Heka Arcana Putra
Doctoral research fellow at Oslo Metropolitan University
Heka is a doctoral student at the Centre for the Study of Professions at Oslo Metropolitan University. His research focuses on teachers’ pedagogical approaches and professional competences in relation to teaching practices that address digitalisation, misinformation, and platformisation in education. He holds a master’s degree in educational sciences with a specialisation in Communication, Technology, and Learning from the University of Gothenburg. Heka has international research experience as a research assistant on the RED (Reconfiguration of Educational In/equality in the Digital World) project, where he collaborated with researchers from Sweden, Germany, Mexico, Argentina, and South Africa. He also has over five years of professional experience as a secondary and upper secondary school teacher, as well as in the role of Head of Digital Learning. His PhD project explores the competences and pedagogical approaches required to empower students to critically search for and evaluate online information. The project is part of SciLMi: Meta-Scientific Literacies in the (Mis-)Information Age, an Erasmus+ Teacher Academy project.
Tell us about your project!
Students today learn about the world online, and the internet has facilitated their access to millions of sources of information every day. Simply searching for information on how to maintain a healthy diet to dealing with complex topics linked to social and scientific issues. While the internet and technological developments have the potential to democratise and mediate our access to information, they have also introduced new layers of complexity in searching for and evaluating the credibility and trustworthiness of what is found online. These challenges are deeply connected to broader processes of digitalisation, culture, and society, which influence how information is produced, shared, and interpreted across different communities.
The aim of this PhD project is to explore and understand current teaching practices in schools related to teaching students to develop the competences needed to critically search for and evaluate the information they find online. This includes information found through search engines, social media platforms, as well as information generated by digital technologies such as artificial intelligence. The project looks at how, and if, teachers include these practices in their subjects and daily teaching, what challenges they face, and what support and interventions they need to assist them in designing and integrating these competences into their existing school subjects.
“The aim of this PhD project is to explore and understand current teaching practices in schools related to teaching students to develop the competences needed to critically search for and evaluate the information they find online.”
— Heka Arcana Putra on his research project “Teaching Students to Critically Search and Evaluate Online Information: Competences and Approaches”