Digital datafication of education

Authors

• Pekka Mertala Jyväskylän yliopisto

DOI: https://doi.org/10.33350/ka.100161

Keywords:

Data, Datafication, Life-long learning, School, Education, Multiliteracies

Abstract

This position paper provides a critical overview of the different forms and meanings of the datafication of education under four main themes. First, the paper discusses how digital datafication relates to other major trends in contemporary education, namely digitalization, learnification, and accountability. Second, the differences between the “actual data” and how data are represented in discourses promoting digital datafication of education are put under critical examination. The next topic to be addressed is how the data-intensive practices of contemporary schools contribute to the naturalization of all-pervading data collection, which serves as a bridge to the fourth theme: the intertwined relationship of life-long learning and digital datafication. The paper ends with a suggestion on how the use of data technologies in schools can be re-framed as possibilities for data literacy education via a pedagogy of multiliteracies.