Secondo voi chi ha ucciso la signora Altieri? La (mancata) tematizzazione della violenza di genere nei manuali di italiano e alcune proposte didattiche per affrontare il tema in classe

L’articolo si apre con una panoramica su dati e fatti relativi ai femminicidi e alla violenza di genere in Svizzera che mostra come questi fenomeni siano purtroppo di estrema attualità. In seguito viene proposta una riflessione su come la scuola dovrebbe svolgere un ruolo fondamentale nella lotta alla violenza contro le donne, sul ruolo particolare degli insegnanti di lingua straniera del livello secondario II e su come il tema della violenza di genere non venga purtroppo trattato adeguatamente né a scuola né nei manuali di italiano. Il contributo si conclude con un invito a trattare la tematica in classe e con alcune proposte didattiche per farlo

What is “technology integration” and how is it measured in k-12 education? A systematic review of survey instruments from 2010 to 2021

This systematic review provides an overview and analysis of the survey instruments measuring technology integration (TI) in educational settings from 2010 to 2021. Given the importance of addressing aspects related to the quality of TI (e.g., the use of technology to support pedagogical goals), we paid particular attention to them. Search results from the PsycINFO, ERIC, Web of Science, and Scopus databases yielded 695 records. Thirty-five different survey instruments used in 36 studies met our eligibility criteria and were then analyzed by applying content analysis. Our results indicate that the diversity of operationalizations is very high and that several instruments have no explicit conceptual or theoretical underpinnings. Most of the instruments measure aspects related to classroom practices and measure TI from the teachers' point of view. The most frequently measured pedagogical aspects of TI in instructional practices include the use of technology to (1) enhance students’ cognitive engagement, (2) promote collaboration between students, and (3) allow students to conduct research online. The study concludes with some perspectives for future research, an attempt to formulate a definition of TI, and some more general recommendations to ensure terminological unambiguity in TI research

“Development and validation of the ICAP Technology Scale to measure how teachers integrate technology into learning activities”

Previous research investigating the use of technology in school has focused mainly on the frequency of use of digital tools during lessons rather than investigating how technology is integrated with respect to different kinds of learning activities. Since the impact of technology use on learning depends on how it is used and on what activities supported by technology are implemented in lessons, a measurement instrument assessing how technology is integrated into learning activities is necessary to investigate its impact on teaching and learning processes. According to the interactive, constructive, active, and passive (ICAP) framework, which distinguishes four different learning activities based on the level of students' cognitive engagement, we developed the 12-item ICAP Technology Scale (ICAP-TS) that accounts for all four dimensions of technology integration in lessons. We used confirmatory factor analysis to validate the four-factor structure of the ICAP-TS with a sample of 1059 upper-secondary school teachers from Switzerland. We also examined reliability using classical test theory and Rasch model analysis to assess the scale's psychometric characteristics. We then analyzed the associations between the ICAP-TS and a general use frequency measure of 12 educational technologies to test the criterion validity. The results confirmed the four-factor structure of the ICAP-TS and revealed good instrument accuracy. The most difficult items to endorse are those describing the integration of technology into interactive learning activities. Furthermore, all 12 items significantly correlated with the frequency of use of 12 educational technologies. We recommend the ICAP-TS as a short and reliable measurement scale for assessing how technology is integrated into lessons, considering different learning activities based on the ICAP theoretical model

Il ritorno del narratore nella letteratura dei e sui viaggi della speranza attraverso il Mediterraneo

Il lavoro offre una panoramica sulla letteratura italiana dei e sui viaggi della speranza attraverso il Mediterraneo (sottocategoria della letteratura della e sull’immigrazione) delineandone a grandi linee l’evoluzione e alcune caratteristiche (formali e sociologiche), definendo l’insieme delle opere che essa comprende (e il loro contenuto) e visualizzando questo insieme in relazione alla letteratura della e sulla migrazione. Il lavoro sostiene inoltre la tesi che nella letteratura dei e sui viaggi della speranza si individuino diverse tendenze osservate da alcuni critici letterari nella narrativa italiana contemporanea e che le caratteristiche di questa letteratura si lascino in gran parte spiegare con il ritorno della figura del narratore, di cui Walter Benjamin constatava la scomparsa nel saggio "Il narratore. Considerazioni sull'opera di Nikolai Leskov". Alcune caratteristiche della narrativa contemporanea riscontrabili anche nella letteratura dei e sui viaggi della speranza sono: l’ibridazione – o la forzatura – dei generi, la poetica documentaria, la combinazione di elementi di fiction e di non fiction, la svolta etica (e epica), la svolta narrativa, l’intenzione degli autori e delle autrici di agire sulla realtà, la centralità dell’esperienza umana e la coscienza della parzialità della verità

