Embedding digital competencies in everyday learning

Confident and responsible use of digital technologies is a key basic skill needed to learn, work and participate in contemporary society. Young people are among the most active users of digital tools and are often referred to as ‘digital natives’ – yet over 40% of young Europeans underachieve in basic digital skills assessment.  

It is essential that they gain the kinds of digital skills that they don’t learn by swiping. In this article, teachers can find practical ways to incorporate digital skills into different school subjects.  

Digital skills as a common objective  

In the ‘Teachers of Europe’ podcast episode Students' digital competences, computer science teacher Stavroula Skiada shares ideas about how to integrate digital skills into everyday classroom activities:  

• Instruct pupils how to check the validity and credibility of online resources (researching author, publication date, purpose, website domain)
• Give pupils examples of biased/fake news articles and analyse to distinguish them from real/objective journalism
• Make participation fun with gamification (digital quizzes, mazes, memory cards)
• Assign projects that require research and data about real-world issues (using Excel or Google Sheets to organise, analyse and interpret data and Canva or other creative online tools for data visualisation)
• Bring assignments to life through collaboration on citizen science projects, in which pupils’ work helps real-life scientists 

Teachers wanting to develop their own and their pupils’ digital competence are supported by the European Commission’s SELFIE for TEACHERS (a self-reflection tool for teachers), and eTwinning, with its collaborative projects.  

Learn more about both in this webinar:  

Developing digital skills subject by subject 

Selected learning activities from our online course ‘Facilitating learners' digital competence’ (currently available in self-paced format) show how to develop pupils’ digital skills, such as:  

• Responsible digital campaign: In this cross-curricular activity, pupils are tasked with creating a digital campaign to promote ethical online behaviour. It combines research, creativity, critical thinking, communication and language skills and teamwork while allowing pupils to practice using online tools such as Canva, Adobe Spark and WordPress. For pupils aged 12–14.
• Famous artist escape room: Pupils with some knowledge on famous artists explore an artist (e.g. Joan Miró). After researching the artist’s style, pupils create an escape room. This activity combines art, history, creativity, research, problem-solving, digital literacy, collaboration and communication. For pre-school pupils.  

In the Teachers of Europe podcast, English teacher Edward Alvar Lockhart Domeño shares an example for foreign language lessons.  

In the assignment, pupils are placed in teams and given different ocean explorers(male and female scientists) from the past.  

Each group conducts research in different ways and then presents their explorer, using five digital resources: 

• A digital timeline
• An interactive map
• A video created with artificial intelligence
• A Kahoot quiz to test the audience
• An infographic 

Throughout the project, pupils must keep a journal to reflect their use of digital tools. The main subject is a foreign language, but pupils also improve their knowledge of science, oceans (environment) and history and five important digital competences through the creation of their resources. They also work on skills such as collaboration, critical thinking, qualitative research and public speaking.  

History lessons can be enriched by technology in different ways, including virtual museum visits, the use of digital collections and immersive applications. For example, the Historiana tool (created by EuroClio, the European Association of History Educators) helps educators liven up history lessons with interactive timelines, lesson plans and multimedia content.  

Mathematics teachers may find online games, puzzles and storytelling tools useful for bringing numeracy concepts to life and making the subject more accessible and engaging.  

For example, the Mathigon platform enables pupils to interactively engage with mathematics with its resources and lesson plans. 

Context is everything, including with digital tools  

Educators can help pupils hone their digital skills while processing what they’re learning in unique and fun ways.  

By using online tools, pupils can become more engaged in their lessons and learn to use online environments responsibly. However, it is important to employ digital tools prudently and guide pupils in tackling the potential downsides of excessive use.