Introduction

The worldwide access to the internet has stimulated the creation of online solutions targeting several life domains, with the potential to improve people’s health, as well as their cognitive, social and emotional wellbeing. Recent studies demonstrate that the use of information and communications technology (ICT), such as computers, tablets and smartphones, indicates improvements in subjective wellbeing among the elderly (^{Nimrod, 2019}); promotes social engagement and diminishes loneliness when connected to online activities (^{Szabo; Allen; Stephens; Alpass, 2019}); and contributes to the development of motor skills, perceptive/cognitive and affective/motivational as a result of playing digital games (^{Wang; Hou; Tsai, 2020}).

An increase in internet use by older people has been observed over time (^{Hunsaker and Hargittai, 2018}), yet this age group still has unequal access to ICT when compared to younger generations, resulting in a digital gap. ^{Gil (2019}) observes that young people born into an environment of technology and digital resources are deemed digital natives, while, on the other hand, those who have adapted or seek to adapt themselves to the new technological reality are digital immigrants.

For older people to enjoy the benefits of technology more broadly, their exposure to digital devices should progress to a critical analysis of the available content. ^{Silva and Behar (2019}) highlight the main differences among the terms alphabetism³ (to be understood as a pre-stage of literacy, that is, basic literacy as opposed to full-fledged literacy), literacy, fluency and digital competence since, although interconnected, these terms present a conceptual evolution. According to the authors, digital alphabetism refers to acquiring the skills to interpret and comprehend codes and language, that is, it is concerned with the first stage of the individual’s experience and practice (mastering writing skills and reading comprehension) within the digital context. This means that alphabetisation differs from digital literacy, which consists of the ability to use and comprehend information of various formats and sources, including the appropriation of the new technology and the practice of reading and writing on the screen. Therefore, a level rise is identified since the latter incorporates the shared cultural and social notion of the functionalities of technologies in the knowledge society.

Digital fluency, in turn, relates to the progress in the ease of utilising technologies, equipping the individual with the ability to evaluate, select, learn and express themselves digitally according to their personal or professional preferences. In this sense, the digitally fluent individual exercise their creativity while producing and generating new knowledge, rather than only comprehending it. Finally, the wide concept of digital competence expresses the various elements necessary for the use of ICT, such as knowledge, the skills and the attitudes towards it. In other words, “what is expected from someone digitally competent is that they can sufficiently comprehend the technological means so to utilise the information, be critical and be able to communicate using a variety of tools⁴” (^{Silva; Behar, 2019}, p. 26).

The development of the technical and operational skills aligned to the ability to understand technological information could contribute to reducing the digital gap. However, it is acknowledged that the adoption of technology by the elderly is a complex theme, as it encompasses multiple affective and psychosocial aspects which may, or may not, facilitate the use of technologies (^{Vroman; Arthanat; Lysack, 2015}). ^{Gil (2015}) argues the need to expand digital competences for the older adult by means of educational programmes focused on the development of technical and methodological strategies.

The emerging field of education for older people requires more detailed investigation, both from an epistemological point of view and methodological approaches (^{Kern, 2018}). ^{Doll (2016}) observes the shortage of educational theories targeting debates about older adults’ learning. Still, the recognition of their learning capacity has prompted reflexions about teaching practice so pedagogical proposals are consistent for the current and future generations of older people.

Aiming to investigate the pedagogical strategies employed in a programme of permanent education for older people, ^{Cachioni, Ordonez, Batistoni and Lima-Silva’s (2015}) study shows that a participative and problem-solving pedagogy - in which the content is appropriate to the older age-group - contributes to learning. Within the technological learning context, ^{Tan (2018}) recommends the prioritisation of student’s needs rather than focusing on the activities through technocentric lenses, that is, the teaching starts with the students’ needs for the relevant technology rather than concentrating on fitting the technology to the students’ purposes. Furthermore, the author stresses the necessary alignment between the organisation of the programmes and the appropriate theories for the elderly.

For a better understanding of teaching-learning, ^{Jarvis (2006}) explains the difference between teaching methods and learning style, the first being related to the variety of techniques and procedures which may be applied to teaching by means of mutual sharing of knowledge between the instructor/teacher and the adult student, while style refers to the “manner of expression”, or the teachers’ “art of teaching” (p.30). The expression “art of teaching” derives from the principles and definition of the didactics proposed by John Amos Comenius (lat.). In the publication Didactica Magna (lat.) of 1657, where Comenius states that “didactics signifies the art of teaching” (^{Comenius, 1967}, p. 5), when defending a universal, humanist education available to all.

According to ^{Jarvis (2006}), there is an overlap between method and style of teaching, as the one teacher directs the learning. However, distinct characteristics between the two terms can be identified; for instance, teachers may be “authoritarian facilitators” or “democratic facilitators”, and may be involved in “democratic didactics” or “authoritarian didacticism” (p. 35). As the author notes, teaching encompasses other perspectives beyond technique and methods, also involving manners of experiencing the teacher-student interaction.

