ3. What cognitive, affective and behavioural processes may cause an attitude change in students toward educational travel in the circumstance of a reduction of in-class activities?

During the COVID-19 pandemic, blended and hybrid learning have become significantly more relevant in everyday school settings (Lampert et al., 2021). It is still unclear whether this shift towards blended and hybrid learning forms is just an episode or if it is the starting point of an even more accelerated development towards digitalisation in education. It appears inevitable that educational research accompanies this shift towards blended and hybrid learning forms. However, the literature shows a lack of consensus as to what blended and hybrid learning mean (Hrastinski, 2019), resulting in difficulties concerning its examination.

In a few cases blended and hybrid learning can be clearly distinguished from each other. While Gil et al. (2022) describe hybrid learning as "face-to-face learning with access to online learning tools" (p. 13), according to Graham (2006) blended learning is defined as the combination of face-to-face instruction with computer-mediated instruction. But in most cases, these terms are used synonymously (Graham 2009; Watson 2008). The use of digital media not only plays a crucial role in the definition of these terms, but also in the organisation of different blended learning approaches as seen in the commonly used classification by Staker and Horn (2012). They distinguish between four models of blended learning depending on when and where phases of online learning are embedded in the instruction (rotation model, flex model, self-blend model and enriched-virtual model). These descriptions of what is referred to as "new traditional" (e.g. Ross & Gage, 2006, p. 167) draw a clear line between learning with and without digital tools. At the same time, researchers argue that such a separation along the above-mentioned lines is based on the simple use of (digital) technologies and should be overcome. Especially taking the evaluation of effects on learning outcomes into regard, they argue that it is not the use of digital technologies per se that should be considered decisive rather than the thoughtful prepared and practical carried out as well as theoretically founded instructional design should be focussed – despite whether and which technologies are used (Fawns, 2019).

While we agree that the differentiation between digital and non-digital forms of learning seems to be obsolete, considering that digital media is used frequently in everyday school, we think it is important to take a closer look at the structural changes they made possible. It is now clear that digital media and tools can significantly broaden the scope of spatial and temporal structures in learning as seen during the COVID-19 pandemic. Students no longer have to learn at the same time in the same place. Synchronous and asynchronous learning phases can be more easily combined using digital tools to meet the individual needs of the students. Therefore, in this paper, we present and discuss an enhanced model of blended and hybrid learning, that considers the digitally driven expansion of the learning time and space.

In the mid 80s, Apple launched the project called “Apple Classrooms for Tomorrow” (ACOT). The aim of this project was to study classrooms in which students and teachers had immediate access to computer technology. The main conclusion reached by this research was that these classrooms allowed students greater control and responsibility of their own learning (Fisher, 1989). This research tried to respond, through technology, to an educational need, hence the focus was on learning subjects and not on technology itself or the spaces in which it was introduced.

Forty years later, the outlook remains the same. In 2012, the consortium or European Education Ministries, European Schoolnet (2017), launched the Future Classroom Lab project, which, like the Apple project tries to adapt classrooms spaces to a more efficient way of learning. In other words, we have adapted the classrooms by focusing on the instrumental or didactic perspective of this technology. We have not considered that space and technology are neutral means whose effect on us depends exclusively on the use we make of them (Dowd & Green, 2019). But neither space nor technology are neutral, they demand certain behaviors from us regardless of how we use them (Sánchez-Rojo & Martín-Lucas, 2021).

For Heidegger human beings “do not dwell because we have built, but we build and we have built because we dwell, that is, because we are dwellers” (Heidegger, 1993, p.350). This means that our human condition impels us to dwell in spaces, make them our own, as it is in and through them that we develop our individual identity. When we make a space our own, we feel at home, protected, safe and let our guard down, which allows us to be guided by their demands.

The possibility of intimacy is what turns an educational space into a place and, at the same time, what allows its influence on the person in formation to be deep and real. That is why in recent years some authors demanded a recovery of what is genuinely pedagogical (Hodgson, et. al, 2017). In this sense they draw attention to the need to stop considering pedagogy as a means to achieve objectives imposed by external environments and educational spaces as extensions of the family home or anterooms of the labor market (Masschelein & Simons, 2013). Examples such as the so called place-based learning situate the school as an essential enclave within the local community (Vander Ark, et al., 2020). Also Colwell et al, (2016) highlights the importance of having special corners in the school so that children can create their own place in the classroom (Colwell, et al., 2016). However, it is becoming increasingly difficult to build spaces in an hyperconnected world where the space-time barrier has been broken by digital artifacts. Spaces are now tending to equalize more and more and, consequently, they are losing their singularity.

In line with the above, in the field of education there are those who have called digital classrooms commonly known as «classrooms of the future». These classrooms are configured by an open, flexible and reconfigurable hyperspace and a hypermedia context that makes it difficult to differentiate between online and offline (Fernández Enguita 2018; 2019). In this respect, this paper's main objective is to analyze, from a pedagogical point of view, the digitized and flexible classrooms that are gradually being used by more and more educational centers around the world and at all levels, in themselves; that is, leaving aside the didactic use that may or may not be made of them.

The need for digital competence development of teachers, which goes hand in hand with digital transformation, among other things, requires the adaptation of existing conceptual approaches and their transfer to all phases of teacher education to foster teachers' digital competences in Europe. This leads to challenges in teacher education, which are also addressed in the "Digital Education Action Plan" (European Commission, 2020). One key goal of this action plan is to develop “digital skills and competences for the digital transformation” (ibid., p. 12).

To achieve this goal, digitisation-related resources such as MOOCs (Massive Open Online Courses), learning videos or digital training modules that are both theoretically sound and practice-oriented can be used in the context of (prospective) teachers' education and training. This approach has the advantage that digitisation-related competences of (prospective) teachers can be developed quickly and nationwide.

A profitable form of developing such digitisation-related resources can take place in cross-phase Communities of Practice (CoPs; van Ackeren et al., 2020) because the cooperation of representatives from diverse areas and phases of teacher education brings together different expertise. This contributes to the quality of the digitisation-related resources and possibly facilitates the transfer of the resources into the teacher education system by addressing the needs of school practice.

In general, transfer research has identified three main areas that are relevant for successful transfer: the characteristics of the learners, the characteristics of the learning situation, and the characteristics of the scope of application of the acquired knowledge (Baldwin, Ford & Prasad, 2018; Grossman & Salas, 2011). Central characteristics of the learners are their understanding of their role and their motivation to perceive the learning situation.

Among other things, this should be as close to reality as possible (ibid.) and is conditioned by the CoP work in the context examined here. Studies indicate that in general, learning from each other takes place in CoPs when there is a high degree of certain characteristics such as the diversity of the CoP members, the cohesion and group feeling, the quality of interaction and the free structuring of the CoP. Diversity refers to the composition of the CoP. If there is a high degree of diversity, the CoP members benefit from the different expertise. However, the basic prerequisite is a common basis of ideas so that compromises are possible in the CoP. With a high degree of cohesion, the openness in the CoP increases and the feeling of a group can also rise. With a high degree of interaction and the independent structuring of work, knowledge acquisition can also increase due to the possibility of adapting the structures to the needs of the group (Sagmeister, 2019; Henschel, 2001).

In addition, it requires the support of the organisations or institutions in which the new knowledge is to be applied, e.g., by creating situations in which this is made possible (Grossman & Salas, 2011).

These general assumptions that apply to transfer and CoPs have so far been studied mainly in the context of economic organizations. However, the context-specific determinants of teacher educators' transfer in cross-phase CoPs and whether there are different types of transfer in the context of teacher educators' CoP work remain unexplored. Based on the research context and data of the COMeIN project (Communities of Practice for Innovative Teacher Education) with more than 400 participants from all phases of teacher education, this contribution focuses therefore the following research questions:

1. To what extent can types of transfer be identified in the cross-phase CoP work of teacher educators?

2. Which determinants can contribute to the transfer success of digitisation-related resources into the teacher education system?

