Digital Engines in learning-by-doing Education Format

The problem. The global digital world effects the educational environment in many respects. First of all, educators are faced with the new generation of students, or millennials / centennials who are often referred to as digital natives. The key features they share is they are practically oriented, less concentrated, digitally obsessed and need other motivators than the previous generations. It implies that education technologies have to keep pace with that.

The method. The authors suggest trying traditional strategies in new perspectives, e. g. project-based learning; combine them with a new promising approach that seem to answer the students’ aspirations, didactics-wise, i. e. the concepts of a few-shots learning, and active learning (AL). The paper focuses on elaboration of these approaches basing on the authors’ teaching practices. In AL students are involved a variety of research activities, inter alia, with the focus on digital technologies, they get ahead learning-by-doing.

Results. The authors suggested a tripartite division of digital engines that can be used in teaching / research practices: search engines per se, such as Google or text corpora, used for retrieving and collecting data; research engines used in linguistic experiments, and interactive ones, e. g. Mentimeter which can yield immediate research feedback in graphically diverse forms. Other digitally supported means were tested such as students’ and teaching staff’s blogs, their potential assessed.

Conclusion. Digital evolution-wise, students are able to master innovative digital technologies which will enable them with a variety of practically relevant skills in their professional future. The focus on active learning to be supported by cutting-edge technologies is a vital means in the educational environment.