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PUBLICATION INFORMATION

TITLE OF PUBLICATION

FOSTERING THE USE OF ICT IN PEDAGOGICAL PRACTICES IN SCIENCE EDUCATION

NAME OF AUTHOR(S)

Maria Lucia Giovannini, Márta Hunya, Minna Lakkala, Sibylle Moebius, Cyrille Raymond, Brigitte Simonnot, Ivan Traina

NAME OF PUBLISHER

eLearning Papers

YEAR OF PUBLICATION

2010

LANGUAGE OF PUBLICATION

English

PUBLICATION TYPOLOGY

Project Publication

TARGET GROUP OF PUBLICATION

Researchers, Teachers

SIZE OF THE PUBLICATION

Over 10 pages

DESCRIPTION OF CONTENTS

Presentation of the FICTUP project (Fostering the Use of ICT in Pedagogical Practices in Science Education) and of the lesson sequences experimented in class within the framework of the project. Note that this summary was taken from the publication and is available in twenty-one languages of the European Union (see link below).
The FICTUP project, funded with the support of the Lifelong Learning Programme of the European Union, aims to create innovative training materials that suggest concrete pedagogical activities using ICT, accompanied by a close tutoring process, and test the impact of the material and the tutoring on novice teachers' use of ICT in the classroom.
The innovative training material, developed collaboratively by both experienced and novice teachers to ensure its accessibility, focuses on specific classroom activities that use ICT. Each case includes a detailed description of the activity and three short, pedagogical videos (ca. 2-6 minutes each) that describe the transversal ICT skills brought into play during the activity. During the first year of the project, nine cases were implemented, some of which focused explicitly on the use of ICT in science education. This paper presents a number of different sample applications, such as “Device – measurement – evaluation: Use of ICT in physics (Hungary)”, “Exploring growth factors: Applying inquiry learning in biology (Finland)”, and “GeoGebra software: Mathematics teaching (France)”.
The increased use of ICT has led to the introduction of new pedagogical approaches, including Resource Based Learning (RBL) where varied learning needs are supported by a wide range of ICT assets. Science subjects in particular are extremely amenable to the advantages offered by RBL and the associated ICT assets. The implementation of technology-supported collaborative inquiry allows teachers to design the educational setting as an integrated whole that provides students with relevant technological tools, directs them to collaborate effectively, and promotes epistemologically high-level and creative ways of working with knowledge.

REVIEWER’S COMMENTS ON THE PUBLICATION

This past European project has some similarities with “Chemistry is All Around”, as it aims to foster the use of ICT in science courses. It starts with a presentation of the project, followed by a description of the case-based instructions and video materials, the pedagogical approaches using ICT and the description of three experiments carried out.
This latter part is the most interesting from a practical point of view. Unfortunately, none of the experiments concern chemistry lessons, but they provide a clear structure that could be applied in a chemistry course:
1) Short presentation of the experiment and of the class.
2) Pedagogical context: age and level of the class, topic of the experiment, required skills (education and ICT)
3) Objectives: educational and technical skills to acquire, subject to master, other kinds of skills (collaborative work, presentation...)
4) ICT tools used: list and description of the ICT tools used during the experiment, with a link to download them. All those tools are available online for free or with a free version.
Those lessons have several benefits. They motivate students as they can use experiments and ICT tools, some of which they know well (computers, photos...). They learn the experimental approach and they acquire various educational, social and communication skills: work in groups, written and oral presentations, problem-solving strategies... Various levels (primary and secondary school) are concerned.
The descriptions of experiments are followed by some considerations on learning with ICT on pedagogical approaches and its assessment, emphasizing the importance of communication tools (forums, platforms such as Moodle...) and suggesting that the assessment tools should be in tune with the learning methods; thus that ICT should also be used to assess ICT-enhanced learning.

WHERE TO FIND IT

http://www.openeducationeuropa.eu/fr/node/2747

PDF OF THE PUBLICATION

23_FICTUP project.pdf

NAME OF THE REVIEWING ORGANISATION

Inforef

Comments about this Publication

Your comments are welcome

Date: 2014.04.03

Posted by Beata Brestenská (Slovakia)

Message: Publication present the FICTUP project, funded by the Lifelong Learning Program of the EU, concerning the fostering of the use of ICT in pedagogical practices, and in science teaching in particular and whose aim was to prepare innovative teaching materials with the use of ICT. The teaching materials for this project were developed collaboratively by experience and novice teachers to help with the transfer of knowledge. The resources available are video clips and a pdf explaining the activities associated with each lesson. A novice teacher actually used this material in real school classes, while his tutoring was supported by an experienced teacher.
Educational institutes from France, Italy, Hungary and Finland. took part in this project. The first goal of this project was to promote the development of innovative training material, with the use of ICT, through the collaboration of both novice and experienced teachers in order to make the knowledge transfer as smooth as possible. The next goal of the project was to test the produced educational material in real conditions. Publication finishes with conclusions about the role of ICT in modern teaching and is valuable as a basis for adapting own solutions, not necessarily based on the FICTUP framework

