The 16th International Scientific Conference, "Theoretical and Practical Aspects of Distance Learning" (DLCC2024), focused on "E-learning & Enhancing Soft Skills," was held on October 14-15, 2024, at the University of Silesia in Cieszyn, Poland. Organized by the Faculty of Arts and Educational Sciences, the Faculty of Computer Science and Materials Sciences, and the University of Silesia, it featured support from various international universities and associations. Amoung participants were experts in area e-learning from 10 countries. Professor Nian-Shing Chen from the National Taiwan Normal University, Taiwan, presented a Keynote Lecture titled “Revolutionizing Education with Pedagogical AI Agents” The conference gathered scholars, experts, and educators to discuss advancements in distance education, e-learning, and technology-enhanced learning. Papers from the conference published in a monograph by reputable publishing house Springer and will be indexed in Scopus. The event highlighted the importance of modernizing educational systems and implementing new technologies. 

The article analysed the main reflections presented by experts from different countries in the area of AI in education, who participated in the round table debate “E-Learning and Enhancing soft skills: Contemporary Models of Education in the era of Artificial Intelligence”. The agenda included three topics: 1) E-learning and enhancing soft skills: contemporary models of education in the era of artificial intelligence; 2) Good practice examples using AI in education for soft skills development; 3) AI – perspectives and challenges of its use in education. The conclusions of the round table lead to the reflection that integrating AI and robots can enhance soft skills development and revolutionize education by creating personalized, efficient, and inclusive learning environments. AI offers benefits like task automation, real-time feedback, and support for diverse needs. However, challenges such as equity, privacy, bias, and ethical concerns must be addressed. Success requires adequate teacher training, a focus on equity and accessibility, ethical considerations, strong data protection, and maintaining human interaction and creativity. By addressing these challenges thoughtfully, education systems can fully harness AI’s potential to improve learning outcomes.

This article presents the results of a pilot study on the use of artificial intelligence (AI) in didactics and academic work among academic lecturers in Poland. The main objective was to identify the level of experience, barriers, and training needs related to AI among university lecturers. The study was conducted using a survey method (CAWI) on a sample of 120 academic lecturers from various higher education institutions. The analysis revealed that most participants have limited experience in using AI tools. The primary barriers include a lack of adequate training, insufficient time to learn new technologies, and inadequate technical support at the institution. Faculty members with higher academic titles and those who use AI tools less frequently display greater training needs. Academics from science and technical fields use AI more often compared to those from other disciplines. The results indicate the necessity of investing in training programs and technological support for academic lecturers to enhance the effective use of AI in education. Preferences regarding AI tools are strongly tied to their financial accessibility, suggesting a need to promote free or partially free tools. The findings can serve as a basis for developing strategies to support AI implementation in higher education, contributing to improved teaching quality and research efficiency.

This study is an attempt to determine major impact of technology on women’s empowerment in present era. To determine the impact of technology, it is important to know the awareness level and the adoption rate of technology among Indian women. This study will also help in finding out various problems/challenges faced
by women and new insights gained by women while using technology. This will also support Indian government in making favourable policies and innovative schemes for women to provide more technology driven power. The structured questionnaire is designed and circulated to 120 women of semi urban areas of
Udaipur district, Rajasthan, based on convenience sampling. 83% of the total questionnaire distributed are found complete for research purpose. Data analysis reveals that after technology in any form it is mostly used by educated women who are between the age of 25–50, and are house makers. The majority of women have
purchased new devices such as smartphones, desktop computer/laptop and tablets for different reasons for doing work from home, entertainment, travel, learning, trading, etc. It is visible from the study that the majority of women have no or insufficient knowledge about ethical guidelines/code of ethics regarding cyber
security. Unfortunately, women restrict themselves to use technology because of severe technical issues, lack of privacy, gender discrimination and digital divide. Other reasons such as domestic issues, overburden of responsibility, low literacy rates, non-participation in decision making, etc., are few other reasons behind
a lower adoption of technology by women. These factors are responsible for smaller interaction of women with the technology and thereby creating stumbling block in empowering women digitally. Strong support of family members, government, policy maker and educational institutions can encourage women empowerment. There is an urge to devise and implement various awareness e-training and support programs for women all over the nation. Strengthening norms for cyber security will add more power and innovation to technology use. Economic and psychological impact of Demonetisation and pandemic COVID-19 have brought tremendous changes to the lives of common man. The new prefix “e” to each and
every word has new meaning “empowering entire earth electronically”. Hence, empowering women has become the top priority of each and every nation. 