Transformational leadership for technology integration in schools: empowering teachers to use technology in a more demanding way

The present study aims to investigate whether the transformational leadership practices of school principals support teachers in using digital technologies in a way that fosters students' engagement in cognitively demanding learning activities in class. To this end, teachers' positive beliefs about digital technology, their technical skills, the digital school infrastructure, and teachers' skills in teaching with digital technologies were investigated as relevant mediators of the relationship between transformational leadership and technology integration. Based on a survey of 2247 upper secondary education teachers in Switzerland, multilevel correlation and structural equation modeling analysis indicated that transformational leadership had a significant and positive impact on the digital school infrastructure, teachers' positive beliefs about digital technology, their technical skills, and their skills in teaching with digital technologies. In turn, all of these factors, except the digital school infrastructure, significantly and positively predicted higher levels of technology integration. These findings position principals’ transformational leadership approaches as crucial in supporting teachers as key players in technology integration in the classroom

Why do some teachers teach media literacy while others do not? Exploring predictors along the “will, skill, tool, pedagogy” model

The present study aims to identify factors that predict whether teachers engage in teaching about digital technologies (media education), which is an under-researched topic compared to the research about teaching with digital technologies (technology integration). Thus, a popular model of technology integration—the “will, skill, tool, pedagogy” model—guided our research on media education. Based on a survey of 2247 Swiss upper secondary school teachers, we found that for most of the media education topics, only a minority of teachers indicated that they have addressed them in class. Multilevel binomial regression analyses revealed that teachers' responsibility beliefs (will) were one of the most important predictors of discussing media education topics. Furthermore, teachers' self-assessed technical skills (skill) positively predicted whether they taught media literacy, whereas skills in teaching with digital technologies perceived by teachers (pedagogy) only promoted the likelihood that teachers would address topics of critical evaluation of online information and ethical questions of automation. The quality of the schools’ infrastructure (tool) seemed to be of minor importance or to have even detrimental effects in the context of media education. Moreover, we observed differences between subjects in engagement in media education, with language, arts, and humanities teachers being particularly more likely to cover aspects of media literacy in class

Von der Digitalisierung zur digitalen Transformation

Digitale Medien werden in den Schulen der Sekundarstufe II immer noch primär für passive Lernaktivitäten eingesetzt. Aktive, konstruktive und interaktive Lernformen sind eher eine Seltenheit, auch in Berufsfachschulen, in denen digitale Technologien mittlerweile intensiver eingesetzt werden als in anderen Schultypen. Das ist das Hauptergebnis der Studie DigiTraS II («Digitale Transformation der Sekundarstufe II»); Fallstudien geben Aufschluss, warum das so sein könnte

Transformational leadership for technology integration in schools: Empowering teachers to use technology in a more demanding way

The present study aims to investigate whether the transformational leadership practices of school principals support teachers in using digital technologies in a way that fosters students' engagement in cognitively demanding learning activities in class. To this end, teachers' positive beliefs about digital technology, their technical skills, the digital school infrastructure, and teachers' skills in teaching with digital technologies were investigated as relevant mediators of the relationship between transformational leadership and technology integration. Based on a survey of 2247 upper secondary education teachers in Switzerland, multilevel correlation and structural equation modeling analysis indicated that transformational leadership had a significant and positive impact on the digital school infrastructure, teachers' positive beliefs about digital technology, their technical skills, and their skills in teaching with digital technologies. In turn, all of these factors, except the digital school infrastructure, significantly and positively predicted higher levels of technology integration. These findings position principals’ transformational leadership approaches as crucial in supporting teachers as key players in technology integration in the classroom

More formal, please! The impact of teachers’ formal and independent professional development on the quality of technology integration

The aim of the present study is to evaluate the relationship between technology-related professional development (PD) and the quality of technology integration. On a sample of 2247 in-services teachers, we tested the effects of formal and independent PD settings (i.e., training course attendance and self-training, respectively) on self-reported technological, pedagogical, and content knowledge (TPACK; Mishra & Koehler, 2006) and technology integration in supporting qualitatively different learning activities in the classroom. As a quality measure of how teachers integrate technology, we considered four types of learning activities that entail different levels of learners’ cognitive activation: interactive, constructive, active, and passive (ICAP; Chi, 2009). The results revealed that PD activities were positively related to self-reported TPACK, but only formal PD activities were positively and significantly associated with technology integration in all four ICAP learning activities. The implications of these findings for in-service teachers’ training are discussed