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On the 25th of October the team of our project organized the main event of our cooperation, the international conference “Digital Solutions in Education for the Future of Learners”.
Technologies have organically entered our everyday life. In today's school, educators use digital tools to promote peer collaboration, learning motivation, independence, self-directed learning, and creative thinking.
The aim of our conference was to encourage educators to use ICT tools in their daily work. Latvian educators and invited lecturers from Sweden, Estonia, Norway, and Lithuania shared their practical experience and showed how to help students master essential skills for living in the digital world.
The lecturers organized practical seminars on the development of 21st century competencies, creativity, problem solving, critical thinking, cooperation, communication, and digital literacy.
Lecturers demonstrated how ICT tools can be used in different subject lessons, integrated CLIL lessons and project work. Speakers covered different educational contexts - how to use technology in general education, working with gifted students and working with students with learning difficulties or special needs, as well as in extra-curricular or alternative education.
Please read an article about our conference on the homepage of State Education Development Agency Republic of Latvia:
https://www.viaa.gov.lv/lv/jaunums/digitalie-risinajumi-izglitiba-kopa-ar-nordplus
02/05/2022
MOBILITY TO VILNIUS GRIGIŠKES ŠVIESOS GYMNASIUM
by Gediminas Jonauskas, headmaster, PI "Edukateka", Lithuania
On May 2-6, the partners of the international Nordplus Junior sub-program project “Digital Creative Education” from Latvia, Estonia, Norway, Šiauliai Sanatorium school and from Klaipėda Public Institution “Edukateka” met for the first time at Vilnius Grigiškės Šviesa Gymnasium. During the mobility, the guests together with the teachers and students of Šviesa Gymnasium participated in various educational and cultural activities: STEAM workshops, learned to program the Battle of Grunwald, took lessons, visited and got acquainted with Vilnius and Trakai cities, their most visited objects and traditions of Aukštaitija region. Also, during the meeting, the project partners deepened their knowledge about the digital environment, digital tools and their application in the educational process.
by Dag-Helge Trodahl, Norlights School, Stavanger, Norway
May the 2nd, we, teachers and students from Latvia, Estonia and Norway, were warmly
welcomed with local dances and songs by students and staff at Griskies Sviesos gymnasium
in Vilnius. This set the standard for a very good week, and despite long days, this was both a
very inspiring and interesting week.
The theme for the «week» was «Digital Creative Education» or «I am digitally creative», and
even if this was a project for the students, the theachers did also have a great pleasure
taking part in the program. The program was put together as a good mixture between
observing, taking parts in lessons, team work, knowledge sharing about being «digitally
creative», presentations of the project, as well as learning a little bit about Lithuania and
Vilnius.
For me and I do also asume for the students, it was both educational and useful to both see
and talk about how other schools work when it comes to the subject. Being digitally creative
doesn’t know any border, we are all on the same arena.
I will not take this too far, but visiting and old castle when being a part of this project made
me reflect a little bit about how the world has developed during centies. A characteristic of
man is often to be curious and constantly seeking for improvements. My experience with this
project was knowledge sharing across the borders, friendship, as well as bringing home
inspiration and motivation to continue being digitally creative and to always search for more
knowldedge. Exchanging ideas. The last is always easiest through a good commonship.
Being creative is an important quality and which some voices believe is lacking in today's
school. It is important to stimulate the creativity of the students and here we did see that
digital creativity also was used in the learning process of other subjects.
23/01/2022
DIGITAL TEACHING AIDS CREATE MORE TIME IN THE WORKDAY AND OPEN UP NEW LEARNING ENVIRONMENTS
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Educational cooperation between Nordic and Baltic starts with Nordplus!
Our cooperation project Digital Creative Education was noticed! Here you can find an article by journalist Joan Rask at Nordplus homepage:
06/12/2021
DIGITAL MOBILITY TO ILLUKA SCHOOL IN ESTONIA
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Despite travelling restrictions, we keep working on our project using digital opportunities. According to the project plan we had a three-day digital mobility to Illuka School in Estonia.
Each day of our mobility was dedicated to one of the topics: the secret of Estonian success in education, usage of the digital learning platform Stuudium, and a practical workshop with Illuka School students about feedback.
We would like to thank Ave Amor, her colleagues, and Illuka School students for leading the digital mobility and sharing experiences about their school and country.
We sincerely thank Maie Kitsing, the Ministry of Education and Research representative for her online session about the system of Education in Estonia and their secrets of success.
You can find our project partners’ articles about this digital mobility below.
"The NordPlus Digital Mobility to Illuka", by Helge Erdal & Josef Berg, Norlights Montessoriskole in Stavanger
Unable to travel to Illuka, Estonia due to covid-19 limitations, teachers here at Norlights Montessoriskole Stavanger enjoyed three digital mobility sessions on November 16, 18 and 19, 2021.
The first session was about the secrets of success the Estonian education system, starting with a presentation of the wonderful country itself. From a challenging situation, the focus on education as an important priority has produced reforms leading to a highly successful school system catering for the needs of teachers as well as the individual students.
The second session was about the school in Illuka and the use of Stuudium as a tool for digital communication. This system has many useful features providing various services and functions that ease the daily workload for the school.
In the third session, the students at the Illuka school took an active role and led a workshop regarding the digital tools in which the students and the teachers at the school use keenly. It was lovely to see that the students have shown their proficiency in the programs they presented. The tools included mote (mote.com) Mentimeter (mentimeter.com), and programs for quizes and etc.
Jeanette Torgersen- contact teacher for 4.-6 grade, Helge Erdal - contact teacher for the lower secondary, Josef Berg- Deputy Principal attended the digital mobility.
We would like to thank the teachers and the students of Illuka school - our Nordplus project partner for organizing such productive digital mobility.
"Digital mobility in Illuka", by Gediminas Jonauskas, headmaster, PI "Edukateka", Lithuania
Despite the challenges posed by the pandemic, we are continuing the “Digital Creative Education” project digitally. According to the project plan, a three-day remote mobility took place on November 16-19 at Illuka School in Estonia.