Some research has demonstrated the main methodological approaches employed in non-formal learning programmes for older people from the point of view of the instructors and mentors (^{Cachioni et al., 2015}; ^{LoBuono; Leedahl; Maiocco, 2020}). The aim of this study is to focus on the older students’ perceptions so to identify the optimising factors in the teaching-learning process in a digital literacy programme for older learners. The target audience’s input regarding the teaching approaches contributes to the development of learning resources more appropriate to older adults.

Methodology

This exploratory and descriptive study is part of a major project titled “Digital literacy and remote scheduled intervention for the elderly by means of mobile devices”, which has been developed by the School of Arts, Sciences and Humanities (EACH), University of São Paulo (USP), in partnership with the Institute of Scientific Mathematics and Computation of São Carlos (ICMC). The project was approved by the EACH Research and Ethics Committee. During 2018 and 2019, an educational intervention in digital literacy for older people was implemented in workshop format in the setting of the USP 60+ programme.

Research protocols applied included pre- and post-testing in addition to testing during the educational activity over the four academic semesters of the workshop, and involved informing the participants about the research aims and objectives, about their freedom to withdraw at any time, and their signing a consent form. The present study focuses on the analysis of the pre-test perceptions of the older adults regarding the digital literacy activity and proposes a discussion in the domain of the teaching-learning process. The chronological age of sixty years was adopted as a defining criterion for the older person, according to current Brazilian legislation (Law n. 10.741, ²⁰⁰³).

The sample for the study consists of 317 older students enrolled in the university’s outreach programme, USP 60+. The research method adopted was the interview and the data collection instruments were pen and paper. For the purposes of preserving the participant’s identity, the respondents were identified with codes representing each thematic category.

The information gathered from a sociodemographic and economic questionnaire administered at the start of the research project indicated the general characteristics of the sample. The majority of the participants comprised females (59,3%), within an age-range of 65 to 69 (32,5%), having twelve or more years of education - expressed by the total number of years in the formal education (40,7%), with average income of four or more minimum salaries (32,8%), married (44,2%), and living with relatives, friends or nonfamily members (64%).

On the first day of the digital literacy workshop, before beginning the thirty-hour scheduled workload, the enrolled older students were invited to freely answer the following open question: “What suggestions would you give to the person who teaches the elderly how to use smartphones and tablets?”. The interviewer recorded each student’s oral answer offered verbatim.

The choice of an open question format was due to its potential to obtain diverse spontaneous thoughts and opinions from the participants. According to ^{Fachin (2017}), the application of open questions allows for the detection of opinions, attitudes, motivation and meanings in relation to the theme under investigation, offering the researcher answers with proper language, free from limitations or deliberations.

All of the participants’ answers were digitised and organised in the IBM-SPSS system (software utilised in the main project). Collected data was subjected to qualitative content analysis in order to categorise the participants’ answers for the study. According to ^{Bardin (2016}), the thematic categorical analysis must follow three main phases comprised of important steps for explicitness, systematisation and expression of the content of the messages: pre-analysis, material exploration and treatment of the results, inference and interpretation.

In this sense, the pre-analysis of the study consisted in the organisation of all the collected material in order to systematise the content in an exhaustive, representative manner, paying special attention to the homogeneity of the data and its pertinence to the study. To do so, the first contact with the collected documents entailed a skim-reading, as is recommended for the development of the technique. Subsequently, the identified material was explored for the registration units and the contextual units.

The following step was to define the thematic axes (for instance, the answers “be patient” and “have much patience” were coded under the same theme of “patience”). The numbering order was based on simple frequency - the number of occurrences of the analysed units - and on a measurement of cooccurrence, considering the distribution of the elements when there was a simultaneous presence of two or more registration units. The thematic axes were then divided into two categories: a) personal qualities and b) Didactics and methodological techniques. Finally, the reflective action supported the processes of inference and interpretation, being discussed with regard to the theoretical framework proposed by ^{Jarvis (2006}).

A word cloud - graphic image which identifies the relevance of words based on their frequency - was generated so to represent the category “personal qualities”, in order to obtain a comparative visualisation among the words expressed in the participants’ answers. By doing so, the answers from this category were coded and converted into contextual units.

Results

The results present the perceptions of the older students regarding the teaching-learning process in digital literacy programmes targeting this group age. In total, 278 answers (88%) were analysed out of the 317 participants’ contributions in the study; 39 of them (12%) were excluded due to the absence of suggestions made by the older students (for instance, “I have no suggestions” (A-5)) or the absence of answer. Table 1 represents the two categories analysed in the study, their respective definitions, the corresponding thematic axes and examples of the participants’ contributions. It is important to note that some of the contributions presented as examples can fall into more than one category.

When considering the sociodemographic and economic characteristics of the participants, those who suggested “personal qualities” were mostly women (74%), in the age range 60 to 69 (65%) and who had completed higher education (26%). Regarding the category of “didactics and methodological strategies”, half the respondents who suggested “to focus on practical actions” had ten or more years of education and household incomes higher than three minimum salaries; from those who recommended “attention to sensorial deficits”, 59% were between 60 and 69 years old.

