Digital Literacy and Digital Skills in University Study

Abstract

Recently, the digitalization phenomenon has been trending upwards globally. This term has occupied all spheres of our lives, including education. Along with global tendencies and calls of the Industrial Revolution, 4.0 national projects outlined by the president in the particular project “Digital economy” have provided many impulses to the Digitalization of education.

This research paper is mainly devoted to exploring digital education and digital learning in Russia's realities today. The author utilizes the current situation with lockdown and, therefore, distance education and learning to try to shed light on some aspects of educational Digitalization. The article provides a theoretical discussion of the irreversibility and necessity of Digitalization of education, its components, stages, structure, advantages, and disadvantages; of what has been done and what is to be done in this field. The author also provides empirical data of studying Kazan Federal University students in foreign language classes during distance education and learning period. Remarkably, the article offers some insight into students’ readiness for the digital era, evaluating their digital literacy and digital skills and competencies, their motivation to keep on studying while on distance, their abilities to take responsibility for their learning as well as some issues challenging students during distance learning.