The use of digital learning material offers new possibilities for teaching and learning in schools: Learning content can be conveyed in different forms of presentation (text, video, audio, graphics) and can be made available to students throughout the learning process, facilitating self-paced learning (cf. e.g. Sánchez Moreno & Martínez, 2022). Compared to analog media, digital media offer more opportunities in self-learning phases to adapt the learning material to the learners (adaptivity) and more interactivity to stimulate students' own activity and to provide them with direct feedback (Köster, 2018). Thus, the findings of Spitzler and Musslick's (2021) study indicate, that digital learning environments can help teachers to support students adaptively (ibid.). Furthermore, digital media can support the implementation of alternative didactic concepts, such as the flipped classroom approach (e.g. Álvarez-García & Enríquez-Díaz, 2020).

However, the International Computer and Information Literacy Study (ICILS) shows that in Germany, digital media are used less frequently in the classroom than in other countries (IEA-ICILS; Fraillon, Ainley, Schulz, Friedman, & Duckworth, 2019). Yet, the use of digital learning materials presupposes that teachers have been appropriately prepared for it and possess the corresponding competencies (Eickelmann, Drossel & Heldt, 2021). According to the state of research, this is precisely where a glaring deficit lies in the context of teacher training in Germany: For example, a shortcoming is evident in the adequate training of teachers in this area, according to which only about a quarter of teachers in each case have learned how to use digital media (25.9%) or apply them in teaching (26.6%) as part of their training (ibid.) – however, these data refer to the situation before the COVID-19 pandemic. The COVID-19 pandemic caused a surge in digitization worldwide through the increased use of digital media in distance education (see, e.g., Sonnenburg & Hornberg, 2022), including Germany. At the same time, however, the pandemic also highlighted the lack of media competencies among teachers: One challenge that emerged were the different competencies and experiences of teachers who had to switch to (an almost) nationwide digital distance instruction unpreparedly (cf. in overview Sonnenburg, Buddeberg & Hornberg, 2022). Even though the study results show that younger teachers tended to be trained more in the area of digital media, indicating a gradual development of teacher education in Germany, there is still a considerable need for development (Eickelmann et al., 2021).

Particularly in the creation and use of digital learning materials, it is important that student teachers not only learn the technical skills to use digital media but receive support in the area of media didactic competence (see Blömeke, 2017). Appropriate learning opportunities are considered essential in teacher education for the acquisition of digital media competence in order to learn and practice the use of digital media in the classroom in a way that promotes learning (see e.g. Reintjes et al., 2021).

In order to teach student teachers both technical and didactic media competencies, we designed and implemented a teaching-learning concept for university teacher education. As part of this teaching-learning concept, student teachers create digital, interactive learning material themselves using the open source software H5P. They also test it in the role of the learner. This gives student teachers the opportunity to gain experience with digital interactive learning materials from both the teacher's and the learner's perspective. Based on this, the project presented here examines how student teachers can thereby be supported in dealing with media-didactic aspects in the creation and use of digital learning materials.

1. Background /problem statement

MOOC discussion forums create a collaborative community where knowledge construction and knowledge sharing can occur. In discussion forums, being engaged in the textual dialogue is essential for MOOC learners to better knowledge and skills acquisition. A growing body of studies probs learner engagement by using learning analytics to extract the trace data in discussion forums. Some studies have examined the total number of forum views and posts (e.g., Khalil & Ebner, 2017; Sunar et al., 2020) as the learning engagement indices in discussion forums. The quantified learning engagement revealed insightful information on learners’ behavioral participation in discussion forums. However, to gain insight into how knowledge construction takes place, it is not enough if we solely pay attention to how frequently learners engage in discussion forums. For this aim, it is necessary to examine learners’ cognitive engagement in dialogues in discussion forums from a content-wise perspective.

Previous studies confirmed that motivation was a strong factor that influenced learners’ learning in MOOCs (Badali et al., 2022). The participation of both non-completers and completers implies that MOOC learners with different motivations for attending a course might vary in investing effort in their learning, and individual motivation might lead to pursuing different attainments. Motivation is a vital factor that should be considered when exploring the mechanism of individual effort investment in discussion forums. Furthermore, in discussion forums, the development of dialogues is an ongoing collaborative work among fellow learners. Social interaction in discussion forums builds up the processes of collaborative learning and position individual in networks of meaning-making and knowledge-building (Dowell et al., 2015). Considering the individual role in social interaction, it might be helpful to understand the mechanism of knowledge construction and sharing. Therefore, this study connects motivation and social interaction to cognitive engagement would contribute to the knowledge of what rationales drive individuals to be engaged or disengaged in MOOC discussion forums.

2. Theoretical framework

1. Chi and Wylie (2014) developed the interactive, constructive, active, and passive (ICAP) framework, for evaluating the modes of cognitive engagement based on contributions within online learning communities, which reflects knowledge construction levels in learning processes.

2. Motivation is defined as the impetus to activate a person toward performing a behavior or actions (Ryan & Deci, 2000). Intrinsic motivation and extrinsic motivation indicate that individuals are mobilized to act by distinct motivational orientations ranging from internalization to behavioral regulation (Deci & Ryan, 1985a). Individuals who have shared motivation orientation can be characterized into different learner profiles of motivation namely autonomous, controlled, and combined motivation (Ratelle et al., 2007). Motivation is a positive factor that drives learners to be engaged in discussion forums. For example, Tang et al. (2018) discovered that learners with autonomous motivation performed well than others in their longitudinal forum engagement.

3. Social networking analysis offers a perspective to identify social interaction patterns (i.e., centrality, and prestige) based on learners’ position (Wasserman & Faust, 1994) in the knowledge network, which manifests the degree of individual contribution to the cognitive discourse in discussion forums. Positive social interaction can moderate learners’ cognitive engagement in discussion forums (e.g., Galikyan et al., 2021).

3. Research questions

Aiming at acquiring precise knowledge, research questions were proposed to be addressed as follows:

RQ1: What modes of cognitive engagement characterize the co-construction of knowledge in MOOC discussion forums?

RQ2: How are motivation and social interaction related to different modes of cognitive engagement in MOOC discussion forums?

RQ3: How does social interaction influence the relationships between motivation and different modes of cognitive engagement in MOOC discussion forums?

There has been a growing interest and awareness in using online technologies to support teaching and learning activities within higher education. While the Covid 19 pandemic, and the subsequent shut down of society, offers one explanation for this growing interest among educators, this increasing interest could also be an outcome of the proliferation of education technologies now available. Online video conference systems have become popular tools for organising both online synchronous teaching as well as hybrid teaching activities. Video conference systems designed for education share some common features and prerequisites for mediating interactions between participants—besides the webcam and microphone, these systems can offer built in support for text chat, whiteboards, and breakout rooms and include awareness and turn-taking functions such as raised hands, emojis, polls, etc. Nevertheless, it is the video and sound that offers the main media for interactions.

Unlike traditional physical teaching on campus, interactions in a video-based teaching situation are characterised by being two-dimensional (2D). Both teachers and students are represented flat on a computer screen where everyone appears as equal regardless of their role. In this context, students do not have options to choose seats in the back but are always placed in the “front row”. On the one hand, it could be argued that this situation creates a space where students are more active and engaged in classroom activities; on the other hand, one could question whether this way of organising teaching puts more focus on personal attributes and creating asymmetrical relations among the participants.

As an alternative to video conference systems, there has been some interest among educators in using 3D-based Multiuser Virtual Environments (MUVE) to facilitate online synchronous teaching activities. In a MUVE, all participants are represented by avatars that they can customize according to their preferences (e.g. gender, clothing, skin colour, hair, age, etc.). MUVEs in education have been used across a variety of subjects and contexts (see for example, Barab et al., 2005; Englund, 2017; Pasfield-Neofitou et al., 2015; Wang & Burton, 2013). In teacher education, MUVE has been used to facilitate role-play instructions (Vasileiou & Paraskeva, 2010), as well as problem-based learning (Mørch et al., 2016).