Table 2 presents the distribution of frequency among the categories and their respective thematic axes. It is important to highlight that the total sum exceeds the total number of analysed answers as 38 contributions (13%) fall into both categories; likewise, the thematic axes of category 1 showed cooccurrence of 27 contributions (13%).

Within the category “personal qualities”, the word “patience” stood out as a registration unit and as a contextual unit, thus being allocated to a thematic axis of its own. Figure 1 represents this category in form of a word cloud, allowing for identification of 21 different qualities. The larger the word, the higher its frequency in the answers.

Source: compiled by the authors⁵ based on the Digital Literacy Programme for the older learner EACH/ICMC 2018/2019

Figure 1:  Word cloud of the category “personal qualities”. São Paulo, 2020 

The specific quality of being patient was the most reported suggestion by the participants, although other qualities were suggested by the older students, such as attention, calmness, understanding, tranquillity and kindness. It is notable that the word “Patience” (CAP122) alone occurred in 72 answers (40%) and the contributions of “Have much patience” (CAP145), “Have loads of patience” (CAP40) and “Much patience” (CAP183) appeared in 24 answers (13%).

Regarding the cooccurrence measurement among the categories, it was verified that 13% (38 contributions) of the total sample of participants proposed to the instructors “personal qualities” aligned to “didactics and methodological strategies” for the teaching of the elderly. In addition to the suggestion of being patient, the respondents recommended more attention to their difficulties (52%), especially by means of repetition (18%) as a teaching strategy. Furthermore, it was observed that the quality of being patient was mentioned along with other personal attributes (13%), calmness and attention being the most frequent ones.

Discussion

The study explored aspects involved in the teaching-learning process in a digital literacy programme from the perspective of the older students themselves. The results confirm the pluralist essence and the interdisciplinary character which is inherent to the field of older-adult education (^{Fejes; Nylander, 2019}), since they evidence themes related to personal and professional qualities and abilities of instructors, to the methodological strategies of teaching and to the favourable conditions for the student learning in the educational context of digital literacy.

The participants’ characteristics in this study corroborate the results found by ^{Vroman et al. (2015}); the authors identified that older students in the lower age bracket, between 65 and 70 years old, holding higher level education and living with spouse or partner, were more likely to make use of technologies. Considering education and income as the main predictive variables influencing the access to internet by the elderly (^{Fang et al., 2019}), most of the older students enrolled in the digital literacy programme, the subject of this study, presented higher educational level and a household income greater than three minimum salaries.

In general terms, the participants’ contributions confirm the evidence presented in LoBuono et al. (2020) research. The authors investigated facilitating practices in the digital literacy teaching for the older learners, though from the perspective of mentors and teachers: verbal and written instructions in a clear manner, use of simplified materials, explanation of technological symbols, review sessions and continuous repetition, and practical experience with the technologies. However, the older students’ contributions in the current study reveal other additional factors involved in the practice of teaching, especially in relation to the instructors’ personal attributes.

Conclusion

The current study has directed its investigation to the process of teaching and learning in digital literacy programmes for older adults. According to the participants, it is desirable that those who teach older learners how to utilise technology present a set of skills, behaviours and personal and professional attributes, which highlight the human aspects involved in the learning process.

For the older students, the main recommendations to the instructors/mentors in digital literacy programmes are: a) to possess, especially, the qualities of being patient, calm and considerate; b) to master the knowledge of technologies and teaching methods; c) to identify the older students’ sensorial deficits so to adapt the educational inputs; d) to plan activities which target useful practices of technology use in daily life; and e) to support the older student’s autonomy during the learning process.

The study reinforces the need for further detailed investigation on the teaching conditions for the elderly and highlights the relevance of training the instructors and mentors who work in technology learning programmes for this target audience. Overcoming the digital gap among different generations, and indeed within this very age group segment, involves the understanding of factors which play a role in the adoption and use of technologies by the older person, as well as the offering of digital literacy programmes which are concerned with the didactic organisation and the teaching style targeting this age group.

The “art of teaching” and the human aspects in the teacher-student interaction should be more valued in the teaching-learning process, being included in the training inputs offered to the instructors/mentors who teach older students. Furthermore, it is important to highlight the importance of content regarding the aging process and older age for the purposes of raising awareness and reducing the negative stereotypes towards older people. Ageism affects most people in several regions worldwide (^{Palmore, 2015}), thus the elderly may internalise in a conscious or unconscious manner the social attitudes and behaviour which discriminate against them.

Technology is more and more present in various contexts across society and demands greater adaptations be made by those considered to be digital immigrants (^{Gil, 2019}). It is expected that the efficiency of digital literacy programmes for older adults contribute to the digital inclusion, as well as to the social inclusion of the older in the digital era (^{Neves, 2018}; ^{Schehl, 2020})⁶.