Forming of Future Teachers’ ICT-Competence: Canadian Experience

The article deals with the phenomenon of digital divide in the education in Canada. The domestic and foreign scientific and educational publications have been studied and analyzed. It has been found out that traditional means for training pedagogical specialists are gradually losing their relevance due to lack of educational dialogue between a teacher and a student. Information and communication technologies have entered today’s youth everyday life and become an essential means of communication, receiving and transmitting information. Based on the source study, the essence and reasons of digital divide have been revealed. Canadian researchers consider that it is possible to overcome this problem by revising the approach to teacher training which will focus on the forming of future teachers’ information and communication competence. Various definitions of the terms “information competence”, “ICT competence”, “digital literacy”, “e-literacy” have been described. The model of ICT competence, its structure and the process of its integration into education have been analyzed. The examples of forming future teachers’ ICT competence in universities of Canada have been given. It has been revealed that the problem of effective ICT implementation into educational activities is in the range of many Canadian studies, but in fact the phenomenon of digital divide in education is still topical due to insufficient activity of teachers of pedagogical faculties and students’ ignoring the problem. A number of studies have been examined, the authors of which give practical recommendations aimed at enhancing the role of new technologies in teacher training in Canada