Development of future teachers of English information-digital competence

The article focuses on the issue of future teachers of English informationdigital competence development as an important condition for the development of
the information society as one of the national priorities. The author states that
while the future teachers are obtaining higher education, the secondary teachers and
school students are also developing and moving forward. The issue of the development of the future teachers of English information-digital skills is considered to be
an urgent issue facing modern pedagogical institutions of higher education. The
ways of future teachers of English information-digital competence development are
revealed, the factors influencing this process and the issues to be taken into consideration are studied. Special attention is paid to the communication and its features
on the Internet: symbols, hieroglyphs, memes, emoticons, infographics, etc. as well
as virtualization and digitalization. These tools are considered to encourage students to communicate in a non-native language as they make this process more
expressive and easier for understanding. The issue of «digital immigrants» teaching
the «digital natives» is partially touched. The article presents the unit «Application
of Information and Communication Technologies in Foreign Language Learning»
being a part of the experimental curriculum of «English Language Teaching Methodology» worked out within the Joint Project of British Council Ukraine and
Ministry of Education and Science of Ukraine «New Generation School Teacher».
Teacher’s information-digital skills, presented in the article, include the ability to
use a variety of software to learn and teach English; to use social networks, blogs,
sites, to evaluate the potential of online audio and video material for language
learning; to assess the potential risks of using the Internet for students of all ages
and to set cybersecurity rules; to study current trends in mobile learning and to use
mobile phones for educational purposes. The examples of the activities for future
teachers of English information-digital skills development are described as they are
used in Methodology classroom.