Date: 2014.03.25

Posted by Maria Sheehan (Ireland)

Message: Fostering the use of ICT in Pedagogical Practices in Science Education (FICTUP) aims to create initiative training materials using ICT accompanied by a close tutoring process. It also aimed to test the impact of the initiative in novice teachers’ use of ICT in the classroom. The training materials for this project were developed collaboratively by experience and novice teachers to help with the transfer of knowledge. The resources available are video clips and a pdf explaining the activities associated with each lesson. A large bank of resources have been developed for this initiative. The approach in this project aims to link the Resource Based Learning (RBL) approach with the use of ICT. The papers lists the following contributions as such examples:
1. Device – Measurement – Evaluation: Use of ICT in Physics (Hungary). The ICT tools explored here were Sinequanon, Calaméo and PhotoFiltre.
2. Exploring growth factors: Applying inquiry learning in Biology (Finland). The ICT tools explored here were FRONTER, Moodle, Google Groups.
3. GeoGebre software: Mathematics teaching (France). The ICT tools explored here were GeoGebra and the Microworld.
Many of the main ideas can be altered to suit the teaching of chemistry.

Date: 2014.03.17

Posted by Tsechpenakis Anastasios (Sakis) (Greeee)

Message: The authors of this publication present thoroughy, the FICTUP project, a pioneer project, funded by the Lifelong Learning Program of the EU, concerning the fostering of the use of ICT in pedagogical practices, and in science teaching in particular. Educational institutes from France, Italy, Hungary and Finland. took part in this project. The primary goal of this project was to promote the development of innovative training material, with the use of ICT, through the collaboration of both novice and experienced teachers in order to make the knowledge transfer as smooth as possible. A second goal was to test the produced educational material in real conditions. A novice teacher actually used this material in real school classes, while his tutoring was supported by an experienced teacher. The whole process was observed and filmed by researchers in order to adapt and improve the experimented training methodology and to propose it to educational institutions for further exploitation.
During the first year of the program, nine cases of actual training material were tested against real school conditions. Three of these cases concerned science education. The first case concerned a physics class in Hungary, the second case, a biology class in Finland while the last case was about Mathematics teaching in France.
These cases against actual classroom situations served a number of pedagogical goals. They gave exemplars of teaching situations and fostered the practice of analysis. Moreover, they provided a mean to narrowing the gap between the general knowledge about principles and procedures and the enactment in real classroom.
When it comes to the pedagogical approach concerning the science teaching and the associated ICT assets, one could say that it is an Inquiry Based Science Learning (similar to Problem based Learning (PBL), but more emphasized in experimentation).
It is an inductive, bottom-up approach which provides greater opportunity for observation and self driven knowledge acquisition. In contrast with the deductive (top-down approach), which is the traditionally applied model in the secondary school environment , the bottom-up approach is more commonly encountered in third level educational settings. Its main drawbacks are that the student must have a basic knowledge to avail of the opportunities provided. Furthermore it is more time consuming and it is difficult to ensure that all students are benefited in the same degree.
On the other hand the use of the ICT assets, especially through the Computer simulations, permit the users to operate in a safe virtual environment. Experimentation is enabled through various scenarios while the users have the opportunity to make decisions and to evaluate the likely consequences of their actions. Last but not least, the students learn through play and generally play is synonymous to having fun!
Conclusively, I believe that this EU project is the next logical step, towards the further day to day use of ICT based methodologies into the common secondary school classroom. Further projects of this kind should be implemented. The common secondary science teacher does have the inclination to use ICT in the classroom, but some plug & play, educational scenarios, which are fit to the each national science curriculum would be most appreciated!

Date: 2014.02.23

Posted by Mariusz Jarocki (Poland)

Message: The document describes the FICTUP Project, whose aim was to prepare innovative teaching materials with the use of ICT. After a general introduction to the objectives of the project, several solutions produced within its framework are presented. The document finishes with conclusions about the role of ICT in modern teaching. The study is valuable as a basis for adapting own solutions, not necessarily based on the FICTUP framework. It suggests what subjects can be supported by ICT, and what tools can be used. Although the solutions are not focused on the teaching of chemistry but teaching natural sciences in general, the document is strongly associated with the mission of the project. I strongly recommend the study to teachers of chemistry.

National Reports on successful experiences to promote lifelong learning for chemistry The national reports on chemistry successful experiences to promote lifelong learning for chemistry are now available on the related section of the project portal. The reports presents examples of successful experiences in the partner countries and the results of testing of ICT resources with science teachers.