Next Education

Making online learning more engaging for students is becoming an increasingly high priority today.

Whether we like it or not, we have to adapt to a new normal of increasingly frequent coexistence of face-to-face and online learning sessions. Even in a newfound health security state, it is difficult to give up the potential of online learning which, especially in certain contexts or in the presence of certain key factors, has proven to be highly effective.

Online learning currently represents a context in which what we can and cannot do is closely linked to the potential of the tools at our disposal. The close connection between the correct use of digital tools and the effectiveness of learning is much more relevant in online contexts than in face-to-face sessions.

This can generate a wide gap between those who have the tools to ensure proper online training and know how to use them correctly and those who do not. The result is often a significant drop in students’ attention to the extent of total disengagement. 

The first step to keep the attention and motivation of the class high is to know what the video chat software we are using can do. The second one is to integrate some other features made available by other online softwares.

We have highlighted 3  main strategies teachers can implement for improving students’ engagement and make online learning more engaging for students:

1. Polling 

It can be used as an engaging tool for assessing the students’ comprehension and collecting feedback on the lesson.

The most used video chat platforms come with polling features where the students see a question pop up on their screen.  Most of these platforms provide specific tutorials on how to use polls (Zoom, Microsoft Teams, GoToMeeting, WebEx Teams).

If you don’t have an integrated poll system you can exploit several free tools to integrate polling into your virtual classroom such as Poll Everywhere , PollDaddy, Flisti, Micropoll, Mentimeter,Swift Polling, Kahoot:, Socrative

2. Collaborative online work

Very often online lessons have a lack of interaction between participants. Most of the video conferencing platforms already support breakout rooms enabling discussions in small groups of students. Usually with a click the teacher can split students in small groups that can be used for specific assignments (Zoom, GoToMeeting). In addition to this you might want your students to collaboratively work on a library with online resources. This is possible using fantastic bookmarking tools such as Diigo, Evernote or Notion.

The interaction between students could be also based on visual environments that act as a virtual whiteboard for team collaboration. For this you can use apps like Mural, Miro or Padlet.

3. Discussions and presentations

Online environments are very effective for one-to-many communication, but not so effective for many-to-one or many-to-many communication for which face-to-face environments perform  much better. This is because in online communication the paraverbal aspects of communication are severely limited and communication itself is limited by technological constraints that cannot guarantee the same signal quality as in real communication.

Despite this, we must not forget that students’ involvement also depends on the possibility of interacting with classmates. This is why we must try to reproduce the same dynamics of interaction between students online as we do offline. 

This will be possible, with some differences, fostering the use of online forum and chat features embedded in the conferencing tools you already use such as Google Meet, Go To Meeting or Zoom. Chats, forums and instant messaging features can be used as backchannels for creating a back-and-forth dialogue among classmates and teachers, but, for example, you can also exploit the potential of Google Docs asking students for feedback and comments on their peers’ work. This will encourage a deeper reflection and self assessment. Sometimes you may want to embed audio and video. In this case you can use apps such as Flipgrid. 

Furthermore there are a lot of amazing tools for making spectacular presentations. Usually students are really motivated to present their work to classmates and teachers. It is possible to use a collaborative tool such as Google Slides or  a more mind-map style tool such as Prezi. The presentation can be transformed in a video with Animoto or in a poster using Glogster.

There are endless opportunities to maintain a sense of classroom community even in a virtual setting. It is up to us to find them out.

Nanolearning is a bite-sized learning solution. It involves providing learners with information in smaller amounts, over a shorter period of time. Sometimes applying the right strategies for improving motivation and engagement is not enough.

In 2019 a team of European scientists from Technische Universität Berlin, Max Planck Institute for Human Development, University College Cork, and DTU, published a new study on the empirical evidence regarding one dimension of social acceleration, namely the increasing rates of change within collective attention.

“It seems that the allocated attention in our collective minds has a certain size, but that the cultural items competing for that attention have become more densely packed. This would support the claim that it has indeed become more difficult to keep up to date on the news cycle, for example,” says Professor Sune Lehmann from DTU Compute.

