Infusing ICT practices in teacher education programs

Abstract

ABSTRACT: This study has a twofold purpose. On the one hand, it aimed to voice pre-service foreign language teachers’ needs regarding digital skills. These needs come from various actors in teacher education programs, including coordinators, teachers and students, and national and international experts in the field of ICT and foreign language teaching and learning. On the other hand, the study also intended to determine how the digital competencies of pre-service language teachers can be fostered with the inclusion of an ICT component in the programs’ curriculum offer to effectively prepare them to teach and/or learn English through the use of technologies. The study arose from the finding which evinced that not all the Licenciatura programs in Colombia included a solid plan that fused ICT and language teacher education, so that teachers and students could be supported to be better able to develop their language trajectory, either in their role of teachers or learners, while meeting the demands of the contemporary society of knowledge and their field of action. This study was conducted on fifteen teacher education programs in Colombia involving eight coordinators, twenty-nine teachers, forty-five students, and ten national and international experts in ICT and EFL. A qualitative inquiry was carried out by the administration of questionnaires and semi-structured interviews. Responses were analyzed using Grounded Theory and coding procedures