Abstract

All school leavers should have efficient online searching skills, defined here as the ability to select suitable search terms, feed them into a search engine, and make active decisions about which options to open from the results page. An additional element in our study includes the ability to search in English. As less than 1% of the Internet is in Swedish and about 60% is in English, this study assumes that Swedish school leavers will need to be able to use both languages. The study provides a qualitative, naturalistic account of the searching activities of Swedish teenagers in English classes from Grade 8 through to English 6 (ages 14‐18 years). Screen recordings from normal English lessons were analysed and supplemented with stimulated recall interviews with 40% of the pupils. The study reveals low levels of ambition and limited digital competence combined with high levels of confidence. Most pupils were unaware that they could have achieved more. The same pattern emerged across four school years in eight different classes. We conclude that improvements in digital competence education require more modelling of skills such as searching, so that teenagers recognize the value of aiming high.