Our brains are bombarded with distracting alerts and notifications day in day out. This constant fragmentation of our time and concentration has become the new normal, to which we have adapted with ease, but there is a downside: more and more experts are telling us that these interruptions and distractions have eroded our ability to concentrate and process large amounts of information.

If we consider this phenomenon in the framework of continuous or professional learning addressed to adult people we can observe how this stress adds to other pressures—from health, finances, and family, etc…—and the ability to focus plummets even further.

The answer may lie in nanolearning.

In a nutshell, nanolearning is a bite-sized learning solution. It involves providing learners with information in smaller amounts, over a shorter period of time.

It has the following main features:

• Ranges from one to 15 minutes in duration
• Focuses on one to three concepts or learning objectives
• Is accessed on a “pull,” or voluntary basis, at the learner’s moment of need
• Is often electronic in format—though it doesn’t have to be
• very often is accessible via mobile phone

Learning in short bursts is proven to increase our ability to take in and retain information. By providing your trainee with small, “pellet” like bits of information, you are much more likely to increase their productivity, capture their attention and aid their ability to learn.

Companies, in particular SMEs, do not always realise the importance of the digital transformation for their business. For European enterprises to compete, grow and create jobs, EU Member States must ensure that they have access to a large pool of people who can lead the high-tech innovation and transformation of their industry (Strategic Policy Forum on Digital Entrepreneurship 2016).

This scenario will require Europe to generate around 50,000 additional high-tech leaders per year in the years up to 2025, or a total of around 450,000 until 2025 (EC, High-Tech Leadership Skills For Europe – Towards An Agenda For 2020 And Beyond, 2017).

This new type of leaders is, able to spot, create and serve fundamentally new markets. This will depend on the ability to capture the benefits of emerging new technologies. Industrial sectors will continue to be reshaped in the next 3-5 years. However, technology adoption and innovation rates remain relatively low due to the lack of technology savvy leaders who can assess and implement technological innovation (EC, High-Tech Leadership Skills For Europe–Towards An Agenda For 2020 And Beyond,2017).

The high-tech leader has the capabilities needed to exploit opportunities provided by ICTs to ensure a more efficient and effective performance of different types of organisations, to explore possibilities for new ways of conducting business and organisational processes, and to establish new businesses.

The e-leader is a person who recognizes new business opportunities or renew existing business operations by making use of new digital technologies. The new digital technologies provide opportunities for new service products, new ways of working in organizations and can have an effect on the business model and new forms of revenue streams. For instance new sensor technologies provide new services in predictive maintenance and products are not a one-time sale but become service offerings using a more intense customer relationship and recurring revenue streams.

The e-leader is able to translate new technology developments into new business opportunities: to use and apply new digital solutions in fields where it was not implemented before and is able to renew or transform business models within existing or traditional industries.

STEAM as a concept is believed to have been first conceptualised approximately 15 years ago in the USA (by Georgette Yakman and others (see BERA 2018)) as a new framework of subjects to support more integrative, holistic educational theory and practice as well as boosting the ‘knowledge economy’.

Original motivations have been described in relation to improving science, technology, and mathematics education, and creating a catalyst to innovation in new technologies, discoveries and advancements, by linking the so-called ‘hard’ and ‘critical thinking’ STEM subjects with the ‘softer’ ‘more creative thinking’ arts. Others view it at least partly as a response to the tendency towards reductionism in education and an effort to undo the disaggregation of e.g. science education from any other context e.g. history of, ethics in, communication of etc. (BERA, 2018)

The field has been evolving ever since with STEAM variously described, sometimes with additional symbols or letters, as including science, technology, engineering, art, the arts, mathematics, applied mathematics, humanities, language, design, ecological awareness, sustainability, curriculum integration and more. (EuroSTEAM 2018).

STEAM stands for Science, Technology, Engineering, Arts and Maths. It started as an extension of the acronym STEM and all that it encompassed, with the addition of Arts. We adopt the broad understanding of the A in STEAM, as including any area of art, arts, design and humanities. 

