IEA International Computer and Information Literacy Study 2018 Assessment Framework

Over the last four decades, information and communications technologies (ICT) have increasingly affected the ways in which we interact with others and do things in our daily lives and work. These technologies have also changed teaching and learning in schools and the ways in which schools are organized. Education systems, and schools within those systems, have seen these technologies as offering the potential to improve learning in schools, and recognized the importance of developing the capacities of their students to use those technologies in their ongoing lives in order to participate fully in what is often termed the “digital age.” The International Association for the Evaluation of Educational Achievement (IEA) has been researching the impact of ICT on educational processes, as well as factors influencing or impeding the pedagogical use of ICT, since the late-1980s. More recently it has turned its attention to investigating the impact of ICT on educational outcomes. IEA’s International Computer and Information Literacy Study (ICILS) is a response to the increasing use of ICT in modern society and the need for citizens to develop relevant capabilities to participate effectively in a digital world. It also addresses the need for policymakers and education systems to gain a better understanding of the contexts and outcomes of ICT-related education programs in their countries. The first cycle of ICILS in 2013 (ICILS 2013) assessed students’ computer and information literacy (CIL) with an emphasis on the use of computers as information seeking, management and communication tools. The international recognition of the importance of developing students’ abilities to recognize and operationalize real-world problems using computational formulations on computers or other digital devices has prompted the development of an ICILS assessment of computational thinking (CT), which was offered to participating education systems as an international option in 2018. The second cycle of ICILS, the International Computer and Information Literacy Study 2018 (ICILS 2018), thus investigates students’ CIL and CT abilities, and how these relate to school and out-of-school contexts that support learning.