Digital literacies for international teacher education: a Ghanaian perspective

Teacher education in Sub Saharan Africa has been highlighted as key in helping to ensure inclusive and equitable quality education across the continent. Digital technologies that support new modes of teacher education can improve access and quality in developing regions (Moon and Villet, 2017a, b; Moon, 2007; Power, 2013), however little is known about how teachers develop digital literacies to enable them to effectively use these new resources, nor the ways in which student teachers are introduced to the technologies they need to support their professional development. Given the scarcity of research in this area and with teacher support and preparation having been the least examined topics in mobile learning research, this project investigated the ways in which student teachers in one College of Education in Ghana participate in learning experiences that develop their digital literacies to support their professional development throughout the college course, both on campus and in school placements. Using ethnographic approaches within a sociocultural theoretical rationale, the aim of this research was to address the gap in literature by examining the ways in which student teachers participate in learning experiences that develop their digital literacies during their training at a College of Education in Ghana. In view of the slow pace of ICT infrastructure advancement in Ghanaian schools, tutors at one college of education are encouraging the use of student teachers’ personal devices such as mobile phones to support their professional learning, both on campus and in the absence of other equipment in school placements. Smartphone use was found to be an enabling tool for students, whose formal and informal use of communication tools such as WhatsApp supported their developing professionalism and gave them access to new ways to locate and use materials for teaching and their wider professional development, including the academic requirements of their courses.