We also work from the perspective that the ‘A’ is not simply, as sometimes perceived, an add on to improve STEM experiences with associated perceptions of ‘supremacy’ of one discipline over the other. Rather that encouraging and enhancing the creativity and creative thinking of learners as well as the critical thinking is fundamental to improving educational outcomes, and deeper learning experiences. 

The inclusion of the “A” as  representative of the arts is a way to invite those students who are not comfortable in these disciplines and at the same time, a way to carry out a strategy to improve their self-efficacy (Zimmerman & Campillo, 2003).

The specific added value of this approach is the adoption of a multi-disciplinary strategy in which STEM subjects and humanities work together for a common goal, facilitated by a mix of multiple educational methodologies, depending on the topic or context. The added value of this approach goes beyond the benefits of the single methodologies included in it.

A holistic approach that includes STEM subjects and humanities enables students to better perform in every sector of their life, understanding STEM as something very related to the real world, to arts and humanities, fostering creativity and innovation and increasing curiosity.

Interdisciplinary projects make STEM subjects more relevant and inclusive for students that usually find them boring and daunting. Furthermore, flexibility in the methodologies used provides opportunities to engage students from multiple perspectives.

Chris Anderson (2012) former editor-in-chief of Wired magazine, defined the maker movement as “a new industrial revolution.” This new era is characterised by three main elements: the use of digital desktop tools, the sharing and online collaboration culture and the use of common design standards to facilitate sharing and fast iteration.

In a MakerSpace there are many ways to create things and ideas using new manufacturing techniques with computer aided machinery. These techniques were originally found only in industry, but in recent years, they have increasingly reached private individuals through Fablabs and MakerSpaces.

The “Maker Movement Manifesto” describes makers’ activities and mind-sets organized around nine key ideas: make, share, give, learn, tool up (i.e., secure access to necessary tools), play, participate, support and change. Embedded in the Making Culture, there is the possibility to evolve and make changes to this definition giving the possibility to include the creation of tangible and intangible outputs, all oriented to produce effects in a real offline context.

Makerspaces are communities of practice constructed in a physical place set aside for a group of people to use it as a core part of their practice, a collaborative work space inside a school, library or separate public/private facility for making, learning, exploring and sharing that uses high tech to no tech tools. These spaces are open to kids, adults, and entrepreneurs and have a variety of maker equipment including 3D printers, laser cutters, soldering irons and even sewing machines.

Experts state that a maker class experience at school provides a wealth of opportunities for students, but how can you determine if a makerspace is needed at your school? How eventually can be integrated in your school?

Mentioned below are some tips which might help you.

Here below some simple questions to answer, elaborated by the National Inventors Hall of Fame, the organisation leader in the promotion of creativity and the spirit of innovation and entrepreneurship in the field of education.

1. Does failure slow or stop creativity in students?
2. Could students expand their perspectives by learning about expression and unique learning styles?
3. Can we improve real-world applications of classroom lessons to strengthen comprehension?
4. How would more hands-on learning benefit curiosity and innovation?
5. Can we increase exposure to the 21st century skills needed for success?

If you answered yes to all the questions, a makerspace can provide the opportunities you are looking for to enhance learning at your school.

A makerspace can be integrated directly into a classroom setting or it can be established in a dedicated location. Regardless of where the space is located, the key is creating a space that provides opportunities for: collaboration, learning, sharing, testing, questioning, experimenting and innovating.

If you don’t have funds for that, you can simply ask to a makerspace that is in near your area.

We hope this article can increase your curiosity about “maker education” which can be an effective approach for making lessons more relevant and motivating.

The new Erasmus+ Programme 2021-2027 is coming and the next seven years will be an extraordinary journey into the European education ecosystem. All of us will have the possibility to build new competencies, share experiences and find new spectacular paths for innovating our daily practices.

It is an opportunity for impact on our communities and at the same time, embrace European values.

Let’s start with your Erasmus+ project! If you don’t know how don’t worry! Here you can find some articles that will be useful to you!

