%0 Journal Article %T DEVELOPING DIGITAL COMPETENCES USING AN EDUCATIONAL SOFTWARE. A PEDAGOGICAL RESEARCH %A Magda£¿ Ioana %A Bontea Timea %J Acta Didactica Napocensia %D 2011 %I Babes-Bolyai University, Cluj-Napoca %X Many teachers and people in educational institutions consider it necessary prepare children for living in a computerized society. The Internet offers an incredible number of opportunities for teachers. The Web offer of e-learning open source platforms reached an impressive configuration. In this article, we present an educational software for developing digital skills conducted on the open source platform Moodle. The educational software has been developed for the grade¡¯s XII students of a technical profile. It covers the unit Databases, namely, the Access application. The contents are particularly adapted for the students of Technical Colleges. We will also present a pedagogical research that demonstrates effectiveness of such an approach. We conducted the research at Technical College "Iuliu Maniu", Carei, Satu-Mare County. The research hypothesis was: Using a software to develop skills of using Microsoft Access application leads to much better results among students from technological high-schools. Our research proves that the use of an educational software and computer assisted instruction in teaching and learning contributes to a significant increase of efficiency of education. %K educational software %K Moodle %K Access %K digital competences %K pedagogical research %U http://dppd.ubbcluj.ro/adn/article_4_4_4.pdf