This paper examines the potential benefits of using a Multi-User Virtual Environment (MUVE) for student collaboration. The study was conducted in two courses: a 15-credit bachelor course in Distributed Collaborative Learning in teacher education at Oslo Metropolitan University and a 3-credit MA course in Learning and Collaboration Technologies at the University of Limerick, both using Open Simulator. For a period of three weeks, Irish and Norwegian students collaborated on a project within the MUVE. The project started with an introductory lecture on Open Simulator and ended with a student presentation of each group’s work. Both courses were entirely online, and the student groups were already familiar with video-based online courses but had little to no experience of MUVE-based teaching and learning environments.

The purpose of this paper is to explore if a Multi-User Virtual Environment (MUVE) enhances or diminishes nonverbal communication opportunities compared to video-based (non-avatar) interactions. Additionally, we will examine if being represented as an avatar in a MUVE shifts the focus away from personal characteristics and increases focus on the subject matter during communication among students.

At the beginning of 2020, we experienced that a lot of activities, that we normally do, had to be put on paus due to the pandemic. One of these activities was international exchange programs in higher education. One way to continue working with international exchange could be to work more with international exchange online, which sometimes is called technology-supported internationalization or Internationalization-at-home – IaH (Mittelmeier et l., 2021). In March 2021, we launched an exchange program for vocational student teachers in Norway, Germany, Sweden, and Turkey, supported by the exchange program ERASMUS. The overarching aim was to provide the preservice teachers with insights in vocational training in other countries and thereby in developing and strengthening their intercultural skills as well as English and digital skills

Students in all four countries studied one or several of three online MOOCs developed within the project. The themes of the MOOCs were 1) Democracy and citizenship, 2) Sustainable development, and 3) values. A fourth course was about how to create digital stories through short videos. After working with the MOOCs locally, the students met in international colloquia collaboratively creating digital storytelling, i.e. short videos, on the themes. The way of working also meant that the students needed to collaborate online and to practice their English throughout digital storytelling production.

In the project, 142 students from our own university in Sweden participated together with student teachers from Norway, Germany, and Turkey. About ten teacher educators from the four countries have had the opportunity to participate in four MOOCs through a common learning platform. Three MOOCs focused on the three themes mentioned above, and the fourth MOOC covered how to create digital storytelling.

The study has its base in a sociocultural tradition, which emphasizes learning through interaction with the support of mediating tools (Ivarsson et al., 2009). Language is described as the most important tool for communication and thinking and therefore also an important tool for learning (Säljö, 2014). In a multimodal setting like the online MOOCs where the preservice teachers were expected to produce videos in collaboration with others, language fulfils a bridging and important function (Ivarsson et al., 2009). In this context, the language was English which was not any student’s mother tongue.

The aim of this study is to contribute knowledge in the field of international exchange between vocational preservice teachers in times when travelling is restricted.

The research questions are as follows:

• How do the preservice teachers experience the participation in an international exchange through online technology?
• What are the advantages, disadvantages and challenges working this way according to the Swedish preservice teachers and their teacher educators?

Interesting in this specific context has been how the student have used, experienced and communicated through the available technological resources, and how they relate to the development project’s overarching aim (to develop intercultural, digital and English competence).

Digitalisation of education has been declared a European priority for 2021–2027 (European Commission, Digital Education Action Plan 2021–2027: Resetting Education and Training for the Digital Age, 2020).

Digitalisation offers new possibilities to teach and learn: teachers online and offline integrate various elements of teaching, learning, assessment, roles and technologies in different ways (Jahnke et al., 2017). Digitalising schools have developed new ways of communicating, planning, organisation and administration (Petterson, 2021).

Research suggests that school digitalisation has many positive effects: fosters students’ self-directed and independent learning, stimulates their engagement and motivation to learn, enhances computing skills and access to online content, improves attendance and enrolment, increases teacher collaboration, professional development opportunities, improves student–teacher relationships, reduces discipline problems etc. (Islam & Grönlund, 2016). However, school digitalisation is a rather complicated process, as it can have not only positive, but also negative or, in some cases, no effects (Islam & Grönlund, 2016; Hatos, 2019; Warschauer, 2007).

In this context, it is important to address the arguments that technology and the use of technology in schools themselves do not change educational practice (Islam & Grönlund, 2016; Warschauer, 2006). Technologies are just tools that “have value only in the hands of thoughtful, well-prepared people, with a clear goal in mind” (Peck and Sprenger, 2008). So, school digitalisation amplifies the role of human mentorship (Warschauer, 2007). This means that the digitalisation of schools greatly depends on teachers’ behaviour using technology.

According to the Fogg Behavior Model, any behaviour depends on the convergence of three factors: sufficient motivation, ability and triggers to perform the behaviour (Fogg, 2009). Based on this understanding, it can be argued that the digitalisation of schools depends to a large extent on teachers’ motivation, abilities and triggers to use technology.

Research shows that since the start of the Covid pandemic, teachers are more motivated to use technology for teaching and are better able to do this (Beardsley, Albo, Aragon, Hernandez-Leo, 2021). Scholars are obtaining more and more evidence that teachers who consider technology as valuable to the teaching/learning are more motivated to use it (Chiu, 2022). The provision of resources for technology use in the school is also seen as a strong motivating factor: the better teachers are equipped with technological resources, the more likely they tend to use them in their pedagogical practice (Chiu, 2022). Insufficient support from schools is a major barrier to the use of technology in the teaching practices (Serriawati & Azwar, 2020). The higher the school support, the more effectively teachers use technology (Serriawati & Azwar, 2020). Support from school leaders, participation in peer co-learning groups and training from external experts can reinforce teachers’ motivation to integrate technology (Chiu, 2022).

However, there is not enough understanding of what motivates teachers to use technology in the teaching practices and how to stimulate this motivation, especially taking into account the diversity of digitalisation processes worldwide and, particularly, in Europe. Hence, it is no coincidence that there have been recent calls to continue researching the influence of leaders on teachers’ motivation (Ryan & Deci, 2020), to investigate teachers’ motivation in digitalisation processes and, especially, in technology integration (Chiu, 2022), and to explore the factors that ensure improvement and dissemination of good practice of technology-assisted pedagogy (Islam & Grönlund, 2016).

This paper focuses on the factors that motivate Lithuanian teachers to integrate one type of technology, the AI driven learning experience platforms.

There is nowadays a wealth of evidence linking educational leadership to student outcomes (Grissom et al., 2021). School leaders influence teacher capacity, motivation and working conditions which then in turn affect classroom instruction and student performance (Leithwood et al., 2017). Additionally, school leaders have long been identified as “change agents” (Fullan, 1993) that can act as gatekeepers or drivers of innovation in schools (Hall & Hord, 2019). These innovations include ICT usage in schools. Here, school leaders have been shown to influence teachers’ knowledge and usage (Dexter, 2018). This has been linked to the competencies and usage patterns of principals and to their leadership approaches (for example Navaridas-Nalda et al., 2020). Generally speaking, instructional leadership has been shown to be beneficial for the quality of classroom instruction and student learning in the anglophone world (Robinson et al., 2009), with some scholars questioning the effectiveness of this approach in other contexts (Klein et al., 2022). As the integration of digital technologies into classroom practices can significantly alter teaching and learning (De Florio-Hansen, 2018), it stands to reason that instructional leadership practices nowadays might need to include or integrate aspects of digitization in order to have a beneficial impact on classroom instruction and student learning. ICT-related competencies of teachers and student might especially benefit from such adapted leadership practices.

However, corresponding research is rare, with some scholars even stating that the “field has no knowledge of digital instructional leadership” (Berkovich & Hassan, 2022, p. 1). Existing contributions are often aimed at practitioners (Sorenson et al., 2016) or rely solely on self-reported data from school leaders (for example Nurabadi et al., 2022). Additionally, such contributions tend to focus on the competencies or attitudes of school leaders. Contributions analyzing the (possible) influence of digital instructional leadership on teaching practices or student learning as well as studies of leadership (practices) that take into account multiple perspectives (for example data from school leaders and from teachers) are lacking. This lack is even more poignant when it comes to contributions making use of large, international datasets.

