piloting

About 60 broadcasters and others interested in the re-use of video resources met in Mykonos, Greece on 23-24 June. The objective of this workshop was to discuss various metadata schema and initiatives against the background of the EUscreen project which is creating an online resource with more than 30,000 video clips drawn for the archives of European broadcasters. During this meeting, the project team presented the selection criteria that has been drawn up to categorise video resources which will be sorted into 14 primary categories like 'Environment and Nature', 'Politics and Belief, etc...

This video content, which will be made available via Europeana, will also be organised into comparative virtual exhibitions comprising selections of materials from different broadcasters under specific topics, e.g. Eastern European Television vs Western European Television.  Trials using the EUscreen approach will begin in Autumn, 2010. ATiT is a partner in EUscreen, supporting the take-up of these materials in the educational sector.

For a detailled report on the workshop see the EUscreen website.

Jim O'Sullivan and Sally Reynolds presented the results so far of the SoRuraLL project during the CESI annual conference held 5-6 February in Portlaoise, Ireland.

This conference, entitled Creative Technology for Challenging Times brought together about 150 teachers and others working with ICT in primary and secondary schools in Ireland for a day and a half of presentations, exchanges and discussions about the effective implementation of ICT in Irish classrooms. One of the highlights of this conference was the presentation given by Joe Dale on 'New Tools, New Curriculum, New Opportunities', to find out more about Joe and the tools he recommends, visit his blog.

The SoRuraLL presentation provided an opportunity to showcase some of the blogs and websites being developed by rural schools in Co. Clare as part of this project.

On Thursday and Friday 14 and 15 January 2010 ATiT participated in the mid term project meeting of the European Commission Lifelong Learning Project SoRuraLL, which focuses on using information and communication technologies in rural parts of Europe, especially within the education and training domain.

Partners from Greece, Bulgaria, Spain, Belgium, Germany and Poland gathered in the excellent premises of Ellinogermaniki Agogiki to discuss the progress of development and pilots. The pilot activities are beginning now and will continue until July involving teachers in Greece, Spain and Ireland as well as learners in Germany and Bulgaria and citizens in Poland.

The second meeting for the SoRuraLL project consortium took place in Barcelona this week in which ATiT is a partner. SoRuraLL is experimenting with various social networking tools to support educational objectives in rural schools and telecentres in different parts of Europe.

The user trials being organised by ATiT involve primary and secondary schools in County Clare in Ireland who from September 2009 onwards will take part in a series of trials involving the creation of local content-driven, community-orientated web sites, school blogs and the use of Skype for learning purposes. Other trials in SoRuraLL involve Greek Farmers, the unemployed in Germany and Poland and teachers in Spain, Poland, Bulgaria and Greece.

As part of the European Commission supported SoRuraLL project, ATiT held a workshop in the Clare Education Centre in Ennis on Thursday 7 May on the topic of Social Networking and how tools supporting the creation of user-generated content can be used in primary and secondary schools.

Teachers from 5 primary schools in County Clare took part in this workshop which also provided an opportunity to talk about the trials that will take place in the 2009 - 2010 school year.

Partners taking part in the recently launched EduTubePlus project met in Athens on 11 and 12 September for two packed days of meetings and discussions about arrangements for this new initiative. Organised by project manager Elina Megalou and her team from the Research Academic Computer Technology Institute of Greece who are leading this project, the convivial atmosphere in Athens proved to be an excellent setting for this meeting which attracted all 16 active members of the EduTubePlus consortium from 12 different European countries.

The purpose of EduTubePlus is to establish a European curriculum related video library and to set up hybrid e-services for the exploitation of video in class. This includes both professionally produced video as well as user-generated video. ATiT will play a role specifically in the piloting of the service and in the support and delivery of various training related activities in relation to user-generated video.

Initial work in the project includes the establishment of selection criteria for video material  to be included in the library as well as the setting up of a common access platform capable of supporting multilingual access and retrieval. A web site for the project will be online shortly and will provide easy access to the latest information about the project as well as all public reports and resources. EduTubePlus is supported under the European Commission's eContent Plus programme.

We are delighted to announce our involvement in a new initiative called EduTubePlus which will create a European curriculum related video library and hybrid e-services for the pedagogical exploitation of video in classrooms. This initiative, supported under the European Commission's eContentPlus Programme will start in September and is being led by the Research Academic Computer Technology Institute in Greece. ATiT has a specific role to manage the pilot implementation of these services in schools through setting up and managing several integrated learning activities designed to exploit the available resources. This builds on other work carried out by the ATiT team including workshops and training activities held in the context of VideoAktiv and eSTREAM. EduTubePlus involves partners in France, UK, Belgium, Greece, Spain, Italy, Portugal, Austria, Romania, Hungary, Finland and Germany.

Mathy Vanbuel described his experience in the provision of educational services to remote schools in Europe in a keynote presentation given on 15th May during an International Conference held in Athens. This conference called "Bridging the Digital Divide in Rural Communities; Practical Solutions and Policies'' brought together project leaders of several pioneering projects many of which are using the latest developments in satellite technology to provide solutions for remote and rural school communities in Europe and elsewhere. Organised in the Ellinogermaniki School in Pallini, this event brought together policy makers, academics and field practitioners from Europe and beyond who share an interest in promoting the use of ICT by rural citizens of all ages. See the Conference web site for more information.