Each of our mobility days was dedicated to one of the topics: the secret of Estonia's success in education, the use of the digital learning platform Stuudium and a hands-on creative workshop with Illuka school students on feedback.
Lithuanian team - Saulius Rudelis and Gediminas Jonauskas from Klaipeda, PI "Edukateka" had a great opportunity to have a digital mobility. Mobility to Estonia was wonderful, it is such a beautiful country with a very good educational system, we had the opportunity to learn from. During mobility our institution had the opportunity to get acquainted with best practices, discussing the most effective teaching methods, educational environments. This mobility was helpful to us as we learned about new tools for online teaching. Saulius learned some new ICT tools like Quizlet, for me it was new Mote. Mobility was very nice especially when students of Illuka school were presenting and moderating discussions. It is very good practice to learn from students. The workshops with Illuka students were amazing, informative and useful. We were presented with tools for feedback, such as Flipgrid, Mote and Mentimeter.
The project activities has ended in Estonia, but the project is ongoing.
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"SHARING EXPERIENCES", by Maryte Jakubauskaite, Grigiskes “Sviesos” Gymnasium, Vilnius, Lithuania
On 16 - 19th November the partners from Estonia, Latvia, Lithuania and Norway of the Nordplus project “Digital Creative Education” took part in the digital mobility to Illuka School, in Estonia, for teachers. The teachers Maryte Jakubauskaite, Lilija Rutaviciene, Vigilija Davidaviciene and Evelina Jonaityte from Grigiskes “Sviesos” gymnasium, in Vilnius, were involved in the activities, as well.
During the digital mobility sessions, we got acquainted with a system of Estonian education. On the first day, we met a representative of the Ministry of Education who told us about the specification of Estonian education, not only their achievements but also the problems they face. We were pleasantly surprised to learn about the educational success of the country.
What is more, we had a chance to see Illuka school, to get information about its curricular and students’ evaluation. To our mind, Estonian digital registers are more informative and they provide more opportunities for teachers to share their plans and ideas.
The workshops with Illuka students were amazing, informative and useful. We were presented with tools for feedback, such as Flipgrid, Mote and Mentimeter. Flipgrid is a learning tool that allows teachers to create a grid for video discussions. Mote is a tool that lets teachers easily add voice comments to shared documents, assignments, etc. Whereas, Mentimeter includes interactive presentations by adding questions, polls, quizzes, images, etc. in order to get feedback on a particular topic or lesson in a funny way. As a result, we had a great opportunity to try the tools ourselves, get engaged in the activities and give feedback.
All in all, the mobility meetings were very beneficial during which we gained new ideas, inspiration and knowledge.
"What Brought Us Here Does Not Carry Us Further. Digital Mobility to Illuka School", by Mihails Frolonoks, CLIL Education Centre board member, Latvia
At the beginning of November “Nordplus Digital Creative Education Project” partners had a little hope to take part in our first onsite mobility in Illuka School, but unfortunately a couple of weeks later it was clear, that we would switch to digital mobility again due to the new peak of Covid-19 cases in Europe.
Our digital mobility took place between 16th and 19th November 2021 online.
Day 1
It was interesting to learn about the differences between destinies of three post-soviet countries (Estonia, Latvia, and Lithuania), which had similar backgrounds but eventually constructed different systems of education.
The first day of our digital mobility was devoted to having a closer look at the system of education in Estonia. The session was held by the representative of the Ministry of Education and Research.
Estonian is an old, grammatically, and lexically complex language. So, a lot of attention is paid to teaching Estonian to ensure that everyone can communicate effectively.
Estonians believe that acquiring such a difficult language form early age, Estonians develop their capacity to learn quickly. It helps them to understand sciences, economics, and IT disciplines better.
One of the most inspiring findings for myself was historical aspiration of Estonians to improve their level of education, as a fact 95% of population of Estonia in 19th century were able to read, while common literacy rate in the tsarist era was 28% of total population.
Indeed, the fact that education is valued in the society influences the quality of it. According to the Australian National University and Nevada University in US research, Estonians are the most reading community (the country which reads the most) in the world. Their smart learner-centered approach, equality and equity principals, autonomy of schools – are something totally different from the experience in our country, and which leads Estonia to highest positions in rankings.
About Illuka School:
Illuka School is a cozy educational institution located not far from Narva in the premises of former manor. There are separate buildings for kindergarten and school where total about 100 children have been studying in the picturesque area. We had a short video guide tour in school facilities organized by Illuka School governance leader. Learning in the unusual environment enables learners and teachers to have interesting traditions, one of them - pumpkin growing for local zoo animals.
Day 2
On the second day session of our digital mobility to Illuka School we had an opportunity to see benefits of the e-learning platform for students, teachers and parents Stuudium.
Illuka School created our profiles at Stuudium platform, so we could feel ourselves like a real Illuka School teachers. Stuudium provides various modes with different options: for administrators, teachers, parents, and students. It is an easy way to interact with all participants of the educational process. Stuudium provides e-register functions, where any teacher can put marks, leave feedback, assign homework, add additional materials for subject and e-learning.
Being a parent, you can follow your child’s performance at school, ask questions to teachers and administration, provide approvals for absence at school. One interesting thing I have noticed in Stuudium was a library of digital tools and websites to support students’ independent learning opportunities.
Day 3
The last activity of our digital mobility was an interactive lesson about the importance of feedback. The session was held by Illuka School students in small groups using MS Teams Breakout Rooms option.
Students introduced to us three digital tools for feedback: Flipgrid, Mote and Mentimeter. Flipgrid allows to film short feedback video messages, Mote allows you to insert audio comments in a Google worksheet, and Mentimeter allows to display short text feedback of participants. You can create a word-cloud or have an open-ended question using Mentimeter.
Students felt surprisingly confident in leading MS Teams lessons, there were no technical issues, and small delays were easily resolved.
The three-day digital mobility let us understand that everything we had seen in the digital mobility days was an approval of Estonia’s reputation as a country with high quality standards in education. Estonians believe that their long route which involved hard work and reforms through centuries has led them to where they are now. They also understand that “What brought us here does not carry us further”.