An international understanding of how school leaders use ICT and how they might influence ICT integration in schools seems especially important as the pandemic has highlighted the potential of ICT in schooling but also – in many countries – that the current state of integration in many countries leaves room for improvement (Karakose et al., 2021; Ramos-Pla et al., 2021).

This contribution and the underlying study were designed to fill in some of the gaps mentioned before. The aim was to study digital instructional leadership, how it might be perceived by school leaders and teachers and its possible effects on inner-school factors. The following research questions guided the research:

1. How is instructional leadership in a digital world perceived by school principals and teachers in Germany and to what extent do the perceptions of school principals and teachers differ?
2. What are the effects of digital instructional leadership on various inner-school factors as well as on student learning?

In many countries all over the world, digitalization has, during the last decades, had an impact on teaching practices. This has led to opportunities for teachers, e.g. more accessible colleagues and material via the internet, and challenges, e.g. teachers’ decreased autonomy to self-regulate their work due to platformization, i.e. digital platforms designed in particular ways for communication, assessment, and schoolwork, finding their way into the teaching practice (Selwyn et al., 2017; Williamson, 2017). In this environment, European policies aim at supporting schools to take advantage of digitalization and to promote teachers’ professional digital competence (PDC), where one aspect is to facilitate students’ digital competence (European Commission, 2020; European Commission et al., 2022; Redecker & Punie, 2017). Previous research highlights teachers’ complexity in utilizing PDC, leading to dilemmas and negotiations in practice (Löfving et al., 2023). However, in the literature, there is a focus on teachers’ PDC concerning technological and pedagogical competences on an individual level rather than as a collective responsibility in the school organization, leaving other aspects sometimes unattended (Skantz-Åberg et al., 2022). Further, research on PDC often draws on teachers’ self-evaluation through surveys (Moltudal et al., 2019; Svoboda et al., 2020; Tomczyk, 2020; van de Oudeweetering & Voogt, 2018). Even if these findings are valuable, we here want to investigate teachers’ PDC through their everyday work as part of a larger organization.

The present study is part of the project Reconfigurations of Educational In/Equality in a Digital World (RED) (https://www.edu-digitalinequality.org). We contribute with an ethnographic approach to be able to explore teachers’ daily experiences and interactions connected to their PDC that take place in practice. We use the lens of disruptive fixation, where educational reforms addressing digitalization, and calling for disruptive solutions, often are framed by powerful outsiders in a first cycle, reworked in a second cycle by educational experts who present solutions, and then executed in a third cycle by, here, teachers. However, the problematization and the reforms seldom take all unmeasurable aspects into account. Instead, teachers must respond to unanticipated destabilizing forces. Thus, the objective is to unpack what in the teaching practice particularly enables and constrains teachers to utilize various aspects of PDC when teachers are understood to be part of a digital teaching practice that reaches beyond the individual teacher and the classroom.

The results show that new time-consuming teaching tasks, e.g., administrating digital technology and instructing students how to use a wide range of such technology, are identified to constrain teachers utilizing diverse aspects of PDC. Additionally, there are enabling factors, e.g., a wide range of resources and infrastructures for communication. We will elaborate further on these constraining and enabling factors.

The study takes place in a highly digitalized teaching practice. Thus the results are useful for researchers and school organizations in other emerging digital teaching practices in Europe and other parts of the world. We hope for interesting discussions on how our contribution can illuminate how organizations can further facilitate diverse aspects of teachers’ PDC.

In the context of modern information technology, computational thinking (CT) as a key competence is considered necessary to live an active life that is required to adapt to the discipline of teachers’ teaching and students' learning in the digital world in primary education. CT can be seen as a thinking process and skills that are essentially about using strategies and cognitive knowledge to solve problems and test solutions with supported attitudes. Some researchers have perceived and defined CT competence. Jocius et al. (2020) mentioned that the value of CT is a way to enhance and support more complex discipline-specific and interdisciplinary understandings, not just an isolated concept associated with computer science. Brennan & Resnick (2012) proposed the key dimensions of the CT framework: “computational concepts (the concepts designers engage with as they program, such as iteration, parallelism, etc.), computational practices (the practices designers develop as they engage with the concepts, such as debugging projects or remixing others’ work), and computational perspectives (the perspectives designers form about the world around them and about themselves)”. CT plays an important role in the teaching of the subject by teachers. Understanding teachers' CT competence and their ability to teach CT is particularly necessary for teachers to instruct effective subject education. There are researchers have begun to focus on teachers' cognitions of CT. Teachers' understanding of CT must build on the subject matter they teach (Yadav et al., 2014). In an experiment to assess the impact of CT modules on in-service teachers, a statewide survey of primary Maryland teachers is conducted to understand how to integrate CT into other content lessons. The survey asked teachers about their conceptualization of CT, the CT resources they rely on, CT integration and their comfort levels to provide effective CT instruction for their students (Garvin et al., 2019). However, most CT assessments are more reflective of Europe and North America and students’ CT (Cutumisu et al., 2019; Fang et al., 2021). Based on the findings of the existing CT assessment, the evaluation content includes CT knowledge and skills, but less attention is paid to CT attitudes. There are few CT assessment instruments in a non-programming environment, and there is a lack of CT assessment instruments combined with specific subject teaching knowledge. Therefore, more research attention needs to be directed to the rest of the world and teachers’ CT competence and their teaching competence assessment to fill the research gaps. Based on the above analysis, this research mainly solves the problem of in-service primary school teachers’ CT competence and CT teaching competence. Specifically, the following questions need to be solved: (1) What are the cognition aspects of CT competence and CT teaching competence considering primary teachers' characteristics in China? (2) How to construct an assessment scale of CT competence and CT teaching competence for Chinese in-service primary school teachers? In this research, a scale has been developed for the purpose of determining the aspects of CT competence and CT teaching competence of the teachers. The assessment scale for CT competence is a six-point likert type scale and consists of 31 items that could be collected under five factors in this research. The theory in this research is mainly based on the new taxonomy of educational objectives to assess teachers’ CT competence in life application and professional application context. We hope to promote reflection on the education and teaching of CT by enriching the CT assessment scales in different contexts. Meanwhile, we hope to use this scale to further our understanding of the current situation and characteristics of in-service primary school teachers' CT competence in European and other educational contexts.

All networks hold a meeting during ECER. All interested are welcome.

This symposium brings together theoretical and empirical contributions from the launch of two large projects funded by the UK ESRC, and one German BMBF research project to critically enhance understandings of ICT as of political, ethical and sociological import not only in the UK and Germany but internationally. Treating of these issues at the level of information theory and data justice, implications and examples are drawn upon from Scotland, England and Germany, but the conceptual and digital aspects relate to patterns common to educational technologies globally.

We would particularly welcome a joint event between the ICT and Philosophy of Education SIGs.

Research questions:

How do the ways digital technology in schools is thought about, promoted and designed reinforce and reconfigure existing educational and social inequities?

How can data justice help to frame the challenges of polarization, datafication and autonomy which arise in relation to young people’s digital lives?

How can teachers exercise ethical agency in relation to civic and moral education for digital citizenship?

Theoretical & methodological framework:

Treating of the conference values of inclusion and diversity as methodological issues, we are interested in initiating a conversation that brings together voices that are commonly not heard in dialogue and exchange in order to furnish a workable moral education for the digital age. We are also seeking to create a conversation between experts and interests that do not routinely communicate on these questions (Tse et al. 2015).

Research papers proceed from a number of intersecting philosophical perspectives. Data justice articulates crucial issues of bias, discrimination, amplifying marginalisation and misrecognition which place some young people at liability in their access to the digital purely as a result of the digital representation of their identities (Eubanks 2018; Dencik et al. 2018) – as such, data justice foregrounds political engagement rather than the engineering of technical solutions. Relational pedagogy highlights the risks which accrue from applying metrics and models derived from an information-theoretic conception of learning as call-and-response to measure learning in diverse human subjects (Lundie 2016). It is in the intersection of the political with corporate data systems that data collection, processing and aggregation harms (Van den Hoven 1999) can manifest in reinscribing educational projects (Hartong 2016).