The Internet these days has endless possibilities. It is used in virtually every human activity. The purpose of this article is not to demonize the Internet, but to examine various dimensions of how young people function in the virtual world. The goal is also to determine what negatives students face and what positives result from the use of this technology. The first part will be a presentation of the most important news in the field of new media, and in particular the characteristics of the Internet. Issues related to various aspects of Internet use will be addressed - from the psychological mechanisms of Internet use by young people, through media education and the dangers of various online activities, to the socio-practical phenomena occurring in the digital world. The knowledge gained through the theoretical part will form the basis for conducting empirical research. The purpose of the research will be to determine the importance of computer and Internet use in the lives of secondary school students. The results of this research, discussed together with their elaboration and the presentation of ways to counteract the threats and methods of positive use of the Internet, can be a valuable source of knowledge useful both in the pedagogical work of those involved in education and useful for parents, since they are most responsible for the education of their children in the use of media.

The article presents a discussion on the application of e-learning in education of prisoners in Portugal. Today, e-learning has already become a significant complementation and extension of the current education offer. Avoiding application of modern technologies in education may lead to intensification of digital, social, educational and economic disparities in the society. There are also threats of complete digital exclusion of some social groups. One of those groups is formed by people serving their imprisonment sentences. A serious problem in offering the opportunity to benefit from e-learning to this particular group pertains to infrastructural disparities and availability of computer equipment and access to the Internet. Furthermore, considering the specificity of penitentiary institutions, security becomes an important issue as well. In Portugal, education of prisoners, including e-learning,  has been focused on the context of life-long learning. Modern tools have been created and applied in education of prisoners and their learning processes. The projects, such as EPRIS@@ and Open University have been already in operation for some time. They can be an inspiration for prison staff members in other countries. The aim of the article is to show the solutions pertaining to e-learning dedicated to prisoners applied in Portugal as an example of the successful use of new technologies in education of convicts. The research methods include a case study. The techniques applied in the research include document analysis, a free-form and question-targeted interviews. The following research problems have been formulated: What solutions in the field of e-learning dedicated to prisoners are applied in Portugal and how are they implemented? What are the objectives of the discussed projects? How does the course of the learning process look like, with the consideration of the applied tools? What problems are presented to prisoners? What are the weaknesses and strengths of the applied solutions? How is the evaluation of the learning outcomes achieved? What does the innovative character of the solutions applied in the field of e-learning dedicated to prisoners consist in? In order to collect the discussed material, the analysis of content, statistical data and interviews with educators working with prisoners have been used. The materials referred to in the article were collected in 2022, in the Institute Piaget and the Open University of Porto in Portugal.

The article discusses the competencies of modern teachers in utilizing information and communication technologies, particularly in the context of programming. The main objective of the research was to assess the knowledge and skills of future early childhood education teachers in applying this knowledge to practical tasks. The study was conducted among students from two public universities in Poland using a diagnostic survey method, with a questionnaire based on a knowledge test as the research tool. The test design was based on the theoretical assumptions of Niemierko (2009) regarding educational objectives An analysis of the results showed that future early childhood education teachers possess theoretical knowledge of programming. However, only 35% of them were able to explain programming principles in detail. The application of this knowledge in practice was less ffective, with success rates of 45% for typical tasks and 47% for problem-solving tasks. These results suggest the need to modify study programs by increasing the number of hours dedicated to programming-related subjects and placing greater emphasis on solving programming tasks through practical experience. Based on the conducted research and observations, the authors propose increasing the number of hours dedicated to programming-related topics. This approach would allow students not only to acquire theoretical knowledge but also to effectively apply it to practical tasks. After all, future teachers will be responsible for introducing students in grades 1–3 to the world of programming and developing their computational thinking. Another important aspect is ensuring a teacher education and training system that enables teachers to develop and deepen their digital competencies in programming. New technological solutions emerge rapidly, and teachers should keep up with them to adequately prepare students for future challenges and foster skills such as problem-solving and logical thinking. The authors also suggest that further research is needed on various components of digital competencies to help future teachers adapt pedagogical programs to the realities of the modern world and equip them with the necessary knowledge and skills.

