Digital literacy of ESP Learners: voices of medical teachers, learners and authorities

The massive adoption of digital technology in all educational sectors has changed teachers’ and learners’ instructional activities. This change has also occurred in the L2 pedagogy, including English for Academic/Specific Purposes (EAP/ESP). In this case, the L2 teacher and learner must be competent in both language and technological skills. ESP is a branch of L2 teaching and learning within applied linguistics, and it aims is to use English in a specific field (Arnó-Macià & Rueda-Ramos, 2011; Liu & Hu, 2021; Paltridge & Starfield, 2013). For example, in the context of ESP, the changes are more extreme since teachers and learners are required to learn three different skills, general English, English for a specific subject, and technology. In the Indonesian L2 context, the ESP course was commonly taught by English teachers who graduated from the English Language Education Department (ELED), who do not have any previous ESP background. Meanwhile, not all Indonesian universities offer ESP as part of their compulsory courses. Therefore, these challenges are more complex because English teachers have to learn both ESP course content and digital literacy at the same time. Since the potential of digital literacy in L2 and EAP/ESP contexts has been acknowledged, teachers and learners are required to be digitally competent in integrating technology and instructional practices (Benesch, 2009; Dashtestani & Hojatpanah, 2020; Lotherington & Jenson, 2011; Mahapatra, 2020; Son et al., 2011). Besides, acquiring adequate digital literacy is necessary for supporting effective ESP instructional practices to help learners learn ESP to support their courses effectively. Various aspects of the ESP domain and digital literacy implementation have been extensively probed using multiple designs. Merits, demerits, and recommendations of blending digital literacy into ESP instruction have also been echoed from previous studies. However, there is a dearth of well-documented inquiry in the context of ESP instructional practices from a comprehensive perspective involving ESP learners, teachers, and policymakers. A previous study indicates that understanding digital literacy levels seems useful to map learners’ and teachers’ digital levels, but it could not provide evidence of how they unravel successful and unsuccessful digital literacy interactions. Research also proves that the use of digital technology influence the quality of L2 teaching and learning (Arifani et al., 2020; Bodnar et al.,2016; Dashtestani & Hojatpanah, 2020). The research objectives aim to unravel significant differences in perceptions, types of digital tools and applications, digital literacy practices and challenges from the perspectives of ESP teachers, learners, and policymakers