And to give you some inspiration here are some project ideas that need to be developed!

1.Reverse Mentoring for improving e-skills in companies

Sector: VET

Problem to be solved: Companies, in particular SMEs, have often not realised the importance of digital transformation for their businesses. For European enterprises to compete, grow and create jobs, EU Member States must ensure that they have access to a large pool of people who can lead the high-tech innovation and transformation of their industry. The COVID-19 pandemic might have even reinforced this trend and thus increased the challenges/pressure. It is fundamental to have leaders and managers able to exploit the full potential of digital tools with high levels of digital literacy.

Innovation: Reverse mentoring pairs younger employees with executive team members to mentor them on various topics of strategic and cultural relevance. One of them is definitely the use of ICT tools. The methodology is focused on regular interactions between the mentor (digitally-affine or native) and the mentee (senior manager). Senior workers will learn new skills and break out of their comfort zones, while younger employees will learn important business basics they didn’t pick up in the classroom.

2. Young Digital Leaders

Sector: Youth

Problem to be solved: Young people extensively use digital tools, but unexpectedly they don’t have the appropriate competencies to do so. Young people seem to be digital savvy, but do young people in the EU really have digital skills? In 2019, four in five young people (80%) aged 16 to 24 in the European Union (EU) had basic or above basic digital skills. At the same time we can highlight that in 2019, 94% of young people in the EU-27 made daily use of the internet, compared with 77% for the whole population.

Now, more than ever, young people should achieve advanced digital skills, so as to exploit the full potential of digital tools and avoid risks.

Innovation: The project aims to provide a training path for young digital leaders that will act as ambassadors in their communities, schools, associations, and even companies. The training path will provide hard and soft skills needed to guide and assist other people in achieving digital skills and use them to reach full digital citizenship.

3. A serious game for pro-environmental behaviour change in students

Sector: School

Problem to be solved: Many of the world’s greatest challenges, from poverty to displacement, wildlife extinction to extreme weather events, are being intensified by climate change. Since climate change is a global issue and cannot be solved by a single person, it is necessary to expand awareness and empower people to deal with this topic, starting from the education community. It is fundamental to help young people understand what climate change is and what they can do to help tackle it.

Innovation: The project wants to develop a serious game environment for raising the awareness of students on the climate change process and give them behavioural models. Serious games are effective and highly motivating educational tools capable of changing users’ attitudes and producing pro-environmental behaviour change. The serious game environment will be based on activities that can be integrated into the standard curriculum, so as to make lessons more relevant and engaging. 

4. Artificial Intelligence as a supporting tool for analysing class sentiment in online educational environments

Sector: School

Problem to be solved: Online and distance learning can reduce the possibilities for a teacher to perceive emotional feedback from students. Without a realistic perception of the class sentiment, teachers cannot detect some needs, students’ mood, or psychological problems. 

Innovation: Artificial Intelligence can be used to analyse the texts produced by students through assignments, essays, and diaries and monitoring the class sentiment. Sentiment analysis attempts to automatically identify and recognize opinions and emotions in text. The project wants to provide supporting materials and a training path for helping teachers in implementing this technology and making online environments more inclusive.

5. Boosting digital health literacy to enhance the resilience of the adult population

Sector: Adult education

Problem to be solved: Due to the Covid-19 pandemic, it becomes crucial to design, identify, or scale-up useful and necessary interventions, both in terms of training and social impact, in the field of Digital Health Literacy. In fact, studies showed up the need to activate concrete actions in order to increase citizens’ awareness of socio-health issues and, in particular, to guarantee digital health literacy for all those who, for various reasons (age, language, education), are completely disarmed both on the technological and on the communication front.

Innovation: The project aims to provide a training path for adult educators equipping them with hard and soft skills needed to guide and assist adult people in achieving digital skills applied to the health sector and use them to better manage their health and illness, improve prevention, produce a more accurate diagnosis and treatment and facilitate communication with health professionals.

If you already have a project idea in mind and you don’t know if it is feasible, here you find a checklist that might help you.

Ready to start?