The article addresses the issue of digital competences observed among English teachers in the context of the post-Covid classroom covered by the time frame from September 2022 to 2023. In order to check the level of teachers’ professional digital competences, also known as TPDC, who, according to the current state of research showed a complete lack of such skills in the first period of the pandemic, the retrospective interview was conducted. Next, in September 2022, when the first school year without any Covid-19 restriction began, the teachers underwent a detailed analysis of their competences via a questionnaire based on the European Framework for the Digital Competence of Educators (DigCompEdu), allowing them to self-mark (un)used digital skills during language lessons. Additionally, the teachers’ state of knowledge and skills from this period was compared with their competences at a later stage, in September 2023, to check the impact of such factors as time, previous experience in using the skills and trainings completed on teachers’ functioning in the classroom. The study was composed of four teachers representing two primary schools in Poland. It turned out that the respondents’ knowledge and use of modern technologies was negligible in the first period of the pandemic, as assumed, while their digital competences acquired later on were a matter of time and result of the courses attended. As the study participants reflected different levels of skills, distributed unevenly over time, three different trends in teachers’ (non)development of the above-mentioned competences were outlined. In addition, the profiles of teachers participating in the study were constructed in line with the lists of determinants of teachers’ digital proficiency proposed by the European Framework for the Digital Competence of Educators (DigCompEdu). Following the research findings, it is not teachers’ age, seniority or degree of professional promotion at school that influences their digital skills, but rather their basic knowledge, education and additional functions performed in an institution that immediately impacts the level of modern technology competences. It is recommended to expand the research to measure the competences in question on a larger research sample, as well as look at the very classroom situation from the point of view of real skills (un)used by teachers during language instructions

The 16th edition of the International Scientific Conference, “Theoretical and Practical Aspects of Distance learning” DLCC2024 (www.dlcc.us.edu.pl) was held under the theme “E-learning & Enhancing Soft Skills” on October 14th and 15th, 2024, at the University of Silesia in Cieszyn. It was organised by the Faculty of Arts and Educational Sciences in Cieszyn, the Faculty of Computer Science and Materials Sciences in Sosnowiec and the University of Silesia in Katowice (Poland).

The Conference was organized under the auspices of Rector of the University of Silesia in Katowice – Prof. dr hab. Ryszard Koziołek, Dean of the Faculty of Arts and Sciences of Education – Prof. dr hab. Katarzyna Marcol, Dean of the Faculty of Social Sciences – Prof. dr hab. Małgorzata Myśliwiec, Director of the Institute of Pedagogy – Prof. dr hab. Irena Polewczyk, Dean of the Faculty of Science and Technology – Prof. dr hab. Seweryn Kowalski, Director of the Institute of Computer Science – Prof. dr hab. inż. Rafał Doroz. The co-organisers were the University of Ostrava (UO), Czech Republic Silesian University in Opava (SU), Czech Republic, Constantine the Philosopher University in Nitra (UKF), Slovakia, University of Extremadura (UEx), Spain, University of Twente (UT), The Netherlands, Lisbon Lusiada University (LU), Portugal, Curtin University in Perth (CU), Australia, Borys Grinchenko Kyiv University (BGKU), Ukraine, Dniprovsk State Technical University (DSTU), Ukraine, IADIS – International Association for Development of the Information Society, a non-profit association, Polish Pedagogical Society, Branch in Cieszyn, Polish Scientific Society for Internet Education Association of Academic E-learning, Poland.

The International Scientific Conference “Theoretical and Practical Aspects of Distance Learning” DLCC2024 is an important event within the field of education, particularly focused on distance learning and its practical applications. It is organized annually by prominent academic institutions, including the University of Silesia in Katowice, Poland, and co-organized with various international universities. This conference brings together scholars, experts, and educators from around the world to discuss advancements in distance education, e-learning, and technology-enhanced learning, which are critical as educational systems worldwide modernize.