An opening between James Conroy and Robert Davis frames the purposes and challenges which motivated the identification of digital citizenship as a field for normative research, the responses of international educational paradigms to ‘Industrial Revolution 4.0’, and the extent to which traditional epistemic and moral capacities are sufficient to these challenges.

Three presentations from Jeremy Knox, Sigrid Hartong and John Gordon follow, addressing respectively, the insights of data justice on the interaction of education policy with technology, the role of technological mediators in reinscribing policy priorities across Europe, and spaces for ethical agency in teaching for digital citizenship.

Summarizing these normative considerations, David Lundie will open the discussion, inviting convergence and application from practitioners and researchers in the ICT education field.

Intended purpose:

This event brings normative resources to bear to refurbish a workable,coherent moral education for the challenges of digital citizenship. The discussion aims to introduce major funded projects of European relevance, make participants aware of the normative resources associated with these projects and highlight empirical dimensions to follow in 2024-25. These issues have an urgency and relevance that has not been widely addressed in the ICT education field. The aim of our discussion is to enrich the dialogue between ICT educators, the philosophy of education and leading research in digital and data ethics. A key aim of the discussion is to furnish a vocabulary for interrogating the ethical challenges of teaching for digital citizenship.

With the advancement of digitization, opportunities for the individual support of students are increasingly opening up. Digital media can help to better take into account students' individual prerequisites, needs, interests and inclinations, learning preferences, and differences in performance in the classroom (e.g., Holmes et al., 2018; Petko et al., 2017; Brühwiler & Vogt, F., 2020). Although previous research points to these potentials, the use of digital media for individual support has not yet been widespread in Germany (e.g., Gerick et al., 2017). This leads to the assumption that the implementation of individual support with digital media requires a lot of preconditions and opens up the question of the conditions for success at different levels. This is where a research project in Germany comes in.

The research project aims to identify conditions for success in individual support with digital media from the multidimensional perspective of school actors. A model of school development and school effectiveness with digital media (Eickelmann & Drossel, 2019) is used as a theoretical approach. Individual support is located on the process level and it is assumed that conditions for success can be identified on the school input level as well as on the process level.

In the context of this research project, individual support is understood to be all pedagogical actions within the framework of school teaching-learning processes that are carried out with the intention of supporting the learning development and process of all individual learners by identifying and taking into account their specific (learning) prerequisites, (learning) needs, (learning) paths, (learning) goals, and (learning) opportunities, based on Kunze (2008) and Behrensen and Solzbacher (2012).

Against this background this contribution will focus on the following research question:

Which success conditions can be identified for the individual support with digital media?

This qualitative study explores young children’s digital media practices in a home setting in Azerbaijan, a former Soviet country. The study provides rich insights into young children’s digital media practices and their parents’ mediation strategies which have not been researched before. Practices are the ways people interact with or incorporate objects and actions into their everyday lives and are influenced by social and cultural worldviews. I draw on the definition of digital media practices from Merchant (2012, p.772) as “the ‘doings’, ‘sayings’ and ‘relatings’” that constitute the social actions of everyday life.

The ongoing changes in the education system of Azerbaijan, such as the recent embedding of digital technologies in primary education, made Azerbaijan an attractive research setting for this study. Given the considerable impact of parents on their children’s education, the role of the home context presented an exciting opportunity to explore influences on parents’ views on and involvement in their children’s digital media practices. This study responds to calls for research into young children’s digital media practices in different countries and cultures in the Global South ( Nikken, 2017; Shin & Li, 2017).

Parental involvement in young children’s digital media use plays a crucial role in positively fostering children’s digital media practices (Connell et al., 2015; Nikken, 2017; Plowman et al., 2008). Fathers are often found to play video games with their children instead of mothers who prefer reading books with them (Connell et al., 2015; Padilla‐Walker et al., 2012). In previous studies, researchers have primarily included mothers when conducting family visits (Livingstone et al., 2015). However, there is a need for more research revealing and explaining fathers’ engagement in their children’s interactions with digital media (Tang et al., 2018). Azerbaijan is a patriarchal society where most of the duties related to child-rearing are left to mothers (Najafizadeh, 2012), which heightens the importance of inquiring about fathers’ involvement in children’s interactions with digital technologies. I will explore fathers’ opinions on their children’s uses of digital technologies, as well as their involvement in their children’s digital media practices through revisiting own childhoods (Cole, 1998).

I aim to explore the following research question.

What are the ways in which fathers in Azerbaijan are involved in the mediation of their young children’s digital media practices?

My study is guided by Tudge's (2008) contextualist ecocultural theory drawing on the everyday practices and interactions among individuals, cultures, and activities (re)shaping children’s daily lives. I also draw on Cole's (1998) concept of prolepsis, which constitutes a considerable part of the theoretical framework drawn for this study. Cole’s concept has roots in the field of developmental psychology, and even though my study is far from this field and is carried out on a small scale, I find prolepsis a good fit for the study to elaborate on fathers’ involvement in their children’s digital media practices. Cole (1998) applies the concept of prolepsis to the practice of childrearing and, in this context, explains it as a process of imagining their child’s future and then channelling the child’s present to meet the expectations of this imagined future. This phenomenon is undoubtedly informed by the culture of parents, rooted in their own past experiences and upbringings, and therefore, the parents’ beliefs and the projection of the desired future for their children can often become a ‘materialised constraint’ on the present experiences of the child (Cole, 1998, p. 184). Cole (ibid) only mentioned mothers when explaining prolepsis. Scrutinizing fathers’ views on their children’s digital media uses through the concept of prolepsis can help explain why the fathers were not inclined to develop their children's digital skills early on.

Topic, objective

Inclusion research is an extensive field of research, which manifests itself, for example, in the area of professionalization of teachers and in the discussion about the basic understanding of inclusive schooling, even if the term "inclusion" itself is and remains diffuse (see, for example, the research of Nilholm & Göransson 2017; Löser & Werning 2013). However, a understudied research field that is based on a very broad understanding of inclusion is the relationship between respective prevailing understandings of inclusion and digital educational materials such as learning platforms in different cultural contexts. Digital learning platforms can be distinguished from other software solutions on the basis of their functions. According to Petko, digital learning platforms offer the possibility of managing knowledge content, and they also enable communication, e.g. through forums. There is also the possibility of setting tasks and timelines. Learning platforms also offer the possibility of conducting exams and also enable course management (Petko 2010). Thus, in the German-speaking but also international discourse, there is hardly any research literature so far that deals with the exclusive elements of learning platforms from an international-comparative perspective (see e.g. Richardson & Powell 2011; Budde, Blasse & Johansen 2017). Furthermore, it is noted that work on countries in the Global South is largely lacking, and this includes, in particular, work on the education system in Singapore (e.g., Hung, Chen & Wong 2006; Singal, Lynch, & Johansson 2018). The focus of the following study is on a comparison between Estonia, a country that can be considered a pioneer in the implementation of digital media, and Germany, which is still lagging behind in the expansion of digital offerings (Reiss et al. 2019). In addition to this binary comparative perspective, a contrast is made with Singapore, which is also considered a leader in the field of digital education (Reiss et al. 2019). The research focus brings the diversity of educational systems and values into focus and, in connection with the theme of the conference, shows potentials through the exchange of best practices.

Theory

The developments in a school and the behaviour of the people in the organisation also with regard to the selection of digital teaching materials cannot be viewed in isolation, but always in interaction with other systems such as the law, the economy and society as a whole. Only this systems-theoretical understanding makes it possible to understand and explain the actions of the individual against the background of social institutions. An essential theoretical access to the interrelationships is offered by the theory of Helmut Fend in his "New Theory of Schools" (2008). Fend points out that action in the school is consists of normative sets of rules consisting of "duties and rights", according to which persons orientate their actions (Fend 2008, p. 172).

Comparisons between countries make it clear that education systems can be organised in very different ways. The federal system in Germany contrasts with a centrally controlled education system in Singapore and an education system in Estonia that is an education system that is strongly characterised by networks with the business community.

