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Partners meet to dicuss development and launch of 16 multidiciplinary MOOCs this fall

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Lisbon, 2nd of July 2014 – After 2 intense days where the ECO MOOC pedagogical model and technological features plus courses outline were presented the overall conclusion is that the ECO platform will offer a set of unique approaches to MOOCs. Both the several innovative developments on the pedagogical methodology as well as the different Massive Open learning modules ´MOOCs´ features were presented and discussed. Moreover all partners joined in to comment on the work ahead as well as that very important launch date in November for the first pilots to be presented to the teachers.

The meetings took place on the 30th of JUNE and 1st of July, hosted by the Portuguese open university (Universidade Aberta – UAb) at the Museu das Comunicações (communications museum) in Lisbon. All work package leaders presented their work so far and what they are planning to work on for the coming months.

Sandra Caeiro, Prof. Auxiliar at Universidade Aberta comments: “It was very stimulating to meet all partners face-to-face. In between these consortium meetings we have a communication platform at our disposal where we organise forums and meetings. Nevertheless it is very good to touch base with collaboration partners and align once again our efforts.”

Caeiro comments that during the meetings it became ever so much clearer how diverse and interesting the contents of the different MOOCs wills be. “We were pleasantly surprised. We knew of course from the beginning of the project in February what the content of the MOOCs would be. But to hear in the partners presenting what they plan to launch is quite impressive.”

Variety of course subjects
The content of the MOOCs varies from e-learning methodology, computing and digital skills to creative skills and the classical foundation of our education system such as mathematics. These MOOCs are all content orientated , whereas a Common Course will be developed in which teachers will be offered a training in the basics of MOOC design.

Launch pilots in November
A total of 16 MOOCs will be developed by 12 Universities, not only from Europe but also from North and South America such as Quilmes University an Manuel Beltrán University. The MOOCS serve as examples and best practices for the targeted 4.000 selected teachers. They will be invited to actively participate on the ECO platform and create their own MOOC.

The coming months all consortium partners will input their efforts in finishing the ECO MOOCs and kicking off the promotion campaign to reach out to teachers via the press and relevant associations before meeting again in January 2015 in Manchester.

Press contact details
Marije Nieuwenhuis
communication@eco-learning.eu
Communication officer ECO learning
www.eco-learning.eu

About the ECO consortium
22 partners from 9 different countries work together to create a pan European platform for ubiquitous learning. The overall objective is to improve the quality and cost-efficiency of teaching an learning in Europe. Moreover the term ubiquitous learning in this project has an ideological intent as ECO aims to create an eco system where courses are freely accessible for teachers and students from different levels, backgrounds, age and ability alike. The creators of the platform are focused on creating a digital tool for a target group of 50000 teachers that will expand beyond the horizon of the classroom. The first practical goal is to create an online e-learning course for 4.000 registered teachers. Promotion of the platform and the recruiting of these teachers will commence in the 2 months prior to the launch of the first MOOCs created by the partner. The pilot MOOCs will serve as example for teachers as well as new students.

Consortium partners are:

  1. Editrain S.L.
  2. Fundação para o Estudo e Desenvolvimento da Região de Aveiro (FEDRAVE)
  3. Fundación Universidad Loyola Andalucia
  4. Humance AG
  5. Vicente Montiel Molina
  6. Open Universiteit Nederland
  7. Politecnico di Milano
  8. Prisma Vist Digital SL
  9. Reimer IT Solutions B.V.
  10. Sunne Hanna Eichler
  11. Telefonica Elearning Services TLS
  12. University of Manchester
  13. Universidad de Cantabria
  14. Universidad de Oviedo
  15. Universidad de Valladolid
  16. Universidad de Zaragoza
  17. Universidad Manuela Beltrán Fundación
  18. Universidad Nacional de Educación a Distancia, UNED
  19. Universidad Nacional De Quilmes
  20. Universidade Aberta
  21. Universidad Paris III Sorbonne Nouvelle
  22.  Vereniging van European Distance Teaching Universities

Press release: Empowering teachers and students beyond the classroom

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for immediate release

Empowering teachers and students beyond the classroom
Pan-European open learning platform introduces MOOC digital learning modules accessible to everyone, anytime everywhere. Even on your mobile.

