Digital Competence in University Students: Insights from Various Training Programs

Abstract

The paper describes the current approaches to the formation of digital competence of a contemporary person. We compare the approaches to the definition of digital competence. Besides, we identify and substantiate the indicators of achieving students’ digital competence. More than that, we provide examples of indicators of achieving students’ digital competence depending on their majors. The paper analyzes the definition of the concept of blended education. We reveal that various scholars consider blended education at the level of the concept of modern education, learning technology, and teaching method. The basics of modern didactics allowed us to conclude that blended education is a teaching method, along with full-time, part-time, and distance education. The consideration of blended education from the standpoint of a teaching method has become the basis for building a structural and functional model of the formation of a person’s digital competence. The research illustrates component features of the structural–functional model of the formation of the students’ digital competence, including the target-, content-, organization-, and efficiency-based components. The goals, objectives, and principles of building the model are disclosed within the target-based component. We consider the principle of proactive training as the primary one. It consists in building a teaching process aimed at creating conditions for the training of future professionals who will be in demand in a dynamically changing labor market and have competencies of the future professions.