Technology-Enhanced and Student-Centered Learning as a Method to Foster Students’ ICT Competence and Problem Coping Skills

The aim of this research-to-practice full paper is to present the results of most recent analyses of the long-term school pilot project named "learning office approach". The learning office represents an alternative branch of a technology-oriented vocational secondary school in Europe encompassing the grades K9–K13 and has been implemented at the IT department in 2016. Students of a learning office cohort have flexible course schedules allowing them to choose between several subjects on a daily basis, which in turn enables differentiation and individualization: Students seeking help or striving to deepen their knowledge and skills may visit chosen subjects more often. Since learning office subjects do not rely on lectures and direct instruction, teachers become facilitative coaches helping students become self-responsible learners and study in a self-driven, self-directed way, which in turn fosters their 21stcentury skills.The COVID-19 pandemic and resulting emergency remote teaching strategies demonstrated the supreme importance of digital competences and self-efficacy: Students were abruptly required to work autonomously with digital systems and study at home in a self-driven way. Since the learning office heavily relies on students working with digital educational material and tools in a self-directed and student-centered way, the question arises if learners show indications of increased ICT competences and self-efficacy in the learning office.This paper evaluates the interplay of students’ self-reported ICT skills, school-specific self-efficacy, and academic performance in the learning office approach and traditional classrooms. Based on an extensive literature review, a questionnaire was developed and distributed among all 552 students of the grades 9–13 and students’ final grades of the winter term 2021/22 were analyzed. The results show a significant increase in self-perceived problem coping skills and ICT competences in the learning office approach, including the sub-scales "general ICT self-concept", "communication", "process and store", and "generate content". We conclude that technology-enhanced student-centered approaches, such as the learning office, are a viable method to foster students’ 21stcentury digital skills.