Taking Digital Media to School: A Sociosemiotic Perspective on Educational Portals

In this article we propose to analyse some of the discursive strategies implemented in Educ.ar, the national educational portal of Argentina. The methodology used contemplates Eliseo Veron’s theory of social discourses, which focuses on the social processes of meaning making, as well as the second trichotomy propounded by Charles Sanders Peirce and some of the conceptual contributions from the fields of Educational Technology and Communication-Education. Our general hypothesis is based on the idea that, initially at least, the use of educational portals may be inefficient because of the lack of structure, organization, and quality in the resources available from the digital platform Educ.ar. In this sense, on the one hand, we might even say that educational portals are not being used to their full potential, since analogue devices such as textbooks still have greater legitimacy as educational tools, while on the other hand, the digital media are still seen as if they only could be related to fun or entertainment. Therefore, in this paper we will describe the formal aspects in the design of Educ.ar in order to shed some light on its characteristics and to enable its better appropriation by the whole educational community. In the end, we will try to suggest some considerations to improve the formal structure of this educational portal.