Education – Training – Research – Projects
The European Initiative for Education has been involved in several Erasmus+ activities and projects and still is partner or coordinating an Erasmus+ project. Here is a picture gallery with impressions from the last year of involvementt in Erasmus+!
The new Erasmus+ Project of the EBI takes care about multimedia and interactivity in Adult Education with a specific focus on Multiple Devices. The project Implementation of interactivity and multimedia-based content using Multiple Devices in Adult Education is coordinated by the EBI/EIE and has partners from Italy, Portugal (Azores Islands) and Denmark.
The project will start in November 2020 – further information will be available then!
The European Commission support for the production of this publication does not constitute an endorsement of the contents which reflects the views only of the authors, and the Commission cannot be held responsible for any use which may be made of the information contained therein.In Europe, learning outcomes are defined by competences. Competence consists of knowledge, skills, and attitudes. This is typical for School Education and practiced this way during the last decade(s).
But is it really always that easy? Are competencies always the result of a learning process?
In the ESCO definition of the European Commission (European Skills, Competences, Qualifications and Occupations) you will find:
“The term competence is broader and refers typically to the ability of a person – facing new situations and unforeseen challenges – to use and apply knowledge and skills in an independent and self-directed way.”
The ESCO definition of competence looks like this:
“competence means the proven ability to use knowledge, skills, and personal, social and/or methodological abilities, in work or study situations and in professional and personal development.”
Source: Eurospace
If you have a look at the ECVET Toolkit (https://www.ecvet-toolkit.eu/) you will find:
“statements of what a learner knows, understands and can do on completion of a learning process, and which are defined in terms of knowledge, skills and competence”.
Source: https://www.ecvet-toolkit.eu/introduction/ecvet-and-learning-outcomes
Reading all this, the question occurs: Is not competence always the same? And – are in Vocational Education and Training learning outcomes, defined as knowledge or skills, valid?
The answer is YES, and I’ll give you an example:
There is the company “Tire Fit” sells and fitting tires for cars. A customer is entering the selling room and asks for winter tires for his car. He is showing the car certification to the salesman. The salesman only must have the knowledge to classify the various parameters of the needed tire – nothing else.
During his specific education, he got the knowledge to decide which tire will fit which car and which parameters or regulations must be kept to ensure safe driving with these tires.
The customer has bought the tires and enters the workshop of the tire reseller to get the tires fixed on his rims. The worker there has learned how to take down the old tire and mount the new one. These are skills – nothing else. The worker must be able to handle the machine to disassemble the tires from the rim and after this mount the new ones and finally balance the wheel.
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This is an example that in specific cases competencies are not versatile to be used as a description for learning outcomes, but in each case, it is necessary to analyze and evaluate how the learning outcomes can be described best. This can be simple knowledge as well as simple skills or complex competencies.
The EBI participated in the intermediate meeting of the “Science Teaching” project (from October 3 until October 4) in Umeå, Sweden.
At this meeting the first products of the project have been presented. The multimedia-based tools will supply teachers in teaching science as well as help students to get a deeper understanding of complex scientific context.
The project addresses three items in the field of Adult Education, which are connected to each other and tied together in this project. These items are
Digital competences must be learned by the users. This requires some motivation. Without motivation, the learning will only “scratch at the surface” and instead of well-proven competences only superficial knowledge and understanding will be the result – without any depth and sustainability.
Digital photography can be the engine to motivate people to care about basic digital competences. This will cover the creation of images (a creative work), the processing of images (a technical endeavour), the storage and administration of images (needs digital competences) and the use of the created images, for instance in social media (needs digital competences as well as basic legal knowledge).
Finally, digital photography enlarges the social contacts (for instance in special interest groups), keeps elderly people active (both in physical and mental sense) and contributes in many cases to promote cultural heritage (as objects in various images) and transnational activities (photography contest with items addressing the European Year of Cultural Heritage).
The project aims to develop digital competences in the group of adults using digital photography as the engine of motivation and to give an impact to social, cultural, and family life. Additional, taken pictures focusing on European Heritage are collected in a free-to-use database (contribution to the year of European Cultural Heritage 2018).
Currently the EBI is preparing a new project proposal in the frame of ERASMUS+. It’s a project focussing on flipped learning with several schools in Europe.
Peter Mazohl visited one of the future partner schools in Trujillo, Spain. He met the headmaster of the school and gave a precise description of the project.
A second school is located in Austria, near Wiener Neustadt. Peter Mazohl and Harald Makl had a meeting with the responsible teacher for the future project, Gabriele Ernst. They discussed open issued and cleared several items in the application.
The application will be submitted in March. Here are some pictures from the preparation work!
Stefanie Mayrwöger attended the SEMIFIT Seminar for intercultural trainers, on Project Design under Erasmus+, from 1st to 6th of December 2018 in Almuñécar, Spain. The week was structured in panel discussions, presentations and workshops, which were all designed and held by the participants. During the seminar all participants found themselves in different roles, such as documentarists, speakers, workshop leaders and marketers. Tools and methods were shown, projects presented, and ideas shared. The aim of the seminar was to create an open space for youth trainers, learning designers and educators to talk about difficulties, tips and ways to improve their skills in project design and management of (inter)national projects.
Here is a video from the event (produced by Steffi)
The variety of topics, that were covered and discussed, was extensive. Therefore, workshops took place, in which the group focused on difficulties in international projects, active learning through games, and how to calculate important factors in project management. In several presentations certain project management methods, successfully designed projects, and the work with open source and free licences were showed. Also, panellists talked about the topic of managing projects including groups with different or difficult social backgrounds. All in all, it was a very enriching week with a big amount of useful knowledge and interesting minds.
Here are some impressions from the work and the working environment.