03/11/2021
PROJECT FOR STUDENTS "The Best Digital Tool for My Learning"
According to our project plan in October all the project partners organized a project for students "The Best Digital Tool for My Learning" in every partner institution. Students had to speak, write, draw, record videos about the digital tools that help them learn, and then teach their teachers about these tools. Teachers had to act as students and reflect on the outcomes of these projects.
Please find below short review about project results in every partner institution.
By Maryte Jakubauskaite, Vilnius municipality Grigiskes “Sviesos” gymnasium, Lithuania, 2021
My favourite app
In October, 2021, the 6 th and 7 th grade students of Grigiskes “Sviesos “ gymnasium participated in the project “The Best Digital Tool for my Learning“, as part of Nordplus project. The students were given a task to present their favourite digital tools and teach school teachers how they work.
On 21 st October, we had a presentation day. Some teachers and the students gathered to share the ideas. Simona Smatauskaite from class 7d presented the English language learning app CAKE. She uses the app to learn words and phrases. Then, we had an opportunity to get to know about various Google possibilities, e. g.,tabs, personalizing etc. The presentation was created by Liutauras Pigarevas from class 6d. After that our lesson was followed by Kahoot! presentations. Evelina Lavrinovic from 6d made a video about how Kahoot! helps her learn. Simona Verobej from 7d made a colourful presentation about Kahoot! Jurgis Muntrimas and Emilijus Semėnas from the same class told us some facts from Kahoot! history. Their presentation was followed by Kahoot! game. The last student to show her favourite tool was Ieva Gradeckaite from class 7d. She made a Kahoot! game as well.
All in all, we had a nice and informative lesson that showed the teachers what tools our gymnasium students use for their learning. So, we can see that Kahoot! is the most popular one among the pupils.
By Ave Amor, PE teacher and a reacreation and project manager in Illuka School, Estonia
The world we live in is, technology is literally everywhere, and the kids adapt to it more than anyone else. For students of all ages, it is natural to use technology in every aspect of their lives. Therefore, digital tools for learning are becoming more and more crucial.
To find out what digital tools our school students use for learning, we asked 6th, 7th, and 9th grade students to make poster presentations as a group.
The most widely used web application is e-diary Stuudium. Students are using this for keeping track of what homework has been assigned, viewing grades, and communicating with the teacher, also getting overview of a school life. Another popular application is Opiq. Opiq is a learning management environment used for learning, which contains textbooks, learning kits and study journal. Students also mentioned they use videos of Youtube and TIKTOK for educational purposes. To communicate with classmates, students use Viber, Messenger, Snapchat, Google Classroom, Zoom, VK, Google Meet, MS Teams and gmail. As our school has many students with Russian as their home language, different translation programs are used such as Photo Translator, eki.ee and Google Translator. In addition, Kahoot, Appwizer, Quizizz, Phet.colorado, Taskutark, Loquiz, Photomath, Padlet and Jamboard are also applications, students like to use for learning.
All in all, using technology for education provokes student’s curiosity, boost their engagement, stimulates creativity and leads to better learning.
By Gražvydė Radavičienė, Siauliai Sanatorium School, Lithuania
"The best digital tool in my lesson"
A project week took place at the school from 18 to 22 October, during which teachers used various digital platforms in their lessons and shared their good practices with colleagues. Today’s teacher needs to be creative. In the lesson, traditional teaching is replaced by new educational methods that encourage creative and interesting work.
The activities of this project week showed that the teachers of our school use various digital platforms in the lessons constantly the students know how to use the provided tools. During such lessons, the work takes place creatively children with different needs are integrated into the activities.
The most used programs in the project week were: Wordwall, Ema, Teams - used for distance, hybrid education, conversations, meetings, Kahoot, Smart board, Just dance.
By participating in the international project "Nordplus Junior 2020 project Digital Creative Education", we will gain more experience in the digital space of student education, we will transfer our experience to the classroom even more freely and creatively, and present it to students.
By Saulius Rudelis - project coordinator, teacher and project manager of PI "Edukateka", Lithuania
In 27th of October, 2021, the students of Public Institution “Edukateka“ participated in the event “The Best Digital Tool for my Learning“, as part of Nordplus Junior project. The students were given a task to present their favorite digital tools and teach our Institions’ other students and teachers how they work.
Some teachers and the students gathered to share the ideas. Dominykas R. from IT studio presented the Canva for Education. Whether you’re a teacher or student, Canva for Education makes it easy to create, collaborate, and communicate visually in the classroom and beyond.
Gustas J. from IT studio and Roberta R. from dance studio presented Quizizz. The software is used in class, group assignments, pre-test review, formative assessments and pop quizzes.
Ieva Š. and Emilija L. from dance studio presented Quizlet. Quizlet makes simple learning tools that let you study anything.
Saulius L. from IT studio made a colourful presentation about Kahoot!. Also he made a Kahoot! game for all participants of this event.
In 28th of October, 2021, the students of our institution had a "Day without technologies", also as part of Nordplus Junior project. On this day they learn some facts about Baltic signs and patterns. After lecture they made own t-shirts with their favorite Baltic signs.
All in all, we had a nice and informative two events that showed the teachers what tools our Institution students use for their learning.
By Veronika Skripačova, CLIL Education Centre Curriculum Coordinator, Latvia
Amazing Digital Tools at CLIL Education Centre
In October 2021, CLIL Education Centre & Colibri School students worked on the project “The Best Digital Tool”. In additional education online lessons students were offered to express their opinions about the most efficient digital tools.
Upper secondary school students had discussions in breakout rooms. They had to answer the following questions: “Which of these IT tools do you use for learning?”, “What do you use them for?”, “How do you rate the efficiency of this tool?”, “If you had to recommend, which tool would you advise to use with primary, secondary school, and adult learners? Why?”
