School Education Gatewway

 

School Education Gateway newsletter 1/2021 - March View this email in your browser

Blended learning: a growing trend As a result of the ongoing pandemic, blended learning - the integration of different learning environments and tools - is an increasingly common scenario for students and teachers across Europe. Despite not being a new concept, blended learning is now perhaps much better understood and more desirable. However, its acceptance as an approach is still not fully embraced, since there is no one-size-fits-all model. Webinar on Blended learning: creating your unique blend Join us for the next webinar on Monday 15 March, 17:00 CET. An opening speech will be given by Mariya Gabriel, the European Commissioner for Innovation, Research, Culture, Education and Youth. Addressing how Blended learning works in practice, our guest speaker Michael Hallissy will explore the broad nature of the concepthow educators can design engaging, flexible and more personalised learning experiences. In the coming months, we will be covering topics such as non-formal learning (in April), traveller education (in May) and whole-school communities (in June) before the summer break. If you don't want to miss any new event, sign up for the webinar mailing list. You can find all the recordings and presentations of past webinars on our YouTube channel. Blended learning in practice – tools and strategies to implement it: new online course coming soon How to bridge distance and school site learning Blended learning can help to personalise students' learning process and increase their autonomy and motivation. Discover all the benefits of adopting it and learn how schools and teachers can create an appropriate learning design for different contexts. This new Teacher Academy course will start on Monday, 29 March 2021. The course is open to any teacher, teaching assistance or school leader who wants to introduce a Blended learning model in their practice. Take the first step and register today! If you want to stay updated on the next activities by Teacher Academy (regarding professional development opportunities), sign up for the mailing list.  Survey on rethinking the curriculum How can curricula expand what is taught, without diluting the existing content? Keeping up with the changes in society is a challenge for policymakers and school leaders. The risk is losing balance by adding new content items, without identifying how these can be given adequate time and attention. This may result in "curriculum overload", which can affect the well-being of both pupils and teachers.  Have these pressures to expand the curriculum affected you and your school, and if so, how? Fill in this survey - your views can help to inform school leaders, authorities and ministries. The survey is open until end of this week, Sunday 14 March and available in 29 languages. The results will be published on our website. Updates due to UK withdrawing from Erasmus+ In spite of Brexit, UK-based users are welcome to continue using School Education Gateway's services As of 1 January 2021, the UK is no longer considered an Erasmus+ Programme country, for which reason it is no longer possible to list UK-based courses, mobilities, or project partnership offers on School Education Gateway. Similarly, the eTwinning login credentials of UK-based users are no longer valid on the platform. We heartily thank all educators, school staff, and course providers who contributed to the Erasmus+ Tools over these past years.   Nevertheless, a large part of the platform's services and content remain totally accessible to UK-based professionals working in school education, who are very much welcome to continue using them: this includes the European Toolkit for Schools, articles, webinars and online courses.

FEBRUARY: WELL-BEING In recent years, the importance of well-being and quality of life has grown and expanded to numerous areas. Schools have an active role to play in providing and ensuring general well-being – with all its social, physical and emotional aspects – for students. Achieving this requires a more holistic and whole-school approach, involving both teachers and parents. JANUARY: RETHINKING THE CURRICULUM As the world faces new economic and social challenges, education tries to find ways of responding to them. Curriculum has a strong impact on learning design, and its revision and renewal play an important role in fostering the competences that societies need today and tomorrow. Which curricular reforms have attracted notice in recent years? DECEMBER: PUPIL MOBILITY Via pupil mobility, students are able to strengthen their valuable skills and expand their horizons. In an ever more interconnected world, the mobility experience has proven to be a key element in developing intercultural competence, creativity and active citizenship. Despite the disruption caused by the COVID-19 pandemic, pupil mobility hasn't declined – only transformed.

The School Education Gateway is funded by Erasmus+, the European programme for Education, Training, Youth and Sport. It is operated for the DG Education and Culture of the European Commission by European Schoolnet, an international partnership of 32 European Ministries of Education. The School Education Gateway is linked to eTwinning, the community for schools in Europe. Copyright © 2021 School Education Gateway, all rights reserved. Our mailing address is: support@schooleducationgateway.eu You receive this quarterly newsletter because you signed up or because you registered at the School Education Gateway. If you no longer want to receive it, you can unsubscribe here.