workshop

On Tuesday 31st of May and Thursday 2 June 2011 the first 2-day MEDEA2020 workshop took place alongside the annual EdTech conference organised by the Irish Learning Technology Association (ILTA). This conference took place in Waterford Institute of Technology (WIT).

This workshop on animation took place over 2 days. The first part, aimed at beginners, provided an overview of different animation techniques and included hands-on practice with different tools. Topics covered getting started with animation as a way of engaging learners, different types of animation for example 2D, 3D. The session continued with hands on sessions with different software tools (Flash and Animate) for the creation of animation. Participants carried out the first steps in creating an animated movie, and explored in that way the principles of animation.
Winning examples of animation from the MEDEA Awards were presented by Deborah Arnold from Videoscop Universite Nancy2 (France) and invited guest Yannick Mahé from CNDP (France) who is the director of award winning educational media Evolution of LIfe. Demonstrations and presentations were followed by discussions with all participants.

The second part of the workshop, aimed at more advanced users, took place as part of the EdTech programme on 2 June. On that day, examples and explanations on the use of animation in a pedagogical context were discussed: how was it produced and what is the impact on learning. How can animation motivate and stimulate the learner and aid understanding of complex abstract concepts. Also on the second day, there was a hands on session on the creation of scenarios that continued where the first day ended based on the scenarios created during day 1 from an educational and media production perspective. The workshop showed the participants clearly the first steps in the development of a short animated movie plus discussions.

The tutors on this workshop were Deborah Arnold from Videoscop, France; Yannick Mahé, from CNDP in France, Philip Penny from IADT, Ireland and Mathy Vanbuel, ATiT, Belgium. Altogether 30 participants attended the workshop over part or whole of the two days.

The next MEDEA workshop will take place in Poland in July and will cover the topic of Webinars. More information soon on this site and on the MEDEA Awards site.

The first 'Using Video to Support Lifelong Learning' course was held in the Irish College in Leuven from 14-19 February. 12 participants took part from 9 different European countries. As part of their practical work, course participants created educational video clips in small teams and presented them to an invited audience on Friday 18th Feb which included Renilde Reynders from EPOS, Belgium and Schepen Mohamed Ridouani. The next course takes place from 4-9 July, for more information, go to the video course pages.

During a one week visit to the Philippines, Mathy Vanbuel assisted the Local Government Academy (LGA) of the Philippines in their process of evolution towards the implementation of learning, knowledge brokering/connection, knowledge exchange, and innovation technologies in their capacity building strategy. The visit consisted of a three day intensive training workshop on e-moderation, content conversion and videoconferencing, which took place at the LGA Training Centre in Los Banos. A visit to the LGA Resource Centre in Region 7 in Cebu concluded this week.

A group of teachers from the Italian School, Fondazione Maddalena di Canossa in Bergamo, took part in a two day workshop on the 'Creation and Adaptation of Video Resources for Use in the Classroom' on 1-2 July. This workshop was organised as part of the preparation work for the forthcoming pilot testing of the EduTubePlus platform which begins in September which will involve these Italian teachers as well as teachers in 8 other European countries.

This workshop was organised by Armando Persico and Iolanda Riseri from FMC. Despite the glorious sunshine, the teachers worked hard to create their first educational video clips on the topics of mathematics and organ music which will hopefully be the first of many made by them.

The workshop was given by Anneleen Cosemans and Helena Bijnens on behalf of ATiT.

The EdReNe thematic network held their 4th strategic seminar on repositories of learning resources in Barcelona from 24-26 March. EdReNe brings together people responsible for European webbased repositories with content owners and other stakeholders within education. This seminar explored EdReNe’s overall themes: which repository strategies work, how do we engage users and producers, which are the relevant standards to ensure interoperability, and how do members address the complex handling of intellectual property rights.

It also provided an opportunity to launch the next stage of EdReNe's life as an independent network and about 80 people attended including many of the associated members of which ATiT is one. For more information about the interesting work EdReNe is doing including their recently published series of synthesis reports, visit the EdReNe website.

ENAIP (the Italian National Agency of Vocational Training) organised a week-long workshop in Brussels from 15 to 19 February on managing e-learning projects. Sally Reynolds was a tutor on this course and was responsible for sessions on developing e-learning proposals and e-learning methodologies, tools and services.

The idea behind this course was to provide participants with information on European policies related to e-learning, new methodologies in technology supported learning and good practices on proposal preparation. Particiants came from Italy, Poland and Turkey.

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.

Despite the bad weather conditions in northern Europe, ATiT staff are planning to take part in the Learning and Technology World Forum 2010 being held in London 11-13 January.

This will include leading an innovation exchange session entitled "Critical Success Scheme for Step-Change in E-Learning" on Tuesday 12th. This session will be highly interactive and will provide an opportunity to further test the validity of the Critical and Key Success factors for e-learning that were developed during the Re.ViCa project. Participants will also receive a copy of the recently published handbook, "Reviewing the Virtual Campus Phenomenon: The Rise of Large-scale e-Learning Initiatives Worldwide" which provides a wealth of background on the Virtual Campus phenomenon as well as a snapshot of the current status of Virtual Campuses worldwide.