Students discussed the efficiency of tools using such criteria as age-relevance, user-friendliness, trustworthiness, and cost. Most students considered the use of Youtube, especially watching TedTalks a great opportunity to enrich their vocabulary and broad horizons. They recommended these sources for secondary school students. They also emphasised the importance and handiness of MS Teams and Zoom. Students speculated about the importance of timely communication in the modern world, and the value they bring to online education during the Covid-19 pandemic. Several students mentioned that they regularly use online libraries such as Gutenberg.org. They said it allowed them to read authentic texts in English. What impressed me as a teacher was that they spoke about the importance of reading literature and their willingness to do so.
Younger students worked on a different project. They had to answer the questions like “How often do you use your computer for learning?”, “What do you do on your computer?”, “Do you like learning in the classroom or online?”, “What is your favourite IT tool?”, “What will the school of the future be like?” Grade 4-5 students were offered to vote for the best digital tool and support their choices with arguments. Kahoot was chosen the best digital tool, Uzdevumi.lv took the second place, and Quizizz took the third position.
The same group of students were offered to vote for the best approach to learning. They had to choose between learning exceptionally at school, online, or partly at school/ partly online. The result of the poll is surprising – our learners enjoy blended learning opportunities. They are keen on spending only part of their school life in the school building!
The last activity that our Grade 4-5 students did was describing the advantages of online learning. They had to make a word-cloud by writing 3 words that characterised distance learning. The most common words were “fast”, “interesting”, “easy”. There were some other revelations like “I can eat during MS Teams conferences” and “more time to sleep”.
Thanks to our Nordplus project we learn so much about our students and apply new strategies in providing ongoing support to their learning!
01/06/2021
DIGITAL MOBILITY TO NORLIGHTS MONTESSORISKOLE IN STAVANGER
On the 26th of April we had the third digital mobility to Norlights Montessori School in Stavanger, Norway. It was our last meeting before project report in school year 2020/2021 and it was organized as effective as possible. Our partners from Stavanger Josef Berg and Helge Erdal performed outstanding digital event, introducing Norlights School to project partners as also performing report on extremely actual topic of Cyber Wellness. Before our digital mobility was started, our guest lecturer Anna Pjatecka, a Riga Zolitude grammar school teacher, reported on her research and experience about Students Motivation While Studying Online. We would like to thank Anna, Josef and Helge for leading the digital mobility and sharing information about their school and country. Please find our project partners’ feedback on the digital mobility to Norlights School below.
by Adriana Martinkevica, teacher of CLIL Educational Centre, Latvia
Anna Pjatecka was a guest speaker who was telling us about the well-being of students during online education. She presented different ways how we make students motivated for learning. It may be reached through group assignments by organising breakout rooms, multi-level tasks, rewards and competitions. The presentation was trying to depict the misconception that teachers should not prevent children from using their mobile phones, as it has become an integrative part of their habits. We can integrate the phone into the learning process to help children learn difficult things in the way that they like best. Another way how teachers may engage students is learning via connection with real life. For instance, teachers may choose a topic that is connected with real life. Moreover, students' interest in the learning process is connected with higher persistence. Anna has managed to present positive discipline support strategies.
Then we proceeded with digital mobility to Norlights Montessoriskole. Our mobility was divided into 4 parts. Firstly, we had a digital sightseeing tour around Norway. Personally I liked Norwegian Fjord, Hardanger and Preikestolen. Then, school representatives introduced Montessoriskole. The first difference is that classes consist of different age groups, it makes up small groups possible to work. The average classroom consists of 8 students. Moreover, students may select activities in which they would like to be involved.
Montessori School implemented digital strategies such as Chromebooks, Transparent Classroom, School link, Into words, Salaby, Skolen, Coding, and Relemo. Moreover, such devices as iPads and PCs are available at the school. Joseph shared the results of a survey on how easy it is for students to learn online, and also prepared recommendations to make online learning more productive. Also, Joseph has shared the experience of how it is possible to seek the balance between activities with digital tools.
Overall, the meeting was useful and contributed to my development of teaching skills.
by Ave Amor, PE teacher and a reacreation and project manager in Illuka School, Estonia
Let’s go to Land of the Vikings!
On April 26, another Nordplus project trip took place, this time we travelled to the land of the fjords and vikings- Norway.
Josef and his colleague Helge welcomed us virtually in Norlights Montessori School Stavanger, school offering authentic Montessori education to 41 pupils.
Montessori education is very popular in Norway. There are over 600 Montessori schools in Norway, at the same time, there are no such general education schools in Estonia. One of the reasons we don't have Montessori schools in Estonia, may be that we don't have Montessori trained professionals. It was very interesting for us to learn more about the basics of Montessori pedagogy.
Montessori education allows children to create their own learning paths, that means that it is believed that children learn better when they’re choosing what to learn.
Another thing that is different from the traditional classroom is that Montessori teachers act as guides and consultants to students on a one-on-one basis. They assist each child along his or her own learning path. Montessori classrooms gather children in different ages and in Norlights Montessori school average number of students in one classroom is 8.
We really enjoyed a 3D overview of their school rooms. We discussed with colleagues that it would have been more exciting if we could control instead of Josef this "remote control" to explore more closely Montessori methodology learning tools.
In a Montessori classroom you will see hands-on learning EVERYWHERE! Although, in our school we also use this “project-based learning” by growing strawberry plants and organizing project days and campaigns, we could do it even more, especially in distant learning periods.
We enjoyed virtually the picturesque nature of Norway and the hospitality of Josef and Helge and hope to get a chance to visit Norlights Montessori School Stavanger in future.
Ave, Airit and Kristi from Illuka School
On the 26 th of April 2021 Lithuanian team had a great opportunity to have a digital mobility to Stavanger, Norway. Stunning mountain ranges, breathtaking sights left the biggest impression on us. So, if you are a nature lover, this place is a must- visit.
Also, we got to know that Stavanger is called a Smart City which is based on the citizen's needs and applies new technology to make the city a better place to live, reside and work.
What is more, Josef Berg, representative of Norlights Montessoriskole in Stavanger, guided us around his school that uses alternative pedagogics. It is one of those educational institutions that cares about children‘s development. The school helps children express themselves through creativity, using their imagination. It takes into account children‘s needs and demands. Every child is important as a personality and individuality.
