A humanitarian approach to the digitization of education

Abstract

Digitization is a global, all-encompassing process, affecting all spheres of human life and society. In this context education is not an exception, and the changes taking place in it are a natural result of the rapid development, wide dissemination and accessibility of information technology and networks. Understanding the methodological and philosophical foundations and principles of the process is a necessary phase of the transition to the digital education, the digital society and the digital economy. In the narrow sense digital education can be understood as a conversion of learning materials and the learning process itself from analog to digital format (i.e. electronic textbooks, electronic libraries, open online courses and webinars, video lectures, etc.), but this phenomenon can be considered in broader terms as the complex changes of infrastructural, managerial, behavioral, cultural nature. Recent events (quarantine almost all over the world because of the Covid-19 pandemic) have made it clear that the broad approach to digitization is necessary for the translation of all education systems across the world to an online format, since it refers not only to the form of presenting educational and control materials but first and foremost to the aspects of general behavior, psychological, cognitive and axiological issues. Studies have shown that in the process of transferring education from the classroom to a distance form, all participants of the educational process (students, teachers, education managers, parents) underwent a reassessment of views on education and its role in the life of a person and society. Furthermore, the contradictions, implicitly or weakly expressed prior to the forced and urgent transition to the distant form, were sharpened, and the problems related, for the most part, not to the technical aspects (although these problems also exist), but to the components of education such as communication, personal development, socialization and even physiology, became most urgent. All this requires more in-depth study, a comprehensive and systematic understanding of all the elements not only from the standpoint of functionality, but also axiological, epistemological, ontological and anthropological meanings. It has become obvious that the focus should be placed not on the technical tools with which digital education is implemented, but on a humanitarian approach with its humanistic values, in the center of which is a person: teacher-pupil /student-director-parent. As participants of the educational process, they determine the goals, objectives and methods of activity, select the appropriate technical means and evaluate their training, educational and development potential; they are the centrum omnium that underlies education. This article is devoted to the digital transformation of education in view of the humanitarian approach based on the study of culture, values and history of mankind as a whole and of the people in particular, supported by the pedagogical, psychological, sociological and communication theories that focus on the person, the individual.