In this paper we present a pedagogical experience with 9th grade Portuguese students attending an eLearning Programme of the European Union named eTwinning Project. The main goal of this EU project is to create a network of collaborative work between European schools, involving all school levels in the development of common projects through the use of Information and Communication Technologies, specially the Internet. The eTwinning Project we present in this pap er was named Crossing the Borders and engaged a Portuguese school in Braga, Portugal and a similar school in the Czech Republic during the school year of 2006/2007. The implementation of an innovative and motivating strategy was at the basis of the project. It should promote not only a broad range of ICT skills, but also the students' moral and social development. In this paper we present the results of asemester of electronic twining ...
The increasing development of mobile technology devices is revolutionizing education. In this context emerge the mobile location-based games. This research was carried out in an effort to understand the importance of mobile location-based games in informal learning and involved the design of an urban game - "MobiGeo". MobiGeo was implemented for an outdoor pedagogical activity and enrolled a group of 173 seventh grade geography students. In order to collect data, a questionnaire was developed and validated measuring three dimensions related to educational games: motivation, interaction and perceived learning. Results show that this urban game was an adequate activity to use in informal learning environments because it engaged students in gaming with high degrees of motivation and interaction. In fact, while solving the tasks proposed by MobiGeo, students´ developed their perceptions of learning, consolidating and acquiring new knowledge about the European Union. ; CIEC – Research Centre on Child Studies, IE, UMinho (FCT R&D unit 317), Portugal ; National Funds through the FCT (Foundation for Science and Technology) and co-financed by European Regional Development Funds (FEDER) through the Competitiveness and Internationalization Operational Program (POCI) through CIEC (Research Centre on Child Studies, of the University of Minho) with the reference ...
Digital Literacy is one of the skills needed to promote inclusion of people in the new social paradigm known as the Information Society. In the European case, inequalities in access to information are still noticeable and digital inclusion is still a subject of attention of the community policies authorities. In this communication we will start by examining the concept of literacy, and then we will discuss the concept of digital literacy which is not synonymous with technological equipping. It is much more than this, i.e., it's about knowing to take advantage of the potential of information and communication technologies to form a responsible citizen in the twenty-first century, a citizen that is aware of the fact that digital inclusion is essential to promote the principles of lifelong learning in society. ; Universidade do Minho. Centro de Investigação em Educação ...
In today's society, the technologies have a role of prominence in all social segments, allowing the understanding of the new social structure - the network society - and thus a new economy in which information technology and communication tools are considered indispensable in handling the information and construction of knowledge by individuals. Therefore, this communication begins introducing the concept of social network as a virtual space where information can be shared in a democratic and egalitarian, focusing our attention on Orkut. Then, we discuss the concept of virtual communities and finally, present an analytical study on the role of e-moderator in virtual communities of Orkut that focused on themes: "Web 2.0", "Teacher education" and "ICT". The objective of the study was to find out the e-moderators opinions and perceptions about their role in the community since the literature identifies him as the subject that streamlines and motivates the group, contributing to the integration and socialization of the members as well as to the construction of knowledge in the community. Results show that the e-moderator is the main actor responsible for the mediation of the process of interaction and knowledge sharing inside the community. We also verified that the quality of the topics discussed assumes a very important nature that influences and determines the participation and retention of members in a community. The e-moderator emerges as the key element in fostering virtual communities, yet it was perceived that e-moderators may not have a full awareness of the importance of his/her role, often assuming a more administrative than pedagogical function. ; Fundação para a Ciência e a Tecnologia (FCT) - ...
Educational Technology has developed in Portugal since mid 70s. Many research studies in the field have been deve loped since then and most of these were reviewed in a meta-analysis conducted by one of the authors that covered the period between 1985 and 2000. A great deal of work, nevertheless, still needs to be done, if we want educational technology in Portugal to flourish, becoming a recognised and established area of research. This has been the main goal of the project we present in this paper: 466 documents (papers and dissertations) published between 2000 and 2005 were analysed in order to identify the main areas of interest and research of educational technologists in Portugal. More than a simple portrait of what has been and ET in our country, we believe that the analysed data point out interesting cues that should inform governmental decisions and define priorities for research in this educational ...
Education is being revolutionized by the introduction, of mobile technologies in the teaching and learning process. However, studies that focus in the application of mobile technologies to informal learning environments is scarce and not systematized [1]. This is the reason for conducting a research project that involved a urban game MobiGeo, designed in to take better advantage of the flexibility and ubiquity offered by the Mobile Learning (ML) but also taking into account the importance of motivation and interaction to enhance students learning. The definition of ML has been a complicated task for researchers, but there are assumptions that can not be neglected: the mobility, portability and ubiquity [2], these are features that will drive new learning spaces and thus motivate students. This idea is supported by [2] that introduces the concepts of "just in time", "just enough" and "just-for-me" and [4] that speaks of the triad "location independence", "independence time" and "meaningful content". These principles of "anytime" and "anywhere" consolidated by mobile technologies came to renew the variety of educational activities available to teachers and in this context arises the concept of mobile location-based games. According to [5] "these games are played in physical space, but at the same time, they are supported by actions and events in an interconnected virtual space", which can be classified into three categories: ludic, pedagogic and hybrid. By being in direct contact with the contents to assimilate and move in a real context, students will have a more significant learning [6] and this will result in the mobilization of knowledge in different contexts. To make the connection between the physical and the virtual world, our research has made use of Qr codes as these devices provide information in real time and in a dynamically way. For this research was idealized an urban game called "MobiGeo", that respect the principles suggested by [7] and that has as common thread the history of the European Union. ...
Education is being revolutionized by the introduction, of mobile technologies in the teaching and learning process. However, studies that focus in the application of mobile technologies to informal learning environments is scarce and not systematized [1]. This is the reason for conducting a research project that involved a urban game MobiGeo, designed in to take better advantage of the flexibility and ubiquity offered by the Mobile Learning (ML) but also taking into account the importance of motivation and interaction to enhance students learning. The definition of ML has been a complicated task for researchers, but there are assumptions that can not be neglected: the mobility, portability and ubiquity [2], these are features that will drive new learning spaces and thus motivate students. This idea is supported by [2] that introduces the concepts of "just in time", "just enough" and "just-for-me" and [4] that speaks of the triad "location independence", "independence time" and "meaningful content". These principles of "anytime" and "anywhere" consolidated by mobile technologies came to renew the variety of educational activities available to teachers and in this context arises the concept of mobile location-based games. According to [5] "these games are played in physical space, but at the same time, they are supported by actions and events in an interconnected virtual space", which can be classified into three categories: ludic, pedagogic and hybrid. By being in direct contact with the contents to assimilate and move in a real context, students will have a more significant learning [6] and this will result in the mobilization of knowledge in different contexts. To make the connection between the physical and the virtual world, our research has made use of Qr codes as these devices provide information in real time and in a dynamically way. For this research was idealized an urban game called "MobiGeo", that respect the principles suggested by [7] and that has as common thread the history of the European Union. ...