We also learned about the system of education in Norway and cyber- wellbeing. All the group says thank you to our Latvian colleague Anna Pjatecka for her presentation about students motivation while studying online. We agreed that a teacher is an engine of the learning process and ‘‘If a child can‘t learn the way we teach, maybe we should teach the way they learn“(Ignacio Estrada).
English teachers Gražina Vaitkunskė and Marytė Jakubauskaitė
by Gražina Vaitkunskė, English teacher, Nordplus coordinator at Vilnius Municipality’s Grigiškės Šviesos gymnasium, Lithuania
19/03/2021
DIGITAL MOBILITY TO "EDUKATEKA" IN KLAIPEDA
Despite travelling restrictions caused by the pandemic, we keep working on our project using online opportunities. We are happy to acknowledge that digital mobilities can be both effective and exciting. According to the project plan, on the 22th of February we had a digital mobility to PI "Edukateka" in Klaipeda, Lithuania. Being run by our outstanding colleagues Gediminas and Saulius, PI "Edukateka" provides a surprisingly wide range of informal education activities for children, young people and teachers, including English learning programme, folk dance, IT, theatre, dance studios, and Young Leader’s studio. We would like to thank Saulius and Gediminas for leading the digital mobility and sharing information about their informal education centre. Please find our project partners’ feedback on the digital mobility to "Edukateka" below.
Covid-19 has disrupted the way we work, the way we live and the way we participate in international projects. Due to Covid-19 situation, physical mobility activities cannot be implemented as planned. Our second Nordplus project mobility took also place virtually in 22 of February in MS Teams. This time we were in Klaipeda and our guides were Gediminas and Saulius from PI “Edukateka”
Klaipeda is the third largest city Lithuania and the fifth largest City in Baltics. At the beginning of our digital mobility, we watched a video Klaipeda- a city that delivers. I knew that Klaipeda is the most important and biggest Lithuanian transport hub and famous fot its port. Klaipeda State Seaport is the northernmost ice–free port on the Eastern coast of the Baltic Sea. Klaipeda region has become an increasingly popular tourist destination also by Estonians, it is famous for its beautiful white sandy beaches and last summer also some of my friends visited Klaipeda and Palanga.
Now that we were learned more about our host’s home city, it was time to get to know more about PI “Edukateka”. It is an educational and scholarly institution, which functions in an informal child, youth and adult education programs. They started in 2015 by teaching English for kids and later also for adults. Now they also offer to take part in photography, dance studios and IT activities. Their dance groups have won in many international contests.
PI “Edukateka” also organizes seminars, lectures for education specialist and parents, lately they organized an international conference “Living School: A Space to Create, Grow, Be”.
The main objective of our project is that each partner institution has to share their expertise in the use of digital tools. Saulius and Gediminas introduced us several different platforms and programs.
One of the programs we learned about was Canva. I use the online design program Canva for making posters. It is great and simple designing tool but sad fact is that it is expensive to use its Premium version.
The new program for me was Pixton. It can be used as comic maker and storyboard creator. I plan to use Pixton in future to create visual materials that engage students’ participation.
Also new platform that I have not use before is Edmodo. Edmodo is a free social learning platform for teachers, parents, and students. It is your all in one line of communication, grade book, and assessment tracker. It is very similar to our online application Stuudium where study materials, information about academic progress and simple messaging are accessible. It also connects students, parents and children in one online environment.
Thanks gentlemen for a memorable and educational trip to Klaipeda PI “Edukateka”.
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by Ave Amor, PE teacher and a reacreation and project manager in Illuka School, Estonia
by Adriana Martinkevica, teacher of CLIL Educational Centre, Latvia
It is a public institution that aims to improve teacher's competencies and bring their ideas to life. Moreover, dance studio performance, graphic studio, IT studio, Little Bits, and Micro Nits for creating inventions are widely used during the studying process by making it a unique and effective way of learning. Moreover, Edukateka presented project activities such as “Cultural Education Program project in Klaipeda Region - Crossroads of Cultures”, Nordplus junior project “Dear to Share” where Edukateka has taken part and now implements different strategies during the teaching process. Representatives of Edukateka gave a brief view on e-learning programmes and tools such as Canva, Word Art, Pixton.
This mobility was helpful to me as I learned about new tools for online teaching. For example, I will use Pixton to teach English through team assignments and interpersonal communication, it will immerse students in the English environment and help to bring the "online barrier" down and imitate live communication as much as possible.
At the very beginning of the mobility, representatives of “Edukateka” introduced the peculiarities of Klaipeda, thus, I have learned that Klaipeda is one of the largest logistics hubs in the country, it is known for a flourishing chemical and pharmaceutical industry. Edukateka was established in 2015 and has been focusing on different types of education. “Edukateka” provides lectures, seminars, and socialprojects for adults.
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by Anželika Grigaliūnė, teacher of Siauliai Sanatorium School, Lithuania
Three teaches from Šiauliai sanatorium school – Anželika Grigaliūnė, Iveta Mockutė and Andželika Jagminė had a great opportunity to take part in the second Nordplus project’s “Digital creative education” digital mobility that was led by “Edukateka” on the 22nd of February, 2021.
The hosts Saulius Rudelis and Gediminas Jonauskas presented their city Klaipėda and the educational centre “Edukateka”
“Edukateka” is an educational institution, which functions in informal child, youth and adult education programs. Were presented programmes for children: English language studio, children's dance studio "Aušrinė", ICT studio and photography studio. Also programmes for adults: English language studio, adults' dance collective, youth’s dance collective and what qualification programmes can be provided. Much attention was given to present and demonstrate Robots. It's so nice that “Edukateka” gives an ability for children and adults to spend their leisure time in a meaningful way, help to improve various competencies.
“Edukateka” is very strong at using and working with various ICT tools. They organize various seminars, courses for teachers helping to implement digital tools to make education more modern.
“Edukateka” as the educational center is also very active in various international projects. They took a part in several Nordplus and many eTwinning projects. They also actively participate in national or regional projects as well.
The digital mobility was very informative. We also were introduced by some new digital tools such as WordArt, Canva, Pixton EDU, Teamhood, Edmodo and learnt how to use them.