Based on the theoretical assumptions, questions are addressed on two levels

At the level of understandings of inclusion: What concept of inclusion can be found in policy documents and in group discussions with teachers and political decision-makers? Here, document analysis and interviews are used for methodological implementation.

At the level of digital teaching materials: How do teachers use digital learning platforms? What exclusive elements are there in learning platforms? Here, classroom observation is necessary, as well as qualitative content analysis of corresponding learning platforms.

As necessary basic infrastructure of a school (cf. Breiter 2021, 568), digital learning management systems (LMS) have been used in universities and schools since around the turn of the millennium. However, their usage in schools has rapidly increased in the course of the Covid-19-pandemic (Helm & Postlbauer 2021), opening the desideratum, which role these platforms can play in (inclusive) school development processes and which potential disadvantages may arise from them.

LMS can be defined as the totality of available platforms, services, software solutions, learning tools and educational media that significantly support content-related and organizational work as well as collaboration in educational settings for teachers, students and, if applicable, other stakeholders (cf. Breiter et al. 2021, 5). While recent studies have focused, for example, on diversity-oriented functions of LMS to support self-regulated learning (Reynolds 2016), to provide individualized (Hase et al. 2022) or differentiated (Frohn & Pozas 2021a) instruction, to enable teacher cooperation (Frohn & Bengel 2022) or to improve parents’ participation in school processes (Bradley 2022), little is known about the potential role of LMS in processes of (inclusive) school development.

This study therefore aims at identifying means and functions of LMS for possible fields of school and lesson development. Based on the assumption that school development should always aim at the value of diversity in schools and lessons, we follow a mixed-method approach (see below) to shed light on the following research questions:

• Which areas of inclusive school development can be supported using LMS?
• Which areas of teaching and learning in heterogeneous groups can be supported using LMS?
• Which students’ competencies can be fostered using LMS?
• How can LMS support differentiated instruction?
• What are the obstacles in using LMS for school development?
• What dangers do teachers perceive in the use of LMS?

In order to explore the research questions, our study consists of two sequential stages: First, we conducted interviews in three cycles (2020, 2021, 2022) among Berlin teachers at schools with a high percentage of students from low-income households (Frohn 2021; Frohn & Pozas 2021b; Frohn & Bengel 2022). While the data showed that the role of LMS at Berlin secondary schools changed quite rapidly, these changes took different turns: According to the interviewees, LMS were hardly used during the first school closures in Germany. The data from the second survey phase suggest a clear development in the use of LMS, both in quantity and quality, which was discussed in almost all interviews. However, the third round showed different developments: While some schools made the use of LMS mandatory and thereby started to implement school development through the use of LMS, other schools almost stopped using LMS completely as soon as regular classes were held again. These findings led to the question if these first findings applied to other schools in Germany, and how the data could be used for diversity-sensitive developmental processes in potential hybrid school settings.

Therefore and secondly, based on the qualitatively generated categories, we developed an instrument in order to validate our findings from the interview study and to learn more about teachers’ use of LMS in the whole of Germany. The questionnaire is currently being shared through various means, and up to now has a sample of 402 primary and secondary school teachers in Germany.

The preliminary quantitative findings seem to confirm the interview data (see below).

The digitalization of every part of personal life challenges schools to prepare students with digital skills needed to handle future expectations in their professional life and to ensure that students have the skillset to be an engaged part of society (Aljanazrah et al., 2022). In this light, initiatives such as the Digital Education Plan of the European Commission or organizations such as the OECD (2020) identify computer- and information-related skills as a central aim of today’s education (European Commission, 2020). In this context, the large-scale assessment (LSA) International Computer and Information Literacy Study (ICILS) of the International Association for the Evaluation of Educational Achievement (IEA) observed that eighth-graders’ computer and information literacy (CIL) is subject to tremendous social disparities in all participating countries (Fraillon et al., 2019). Against the results that students from low socioeconomic status backgrounds score on average significantly lower in all countries that participated in ICILS, a minority of the schools scored high despite their low-SES student body composition (Drossel et al., 2020) and have overcome the digital disparities. Referring to the psychological trait of resilience, these schools are regarded as organizationally resilient (Henderson & Milstein, 2003).

Research on organizationally resilient schools in other educational domains, such as reading, mathematics, or science, suggests that organizationally resilient schools differ from nonresilient schools in their input and process characteristics (Agasisti et al., 2018). For the field of CIL it is shown that the phenomenon of organizational resilience is also widespread in CIL internationally and that the prevalence of resilient schools varies across the selected education systems participating in IEA-ICILS (Drossel et al., 2020). Furthermore, it is demonstrated that organizationally resilient schools share common school characteristics (ibid.).

Nevertheless, the question of how teachers and learners can use digital media to shape teaching and learning processes has not yet been answered in the context of the conditions of digitality in resilient schools. To analyze teachers' use of digital media to promote learning in resilient schools in more detail, this contribution draws on the theory of three basic dimensions of teaching quality (effective classroom management, cognitive activation, supportive climate) (Praetorius et al., 2018). For effective classroom management, research on the use of digital media to support learning at the instructional level suggests that the impact on learning success depends on the learning environment, social form, and modalities (Antoine et al., 2018). With regard to cognitive activation, studies show that digital media contributes to positive changes in effort (Fütterer et al., 2022; Labonté & Smith, 2022). As for the supportive climate, research shows that the introduction of digital media for teaching is perceived as supportive (Hammer et al., 2021). Overall, however, it remains unclear how schools use digital media in the classroom. Therefore, the value of diversity in education can be seen from the link between diversity and the use of digital media. Thus, the desideratum primarily relates to the design of teaching and learning processes in resilient schools, taking into account the three basic dimensions of teaching quality. This contribution therefore focuses on the following research question:

1. How do resilient schools in Germany conduct the use of digital media to promote learning at the instructional level, taking into account the three basic dimensions of teaching quality such as effective classroom management, cognitive activation, and supportive climate?

We live in the 21^st century and many forms of social and cultural diversity is seen in digital forums since we live in a digital society. We are in many ways dependent on digital resources to be able to perform various socially obligatory functions in work, study, and everyday life. The digital resources connect people with each other and erase the limits between the surrounding word, society, school, and the teaching situation (Säljö, 2019). Schools in Europe have been gradually digitized especially since the 1990s and the curriculum emphasize that teachers should give all students the opportunity to develop their ability to use digital resources and to prepare for the surrounding society (Lundgren, 2014). The expression digital learning resources (DLR) is an expanded cumulative concept for digital technology and in this paper, it refers to any kind of digital resource that is used in education (Nilsen, et al., 2020; OECD, 2009; Selander, 2017; Wallin, et al., 2017). Although the access to digital resources in schools has been good, teachers’ didactic use of it has been varied (Tallvid, 2016). However, a major change took place in terms of teaching from the spring of 2020, when many schools in Europe and all over the world switched to online teaching to reduce the spread of Covid-19 (Beardsley, et al., 2021). This change forced every teacher to be more flexible and to use digital resources to be able to teach and communicate with students (Gileada & Dishonb, 2022).

Many surrounding factors have affected teachers use of digital learning resources such as school environment, support access, professional development, outside school education and experiences. Studies show that school environment on organizational level affect teachers’ competence using DLR, together with several contextual factors (Pettersson, 2018). Another important factor is teachers’ attitude towards digital resources in teaching (Eickelmann & Vennemann, 2017). Previous research also indicates that demographic factors such as teaching subject affects teachers use of digital resources(Bratland, et al., 2022; Erixon, 2014). Studies regarding teachers’ use of DLR emphasizes the need of further research on influencing factors (Erstad, et al., 2021). Against this background the aim of this study is to explore how surrounding factors and school environment influence upper secondary school teachers' use of digital learning resources (DLR) for teaching. The following two research questions were addressed:

1. What are the categories of surrounding factors and school environments affecting upper secondary school teachers use of DLR?
2. Are there any differences between these categories and the dimensions of teachers’ use of DLR?

