Editorial Digital / Distance Learning

Abstract

A new issue of the Open Access Journal DiSlaw (Didaktik slawischer Sprachen) is now available. The second DiSlaw-issue is dedicated to the topic Distance / Digital Learning that has preoccupied us on various levels and has eventually become a new reality since the COVID-19-pandemic hit. The sudden and constant use of digital media for teaching and learning purposes as well as their effective and learning outcome-oriented implementation did indeed pose some new challenges for us. In reference to the ongoing digitisation of teaching and learning materials, Funk (2016, p. 439) points to a “threefold problem”: firstly, teacher educators and textbook authors are being replaced by freelance editors and non-specialist developers; secondly, there appears to be a lack of criteria-based analyses of materials for mobile learning scenarios; lastly, due to the increasing diversity of learning environments and learning paths the weakly established empirical impact research on textbooks becomes incrementally less accessible to observation.