Thanks Saulius and Gediminas for a great opportunity to visit their institution and learn some new useful things.
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by Violeta Kalandarašvili, English teacher at Vilnius Municipality’s Grigiškės Šviesos gymnasium, Lithuania
I’ve prepared a list of useful links, which I am going to try out during my own classes or just for my online presentations: 1)www.canva.com; 2)wordart.com; 3)pixton.com; 4)LearningApps.org 5)issuu.com; 6)wordwall.net and 7)SPOT – for e-learning, where we can create virtual forums and separate classes, as well as see progress of different age group students.
The online presentation of “Edukateka” was well designed and in my opinion it was very motivating for us, teachers. A big THANK YOU for the lecturers and the organizers of this project in general.
I had a great opportunity to participate and learn about centre “Edukateka” located in beautiful Klaipėda, its educational programmes for children and adults, vocational training opportunities, STEAM education (especially “Fablab”) and meet the experts, Saulius Rudelis and Gediminas Jonauskas, learn about the possibility to launch e-learning programmes and digital platforms for creating online courses and other platforms.
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26/02/2021
REPORTING ON THE DIGITAL TOOLS IMPLEMENTED IN NORDPLUS PARTNER ORGANISATIONS
On the 8th of February, according to the project plan, we had an online conference, where all partners presented their reports about a variety of digital tools they had implemented at schools. You will find a short review on new digital tools for learning used in every partnership organization further in this article.
PI "Edukateka" have chosen to implement digital teaching resource creation tool WordWall. Wordwall.net is a creative classroom activity maker, which allows to make various teaching resources in an easy way. All you must do is to choose a template, enter your content, and your teaching resource is ready to be printed off or to be played on the screen.
The platform allows to choose between 18 ready templates: Crossword, Random wheel, Quiz, Labelled Diagram, Match up, Group sort – these are only some of them. It is even possible to switch templates for your material or edit the template.
WordWall allows to make community and share your resources between teachers or students. The free version allows to create up to 5 resources.
At Siauliai Sanatorium School, since November 2020 to February 2021, teachers have implemented 5 digital tools, which help them in daily routines and make the educational process easier and more interesting. 11 Siauliai Sanatorium School teachers, 2 special pedagogues, a speech therapist and an administrator are active members of the project.
Among the implemented tools there are Kahoot!, Quizlet, Google forms and MS Teams forms, Quizizz and Classroomscreen – online tool that allows to visualize your lesson instructions.
Kahoot! Is a well-known quiz and survey creation tool, which allows to make students’ learning process more engaging and interactive. Google and MS Teams forms are a modern way to create surveys and polls, for example if you need to collect feedback from parents.
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Quizizz platform allows to choose a ready-made quiz on different topics, or create your own. Using Quizziz, students play a live game together or use the Homework Mode to work independently at their own pace. Students can use any device and complete the quiz. Quick feedback opportunities are very important for any teacher. Quizlet is a free website providing learning tools for students, including flashcards, study, and game modes. More than 40 million flashcards are available on website as well as 6 study and game modes.
Vilnius municipality Grigiškės "Šviesos" Gymnasium had broad experience working with Google Classroom platform to provide distance learning. To make learning process online more interesting, teachers also used bookcreator.com, mentimeter.com and
freevoicerecorder.com platforms.
Mentimeter – allows to create interactive presentations, word clouds to get the real-time information input from students. Bookcreator is a simple tool for making digital books for learning. Freevoicerecorder is voice recording software, which can help you to record sound through a computer microphone to generate MP3 audio files.
lluka School in Estonia have chosen to implement Microsoft Teams as a reliable distance learning tool. Based on their previous experience with Zoom, they found MS Teams more secure, and they also positively evaluated integration of MS Teams with Office 365, Dropbox, Google Drive, which allows planning online meetings and discussions in different ways. In October, the first tutorials on how to use Teams for Illuka School personnel and children were organized, and it helped teachers ensure distance learning, which started in winter. Illuka School teachers regularly followed their students and colleagues’ progress in the use of Teams, organized surveys for students and teachers about using Teams, and gathered feedback about the platform and its efficiency in distance learning.
The curriculum of Norlights Montessori School in Norway includes programming in Mathematics, Science, and Arts and Crafts. One of the implemented digital tool was tiny micro:bit computers for 5-7-year-olds, which were provided by the Savings Bank Foundation DNB programme in Norway. The BBC micro:bit is a pocket-sized computer that helps children understand how software and hardware work together. It has a LED-light display, buttons, sensors, and many input/output features that, when programmed. All tolls let children explore technology and interact with the world. Here you can find more about micro:bit project in Norway.
Norlights Montessori School teachers also use Skolen platform from Cappelen Damm to ensure teaching and learning remotely. The platform seems to include all the necessary tools. There you can find teaching aids that help you with Norwegian, mathematics, English, science, and social studies. The online library with over than 250 books is available at Skolen. Here you will find books in different genres for all ages. Some packages of kids’ books are translated into a number of different languages. Teachers can plan their lessons and send the content directly to students; the platform also allows to track students’ academic progress. The platform is easy to use for teachers, as it includes step-by-step instructions.
One more interesting platform from Norway – Salaby. Salaby is a digital learning universe for kindergarten and primary school. At Salaby.no you will find a wealth of resources in all subjects at all levels of primary school. It is also a multilingual resource to support children with Norwegian as a second language.
The content includes games, activities, films, and assignments. All content in Salaby supports Norwegian curriculum goals and includes tasks to cover all standards and benchmarks.
CLIL Educational Centre reported on the implementation of two digital tools –Quizizz and Britannica School Digital Learning. All teachers in Latvia were forced to go online since December 2020, some bigger schools had to start teaching remotely even earlier. A decision to implement Quizizz was a result of collaboration within this Nordplus project, the resource was introduced to CLIL Education Centre by one of partner schools during previous meeting.