This study uses the expanded didactic triangle to understand both the use of DLR and the factors affecting teachers use of DLR (Hudson & Meyer, 2011). Teachers’ didactic use, surrounding factors and school environment are explored through teachers views and answers in an online survey. Teachers’ dimensions using DLR includes the didactic purpose, the classroom practice and the frequency using different digital learning resources.

Climate change is a critical challenge facing society, and understanding earth systems, like the carbon cycle, has become an essential component of educational curricula around the world. The Swedish compulsory school curriculum emphasises learning about the carbon cycle and its connection with various biological and environmental issues. Understanding the carbon cycle is complex and requires recognising the carbon reservoirs, how carbon atoms circulate between reservoirs, and various dynamic relationships that exist within the system. These characteristics align with systems thinking skills, a crucial aspect of learning and teaching science. Assaraf and Orion (2005) have summarised eight hierarchical characteristics of systems thinking in the context of earth systems and have proposed the Systems Thinking Hierarchical (STH) model to describe how students learn about complex earth systems. The hierarchical levels of this framework include system thinking abilities that comprise analysis (e.g. identifying components), synthesis (e.g. relating components), and implementation (e.g. understanding hidden dimensions).

The carbon cycle is often taught through simplified and static diagrams in school textbooks, which can make learning about this abstract cycle and its interrelating components very challenging for high school students in grades 7-9 (e.g. Düsing, Asshoff, & Hammann, 2019). An example of a common difficulty in this context is to understand how carbon atoms move between various organisational levels. To address such challenges, carefully developed interactive visualizations that guide pupils through the components of the carbon cycle can help scaffold their systems thinking skills. Contemporary research in this area includes work on interactive learning environments in STEM contexts and adaptive feedback for supporting the learning of complex natural systems (Linn et al., 2014; Vitale, McBride, & Linn, 2016). Although these environments have proved promising, there remains a need to explicitly involve teachers in the design process, as well as connect established theoretical frameworks to learning goals of school science curricula. In this regard, not much effort has been directed to pedagogically-informed design and implementation of adaptive interactive learning environments for developing learners’ systems thinking. In fact, very little work has reported systematic design processes as an empirical contribution in the development of science education interventions (e.g. see Bopardikar, Bernstein, & McKenney, 2021).

In response, as part of a larger research program, the purpose of this work is to provide a theoretically and teacher-informed design process of an adaptive interactive visual learning environment that supports the development of grade 7-9 learners’ systems thinking skills in the context of the carbon cycle.

To respond to this aim we describe our iterative and theory-based design process by highlighting the main design activities and the rationale behind them, including: 1) content conceptualisation, 2) pedagogical (teacher) input, and 3) adaptive characteristics. The outcome of this process has resulted in an adaptive interactive visual learning environment with multiple learning tasks and quizzes organised in three modules. Each module is designed with coherent learning objectives aligned with a hierarchy of systems thinking skills and the Swedish school curriculum. Pupils interact with the learning tasks through three core mechanics including: A) dragging and dropping cards to complete a diagram, B) drawing arrows to complete the partial and global cycles, and C) clicking on the icons to reveal more information. Pupils’ interaction with this learning environment is supported through various forms of immediate (e.g. automatically correcting a misdrawn arrow) and delayed feedback (e.g. visual and textual verification of a correct response following a task response). Focusing on the carbon cycle, our work aims to provide a personalised learning experience for learners in grade 7-9 in scaffolding different levels of systems thinking.

A fundamental prerequisite for developing environmental literacy for sustainability is understanding systems thinking (Kali et al., 2003). For example, developing the ability to interpret and understand the carbon cycle in terms of a system is necessary to grasp the monumental challenges posed by climate change (Shepardson et al., 2012). Although international school curricula, including countries like Sweden, promote the learning of the carbon cycle, science education research shows that understanding complex earth systems is challenging for pupils as it requires integrating knowledge from different levels of organisation and content areas (Düsing et al., 2019). Obstacles that pupils encounter include perceiving components of the system as separate “entities” rather than connecting them, or struggling to relate the system to everyday life (Assaraf & Orion, 2005). Systems thinking about earth systems requires mastering a range of skills, such as identifying the components of the cycle, through to thinking temporally about predictive implications of a system. Assaraf and Orion (2005) have articulated a framework of systems thinking abilities that consists of three hierarchical levels, namely Analysis (skills for identifying components of a system), Synthesis (skills for relating system components) and Implementation (skills for perceiving hidden system dimensions).

A large body of empirical evidence has confirmed the learning benefit of including pictorial elements in educational materials, and that careful design of multimedia resources that consider human cognitive processes has great influence on learning outcomes (Mayer, 2014). At the same time, Asshoff et al. (2010) claim that visually representing the complexity of natural processes such as the carbon cycle should provide more interactive and dynamic opportunities for learners. Therefore, it is rather surprising that the complexity of the carbon cycle is typically depicted and taught via static and often highly conventionalised diagrams. Little work has investigated how systems thinking can be supported through interactive, adaptive visualizations that also integrate aspects of canonical representations familiar to pupils and teachers.

This study forms part of a larger research program developing and testing an adaptive visual learning environment, termed Tracing Carbon, which supports pupils’ systems thinking skills in the context of the carbon cycle. Tracing Carbon comprises three modules, each integrated with interactive visual tasks and respective quiz questions aimed at probing abilities related to the three hierarchical levels (1-Analysis, 2-Synthesis, 3-Implementation). The current study purpose was to explore pupils’ interaction and performance with Tracing Carbon, guided by the following research questions. How do pupils:

• Interact with the Tracing Carbon learning environment when performing tasks?
• Perform on the quiz questions in terms of assigned hierarchy and difficulty levels?
• Assess the difficulty of quiz questions in terms of assigned hierarchy and difficulty levels?

This paper will examine the discourses of Information and Communication Technology-based educational technologies (henceforth referred to as EdTech) in contemporary Indian and Chinese policyscape and how ambitious narratives of future are built on the backbone of EdTech-based educational reforms. The paper will be a conceptual analysis conducted using Jasanoff’s concept of sociotechnical imaginaries and Bacchi’s WPR approach.

Background

From being another tool in the pedagogue’s arsenal to a revolutionary force which could cure ills endemic to educational systems, educational policies in many nation-states now routinely deem EdTech as the driver of socioeconomic transformation and global domination. It has simultaneously generated and has been accompanied by a rich discourse on knowledge economy/information society and an ever increasingly hyperconnected world shaped by supranational policy advocacy organisations, mega tech corporations, and philanthrocapitalists.

These globally circulating ideas become sedimented in different national contexts in the form of what Jasanoff and Kim term as sociotechnical imaginaries, i.e., “collectively imagined forms of social life and social order reflected in the design and fulfilment of nation-specific scientific and/or technological projects.” Such visions, and the policies built upon them, have the power to influence technological design, channel public expenditures, and justify the inclusion or exclusion of citizens with respect to the benefits of technological progress.

It is interesting to note that states with vastly different political and social systems can have very similar sociotechnical imaginaries and the projected ideal futures–which is to say, that these states may assign similar roles or weightages to edtech in order to realise futures with common characteristics such as global domination, economic prosperity, national strength, and a stable society. Recent educational policy developments in China and India are a very good example.

As two nations gaining independence from hostile rule at roughly the same time, China and India have evolved with very different political and economic systems, social organisation, and foreign engagement. Both have struggled through geopolitical instability, economic sanctions, and social unrest to become among the largest economies in the world. As the centennial anniversary of both nations’ independence (China in 2049, India in 2047) draws closer, it is natural that they have lofty ambition of becoming global powers. In 2012, Xi Jinping set the goal for China in 2049 to become "strong, democratic, civilised, harmonious, and modern socialist country." More recently in August 2022, Narendra Modi announced the goal of India as a developed country in 2047 along with “removing traces of colonial mindset, unity and a sense of duty among the citizens.”

Central to the realisation of these goals is reform and development of education, and recently, EdTech. The linking of use of EdTech with the overarching goal of national development can be investigated with the concept of sociotechnical imaginaries. Policies on education and/or EdTech thus provide unique sites for exploring the role of political culture and practices in stabilising particular imaginaries, as well as the resources that must be mobilised to represent technological trajectories as being in the “national interest.” Bacchi’s concept of problematisation can help us examine the specific manner in which the ‘problem’ of rural education is defined and how EdTech is proposed as the solution.

