Consumption of Digital education –

In this study, we explore students’ attitudes towards the use of digital tools in the learning of English in Sweden and Germany. Further, we look into the official policies concerning digitalization in schools in both countries. The hypothesis of this study is that there will be differences in the treatment of and attitudes to digital tools between the students and between the two countries. Data were collected through a semi-structured questionnaire answered by 155 German and 185 Swedish students, aged 15‒16. The study shows that there are differences in how digital tools are integrated in school education. Although Sweden and Germany can be perceived as empirical contexts within a common European background, they have diverse viewpoints on how digital learning should be prioritized and facilitated for school level education. The Swedish system is more conversant with the use and integration of digital learning tools as compared to Germany. While Swedish students use a variety of tools, there is a lack of access to digital learning tools in Germany. This is also obvious in how Swedish students are more comfortable with and are able to present stronger suggestions for the improvement of digital tools as compared to the German students. Our results also show the lack of efficient digital learning tools in both Sweden and Germany. Co-creation between students, teachers, entrepreneurs and policymakers must be encouraged to support innovative, efficient and user-friendly digital tools in education.

"Our study reveals obvious differences between school policies regarding ICT integration between Sweden and Germany. At least in Sweden, school policy seems to be more about the presence of ICT, i.e. having ICT as the goal, instead of looking upon ICT as the means of achieving the goal of higher student performance.... The Swedish system is more conversant with the use and integration of digital learning tools as compared to Germany. This is obvious also in how Swedish students are more comfortable with, and are able to present stronger suggestions for the improvement of digital tools as compared to their German counterparts." (Authors, 284-285)