Madrid, 19th of JUNE 2014 – A truly pan-European project where 9 different countries, 6 leading educational entities and 6 ICT companies collaborate on creating the largest eco-system of open teaching modules in Europe so far. With one goal: to convince the teacher to invest a little bit of time to become an E-teacher, step out of their comfort zone and create their own teaching modules. The modules are structured in such a way that it will allow for teachers (and pupils) to teach, learn, anytime, anywhere.

The project acronym ECO stands for E-learning, communication and Open-data and conveniently illustrates what the project partners set out to do. The goal within the project running time of 3 years is to create a self sustaining beehive of individual MOOCs that will grow as an independent and healthy eco-system. MOOC stands for Massive Mobile Ubiquitous and Open Learning.

Sara Osuna, is Assistant Deputy Head at UNED, university of distance learning in Madrid and head of the South American operation, is coordinator of project ECO: “We are 5 months into the project and the educational concepts as well as the technical groundwork are all set in place. They have to be because in November 2014 the pilot ECO-MOOC modules will be launched.”

These pilot MOOCs will serve as an example for teachers to look at when they will start and create their own MOOC and learn how to do so in 8 weeks. “We want to reach out to 50.000 teachers from all educational levels in 7 target countries” Sara explains. “From this interest group we will then recruit 4.000 teachers who will be offered to complete the accredited course to become a MOOC teacher”.
For those who are Interested: they can already sign up for the mailing list as of today to be informed about the course to become E-savvy teachers.

Press contact details
Marije Nieuwenhuis
communication@eco-learning.eu
Communication officer ECO learning
www.eco-learning.eu

About the ECO consortium
22 partners from 9 different countries work together to create a pan European platform for ubiquitous learning. The overall objective is to improve the quality and cost-efficiency of teaching an learning in Europe. Moreover the term ubiquitous learning in this project has an ideological intent as ECO aims to create an eco system where courses are freely accessible for teachers and students from different levels, backgrounds, age and ability alike. The creators of the platform are focused on creating a digital tool for a target group of 50000 teachers that will expand beyond the horizon of the classroom. The first practical goal is to create an online e-learning course for 4.000 registered teachers. Promotion of the platform and the recruiting of these teachers will commence in the 2 months prior to the launch of the first MOOCs created by the partner. The pilot MOOCs will serve as example for teachers as well as new students.

Consortium partners are:

  1. Editrain S.L.
  2. Fundação para o Estudo e Desenvolvimento da Região de Aveiro (FEDRAVE)
  3. Fundación Universidad Loyola Andalucia
  4. Humance AG
  5. Vicente Montiel Molina
  6. Open Universiteit Nederland
  7. Politecnico di Milano
  8. Prisma Vist Digital SL
  9. Reimer IT Solutions B.V.
  10. Sunne Hanna Eichler
  11. Telefonica Elearning Services TLS
  12. University of Manchester
  13. Universidad de Cantabria
  14. Universidad de Oviedo
  15. Universidad de Valladolid
  16. Universidad de Zaragoza
  17. Universidad Manuela Beltrán Fundación
  18. Universidad Nacional de Educación a Distancia, UNED
  19. Universidad Nacional De Quilmes
  20. Universidade Aberta
  21. Universidad Paris III Sorbonne Nouvelle
  22.  Vereniging van European Distance Teaching Universities

Do you believe Google glass is fit for the classroom?

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Here at ECO we are unsurprisingly quite eager to learn about new tech developments that have an application in education. The application of Google glass keeps us however in a loop with many question marks. However we think we should not be the nay-sayers so listed a few of the advantages of this head-mounted device for students:

1. It optimises documentation time and there it helps you save time – for the teacher a lot of time is consumed by administration of student data. Report cards, observation memos, team reports writing, student presence, exam statistics, etc. The glass device the possibility to input different types of data in a lot less time than it takes a person to write it all down or even type. The voice recognition tool here is one the key features.
The glass function aids to cross reference documentation as well making it easier and fasster to give the teacher an overview of a student`s progress and cricle back with the parents.

2. It allows the teacher to create rich materials – Video, audio, images text can all be picked up with the glass and linked to a presentation.

3. It allows for post-class reference – The glass can be used to audio-record your class. You can then make this class available to your students by uploading the audio file to the school website.

4. It allows for online teaching – When you connect the device to internet you can connect to on online auditorium.

This is a quick overview of some of the advantages we see. Possibly there are more.
What do you think?

If you want to learn more about the use of a glass device in education we recommend this reading: The Teacher´s Guide to Google glass.