Research question

How is rural education problematised in contemporary Indian and Chinese policy discourses on EdTech?

Digital transformation in education became a topic which a great deal of reflection due to experiences in COVID-19 related school closures. The sudden change to online education prompted a number of research in different national education systems (Russia: Koroleva, Naushirvanov, 2021; Hungary: Czirfusz et al, 2020; Horváth et al, 2021). Previous research focused on teachers’ digital competence, technology readiness, technology acceptance or generally on the processes of the emergence and diffusion of digital educational innovations (Badri et al, 2014; El Alfy et al, 2017; Halász, 2018; Horváth, 2017; Horváth et al, 2020).

Despite the global trend and the commonality of the digitalization task, the applied policies of different countries are an excellent example of the diversity of strategies for the transformation of national educational systems. This diversity is possible also because of the specific cultural context (Voogt J. et al., 2017; Klievink B. et al., 2017). Cultural and state-level characteristics determine readiness to embrace and integrate modern technologies, as well as set the direction of the modernization process in education. Digital technologies in turn lead to changes in the culture of communication, policy implementation, and daily routine practices (Selwyn, 2012). Investigation of the impact cultural patterns have on digitalization of education, and how new technologies change cultural attitudes and practices in different countries can be seen as one of the explanatory models.

Few studies take into consideration the cultural patterns that could influence successful digital transformation in education systems. The main aim of our paper is to provide a comparative perspective by examining factors related to successful digital transformation in Russian and Hungarian education systems. By conducting a joint study on teachers’ technology readiness, attitudes towards educational technologies and cultural values in both countries we provide a deeper understanding of the underlying cultural patterns that could influence processes of digital transformation.

Digital transformation of the educational systems and implementation of digital technologies in the educational process can be still considered as an innovation for many teachers. Taking into account the socio-cultural specifics of these processes, on the one hand, expands the understanding of individual factors stimulating or blocking the course of transformation for each teacher individually. In order to facilitate transformational processes here we can talk about targeted support strategies for teachers with different attitude profiles regarding the use of technology. On the other hand, differences or similarities among socio-cultural patterns at the country level can form the basis that may inform national and supranational digitalization strategies. Here the discussion on possibilities for globalized solutions in the diverse cultural contexts of Europe.

A comparative perspective of two countries (Russia and Hungary) allows a deeper understanding of digitalisation processes as well as identifying the universal and specific relationships between individual and organizational level factors. Those two cases can be seen as two different frames with which it is convenient to compare. The selection of specific cultural characteristics from a known model (Hofstede’s cultural dimensions model) as well as individual characteristics measured by known instruments (Technology readiness index, Unified theory of acceptance and use of technology) makes it possible to define an approach that is easily replicable in other countries.

With predictions of robotics and efficient machine learning as the building blocks of the Fourth Industrial Revolution, countries need to adopt a long-term strategy to deal with potential challenges of automation and education must provide students with a grounding in certain skills, such as computational thinking, and an understanding of robotics, which are likely to be required in many future roles. The use of humanoid robots has been a widespread practice for years to help children construct logical reasoning and computational thinking. Children can acquire new knowledge and develop cognitive, conceptual, language, and collaborative skills through interacting with robots (Benvenuti, M. & Mazzoni, E., 2020; Toh, L. P. E., Causo, A., Tzuo, P. W., Chen, I. M., & Yeo, S. H., 2016). Humanoid robots can spark their interest in coding as they are able to make the robot function (Keane, T., Chalmers, C., Boden, M., & Williams, M., 2019).

However, there is a lack of empirical research involving the use of robots in school learning environments and there is a need for more effective analysis of the potential of robotics as a teaching tool for schools (Benitti, F. B. V., 2012). A recent review of the literature (Anwar, S., Bascou, N. A., Menekse, M., & Kardgar, A., 2019) observed that the majority of the existing studies lacked an experimental or quasi-experimental design. Recently emphasis has been put on the importance of conducting these interventions with effective robotic pedagogies and underlying theoretical foundations that are required for educational modules in STEM education to make robot-based pedagogies more efficient (Anwar, S. et al., 2019).

Further to this, it has been argued that educational robotics allows for an integrated, multidisciplinary approach and it is essential to provide a more holistic portrayal of the research on educational robots(Anwar, S. et al., 2019).

In response, this paper contributes to the field by presenting a study with Grade 6 students (n. 20) using a multidisciplinary framework. The multidisciplinary nature of the framework acknowledges that the use of humanoid robots in school learning environments must be holistic, rather than focusing on just the technical, or the pedagogical for example. The multidisciplinary framework proposes that the introduction and evaluation of technology in the classroom should be explored from the following four perspectives: pedagogical, technological/human robot interaction, psycho-social development and a consideration of the ethical implications of using humanoid robots. The framework is grounded in experiential learning theory (ELT) which defines learning as "the process whereby knowledge is created through the transformation of experience. Knowledge results from the combination of grasping and transforming experience" (Kolb, 1984, p.41). The ELT model allows for a diversity of learning styles in students. This paper focusses on the pedagogical aspect of the framework and has the following research questions; Firstly, to what extent is programming a humanoid robot engaging when the robot helped visualize the coding, instructions, and outcome of the process? Secondly, what are the student´s perceptions of the experimental learning approach used?

Teaching children the basics of programming dates back many decades, starting with the coding language LOGO which used a simple programming language which could be used by young children (Papert, 1980). While LOGO has continued to be developed, other tools like Scratch, Bee-bots and KIBO are nowadays more prevalent. Discussions regarding, not only programming and coding, but also computational thinking (Wing, 2006) has been highlighted in many countries. Countries like Denmark, France, Ireland, Spain, Portugal and the UK have introduced programming in the national curriculum during the 2010’s (Bers, 2018). The need to reform schooling to better prepare students with so-called 21^st-century skills has been a focus in academia for many years, with discussions concerning what new forms of literacy that today’s students need to tackle the problems of tomorrow (Trilling & Fadel, 2009). Therefore, learning programming at a young age is not only important in regard to changes in curricula, but also in relation to the world becoming more digitized and harder to navigate without technological completeness like programming.

Previous literature reviews related to programming education with relevance for the K-6 field have focused on a wide variety of themes. Xia and Zhong (2018) analyses articles relevant to K-12 robotics education and concludes that there is an educational potential using robotics in education. However, they also criticize studies within the field for the low number of participants and short interventions, which further studies should have in mind. Sun and colleagues’ (2022) systematic review focuses on articles related to K-12 students programming ability and concludes that block-based programming tools are common in research and that programming education cultivated students’ cognitive and operational ability. Macrides and colleagues (2022) focus on programming education in early childhood education and conclude that teaching young children programming is not only possible but can also contribute to creativity and collaboration. They also note that there is a need within the field to develop measurement instruments. Kakavas and Ugolini (2019) analyses articles relevant to computational thinking in K-6, and concludes that there has been an increasing interest in how to develop students’ computational thinking skills in later years. Furthermore, they observe that most studies in their review use visual programming tools like Scratch, Alice and Kodu. The presented literature reviews show positive aspects of programming education, but it is also of importance to understand how data was produced to fully understand the effects of programming on student learning. Since the existing systematic literature reviews on research related to K-6 programming education do not fully cover the methodological aspects of the research, there is a gap within the research field which this study aims to fill.

The purpose of this study is to present the latest developments and tendencies through a systematic review of empirical research on the methodologies used in the emerging field of K-6 programming education. This is of importance in order to understand how the field is developing, but also to find gaps in the research field, which could give rise to discussions regarding how to fill these gaps. The study also aims to contribute to teacher education and to support teachers working with younger children, through a broader approach than previous literature reviews, presenting available K-6 programming research, thereby making it easier for practitioners to find relevant research that could contribute to their practice.

Research questions

What methodologies were used in the studies and where was the data collected?

What programming tools were used and what ages were the children in the studies?