Quizizz focuses on learners’ engagement and motivation. This resource allows to find or create free gamified quizzes and interactive lessons to engage any learner. CLIL Educational Centre teachers created and used ready-made quizzes at online lessons, as well as used the platform for ensuring students’ independent work. Using this tool makes it easy to instantly report on the students’ progress to parents. As a teacher, you can measure, control, and overview the performance of your class. Quizizz overview tab displays the data about students’ comprehension level in a grid format, that makes it easier to identify each student’s learning gaps.
Britannica School Digital Learning provides complex approach in blended and remote learning support, guidance, and resources. Britannica digital platform allows you to download learning materials on any topic as well as a remote resiliency checklist, which can help to keep digital tools in your organization thrive in the context of change and uncertainty.
There are various learning solutions on the platform, in their daily educational work CLIL Educational Centre teachers use some of them: Britannica School, Britannica LaunchPacks, the organized data base of images ‘Britannica ImageQuest’, and the early learning tool for kindergarten Britannica Fundamentals. Britannica School adjusts content to students’ learning level – elementary, middle, and high. Use the search tool to find the content about your topic, choose it, and set one of 3 levels. The content includes articles, magazines, videos, and lots of other materials in English.
Britannica LaunchPacks are intended to provide teachers and students access to rich, high-quality, and diverse content sets that are easily found and used. The content in each Pack relates to a specific topic in social studies and science subjects that is vital to learning. Each Pack offers resources that allow teachers a great flexibility in their use. Through annotation tools, multilevel articles, diverse content types, students engage with the selected text, develop critical-thinking and reading skills.
We are pleased to understand, that all the Digital Creative Education project participants succeed in implementing digital tools in their educational institutions. There are various approaches to working in the remote or blended mode in different countries, but a variety of free digital tools for learning allows to create a customized approach for each educational organization. The interactions with digital tools are quite simple, which allows to operate with multiple tools within one lesson. Our project helps to connect teachers from different countries, motivates them to be confident and choose appropriate tools to gain good learning results during distance, blended and hybrid learning. We understand that teaching remotely is not easy, and it requires a lot of teachers’ competence. We thank all project participants for sharing their experiences!
10/02/2021
INTERNATIONAL ONLINE CONFERENCE "LIVING SCHOOL: A SPACE TO CREATE, GROW, BE"
On the 9th of February, our Partner public institution „Edukateka“ and Klaipėda Gedminai progymnasium
have organised International online Conference "Living School: A Space to Create, Grow, Be", where took part two speakers from Coordinating institution CLIL educational centre.
Four hour conference consisted of 10-15 minute reports of speakers from Latvia, Lithuania, Romania, Bulgaria, Greece and other countries. The aim of the conference was to share best practices about the development of an educational institution as a living organization, creating opportunities for each student to achieve better results according to their abilities.
The participants of the conference were teachers, principals, deputies and other educational specialists from European countries.The main objective of the conference was to share experience between countries and teachers on how to organize the educational process in a conventional, remote or mixed way. During the conference speakers shared their personal experience, examples, practically applied methods. The presentations covered topics about ICT innovations, advanced and non-traditional teaching methods and techniques, activities to promote the expression of students’ creativity, innovative teaching tools and their application to improve the quality of teaching and learning.
The record of the conference is available on "Edukateka" YouTube cahnnel:
Two speakers from CLIL educational centre took part in the conference: Veronika Skripačova with topic "Digital Tools to Foster Students’ Productive Skills and Independence in Language Acquisition" and Adriana Martinkēviča with her topic "Implementation of team assignments in the learning process and tracking their effectiveness using electronic resources". We thanк Veronika and Adriana for their presentations and we are grateful to the conference organizers for managing the event.
3/11/2020
OUR FIRST DIGITAL MOBILITY
To meet the challenges posed by Covid-19, the Nordplus administration approved a number of temporary changes to the Nordplus rules, , for example postponing travels or replacing physical meetings with virtual ones.
We have meet the challenge and organised our first digital mobility and visited our project partner Siauliai Sanatorium School via Zoom conference.
The main aims of our digital mobility was to learn more about structure, curriculum, pedagogical process, methods used and of course Sanatorium School expertise in the use of digital tools.
Sanatorium School is a boarding secondary school for students with movement impairments (spinal disorders) for students from different parts of Lithuania.
Students acquire general education in the environment which is adapted to their needs. They need to spend time on physical activities throughout the day; learn, lying on the special beds, regularly participate in the activities in the swimming pool and outside.
The school sees big potential in using digital tools to track students’ individual progress and as a space for teachers’ collaboration. In the environment with special education children, the teachers spend most of the time with their students, providing help and support, so the digital systems they use need to be handy and easy to use.
Digital mobility to Siauliai Sanatorium School was led by school teacher Anželika Grigaliūnė. Anželika did a great job and supported her presentation with relevant video and presentation materials about Lithuania, city of Siauliai and Sanatorium School. You can find full Aželika’s presentation here: Digital mobility to Siauliai Sanatorium School
by Gražina Vaitkunskė, English teacher, Nordplus coordinator at Vilnius Municipality’s Grigiškės Šviesos gymnasium, Lithuania
As American politician Antonio Villaraigosa has once said ‘‘Literacy is crucial to creating job opportunities, supporting workers and their families and eradicating poverty in our region...Literacy must start in homes and classrooms by giving the children the best education possible to enable them to pursue their goals and become engaged citizens. ‘‘ But nowadays digital literacy is as much important as functional literacy itself. So, the pedagogues of Vilnius Municipality‘s Grigiškės “ Šviesos“ gymnasium leapt at the chance and became a part of an international team that is digital creative.
The first online sessions (October 14th, 28th, 2020) of Nordplus project „ Digital Creative Education“ were held for partner coordinators from Lithuania, Latvia, Estonia, and Norway in order to introduce themselves and digital tools that are used in their organisations.
Later, on the 9th of November,2020 the English teachers, Gražina Gaitkunskė, Dalia Tarosaitė, and PE teacher Evelina Jonaitytė from Grigiškės“ Šviesos“ gymnasium, Lithuania had a great opportunity to take part in the first Digital mobility that was hosted by Šiauliai Sanatorium School, Lithuania.
