3Ds of Integrating Cloud Technologies into Classrooms: Digital Identity, Competencies, and Self-Efficacy

Introduction

Effective integration of technology into classrooms involves a complex process. The teacher, whether as a sage on the stage or a guide by side, plays central role in blending technology into teaching and learning processes. Customarily, teachers’ digital competencies followed by their technology beliefs and attitudes (referred to in this chapter as digital self-efficacy) are considered the most important factors for successful integration or blending of technology into classrooms (e.g., Ertmer, Ottenbreit-Leftwich & York, 2006; Hew & Brush, 2007; ISTE Standards for Teachers, 2016). However, many teachers face enormous challenges to develop their digital competencies and maintain a positive digital self-efficacy in the context of ever evolving technological advancements. This is even more challenging when it comes to using emerging technologies such as social media, educational apps, learning games, and cloud computing. As result, technology makes little, if any, inroads to the classrooms.

Although digital competencies and self-efficacy are essential, I argue that there is a little explored third factor – the teachers’ digital identity, which is at the core of their technology-mediated pedagogical practices. Developing a strong, solid digital identity, I argue, empowers teachers to explore emerging technologies and build their digital competencies and self-efficacy accordingly. In this chapter, I seek to critically explore and examine new pedagogical possibilities of integrating cloud technologies into classrooms within the triadic interplay of digital identity, competencies, and self-efficacy (3Ds).