The host, an English teacher Anželika Grigaliūnienė, introduced all participants to the most beautiful country with its tremendous history, the beauty of nature, and multicultural society keeping old traditions and customs alive.
She also presented her city of the Sun, Šiauliai, the school, its students (grades 4-10, age 7-16), teachers (23 teachers and 18 tutors in the afternoons) and medical staff (16), the mission of this organisation and education it provides. As it is a sanatorium school, children study and get treatment at the same time. The school also provides accommodation, which is free of charge. The travel home is also funded by the school on weekends.
Our team was astonished by the amount of digital and traditional activities, events, and projects that are held in the sanatorium.
We got much food for thought and have already started implementing the best practices of this organisation into our environment. The interactive floor left the biggest impression on our PE teacher Evelina Jonaitytė. She considers asking our authorities for purchasing one of these interactive tools for our gymnasium.
Moreover, on the 11th of November, we held a professional development meeting where the digital glances from Šiauliai Sanatorium School were presented.
We also had a workshop on Digital tools where interactive programs such as mentimeter.com and bookcreator.com were taught to use.
It is never too late to learn, so that is just the beginning of digital workshops in our organisation.
To be continued...
by Adriana Martinkevica, teacher of CLIL Educational Centre, Latvia
Sanatorium School has demonstrated the presentation about Lithuania, its sightseeings, history, national cuisine, language, tourism, and business. Even though Lithuania shares a border with Latvia, I managed to learn a few new and interesting facts. Angelina showed the city where the school is located - Šiauliai. Siauliai Sanatorium School has important values - health, integrity and encouragement. The school is notable for the fact that it combines the principles of an active lifestyle and the learning process. The infrastructure of the school allows for full-fledged lessons for children with disabilities; moreover, the school employs a team of teachers and medical staff. The main principle is inclusiveness, children, regardless of living conditions, health and place of residence, have equal rights to receive a decent education. The school uses the latest advances in technology - iMo cubs, interactive floors, eMice and Apple classrooms. Students have an opportunity to choose different entertaining activities such as a library, relaxing room, apple classroom, kitchen and botanical garden. School provides non-formal education, students can choose some of them: drama, art, photography, floristics, pottery, swimming. Each year teachers and students organise traditional school events, for instance, the procession of Siauliai city birthday, Teacher’s day, Halloween, support actions and Christmas. The school is truly at the forefront of using the latest technology for learning at all levels. A great example of how technology can help engage students in the learning process.
by Ave Amor, PE teacher and a reacreation and project manager in Illuka School, Estonia
On November 9, the digital mobility of our Nordplus project “Digital creative education” took place. Our hostess was Anzelika Grigaliune from Šiaulių sanatorinė mokykla. Anzelika had put together presentation about Lithuania and city Šiauliai in general and about her school Šiauliai sanatorium school in more precise.
Some of the information about Lithuania was already familiar. The history of Estonia and Lithuania is very similar and that is why most of the Estonians know about it. Also we know that Lithuanias love basketball and playing it great, we also keep our fingers crossed for the Žalgiris Kaunas basketball team. Some facts were new and interesting. I personally did not have a clue that the Europe’s geographical centre is located in Lithuania.
Travelling from Estonia through Lithuania to central and southern Europe, we cans see Šiauliai signs on the roadside. When I and my family drive past the signs Šiauliai, there is always a lot of fun when we try to say the name of a city. Pronouncing the name Šiualiai is a quite difficult voice exercise for Estonians.
We saw form the presentation of Anzelika that Šiauliai is an education and cultural centre in Lithuania. Šiauliai- the city of the sun has one of the oldest pedestrian boulevard of the Europe. I have heard stories about the Hill of Crosses in Šiauliai from my mother and this is definitely place, I would like to visit in the future.
The most interesting and informative was the presentation about Siauliai sanatorium school. I was surprised how many modern teaching aids they are using. This is a school for students with special needs, all over Lithuania. While schools in Estonia are more disability-based, in their school students are with various health problems.
Sanatorium school has great school facilities to create effective learning and healing environment- swimming pool, relax room, school garden, apple classroom, interactive floor and etc.
My colleague and I were impressed about the digital equipment. We both googled an interactive floor solution. It would be great if our school (Illuka School) has the same tool to students to be active in the breaks. Our school children spend a lot of time outdoors, but students could use it if the weather is bad or in addition to the gym breaks.
As a physical education teacher, I admired how they provide inclusive opportunities, consideration for students' individualities. They have ideal resources and tools to do that.
Another interesting treatment was an oxygen cocktail. It seems to me that all participating project partners were excited to try it.
In Estonia we used to have botanical gardens in schools and students had to go gardening in the summer. Then the gardens were abandoned. Today, gardens and greenhouses are being rebuilt in schools. School gardens can help children to learn but gardens are more than just another classroom: they’re hands-on, outdoor classrooms that teach children self-regulation.
Sanatorium school is very active in different project activities. They celebrate different events and holidays. Also, they have been participated in different European projects (Nordplus, Erasmus+).
The digital mobility in Šiualiai was thorough, informative and engaging.
by Saulius Rudelis - project coordinator, dance teacher and Gediminas Jonauskas - headmaster, IT teacher of PI "Edukateka", Lithuania
On the 9 th of April, the first Nordplus (NordPlus Framework Programme) for Nordic and Baltic cooperation in education Nordplus Junior program „Digital Creative Education” project digital mobility was held in Šiauliai Sanatorium School. It involved project partners from Lithuania, Estonia, Norway and Latvia. In this digital mobility PI „Edukateka“ was represented by project coordinator Saulius Rudelis and director Gediminas Jonauskas.
During this mobility, guests got acquainted with the history and culture of Lithuania and Šiauliai. The guests were acquainted with Šiauliai Sanatorium School.
During this digital mobility partners took part in „lessons“, „creative workshops“, during which they deepened their knowledge about digital environments and digital tools.
During mobility our institution had the opportunity to get acquainted with best practices, discussing about the most effective teaching methods, educational environments and students’ leisure time forms in Šiauliai Sanatorium School.
Project activities in Šiauliai are over, but the project continues.