Competences for collaboration and knowledge sharing in digital society - a case study with an erasmus intensive programme

With the advent of social and collaborative environments, students became more active and participative - they not only have access to contents but also create and share them, becoming proactive. Communication has evolved, and with this evolution came the new media and the possibility of live conferencing, video sharing, social networking, collaborative tools, allowing the student to create, work collaboratively and communicate in a more direct way with their peers and their teachers. Instead of merely searching for information, applications such as bookmarking, feeds, tweeter and pinboards, digital portfolios, etc., along with the possibility of creating your own personal webpage, today’s Web gives students also the chance to create a PLE - A Personal Learning Environment. A PLE “recognizes that learning is continuing and seeks to provide tools to support that learning” (Attwell, 2007). The Individuals are responsible for the management of their own learning environment and for the selection of tools and contexts where learning will take place. Students need to acquire certain skills and competences, specific of a digital and connected society, in order to “effectively benefit from e-government, e-learning and e-health services, and participate actively in the knowledge society as co-creators, and not simply consumers, as highlighted by the European e-skills strategy” (McCormack, 2010). To only possess hard skills (that comes with experience and formal education) may not be enough to get someone a job. Besides e-skills and e-literacy competences, soft and social skills are also required. These can be practiced and enhanced in virtual environments. Digital literacy, and therefore e-skills, are transversal competences needed to every citizen. In this paper we will present the results of a case study carried out with attendees of an Erasmus Intensive Programme, which has promoted the development of digital literacies among participants. The Programme took place during 2013 summer and involved students and teachers (of teacher education and social service fields) from 3 different countries. The classes covered different tools and 12 tutors were involved. The main objectives were to provide students with information and communication technologies (ICT) skills for a digital society, namely: • Identification of students’ competencies in ICT; • Present students with different available collaboration tools by exploring the web 2.0; • Selection of specific tools to create students' personal learning environment (PLE); • Acquire necessary knowledge to master the selected tools; • Work collaboratively with the web 2.0 tools; • Establish methods for instruction and course design based on Web 2.0 (teacher education) with the goal to integrate technology enhanced learning and individual knowledge management in educational processes. At the end attendees were able to: • Master the different tools & services; • Be capable to use and select the most adequate web 2.0 tools & services; • Create and manage their PLE; • Share and to work collaboratively; • Be digitally skilled.info:eu-repo/semantics/publishedVersio

Facebook + Moodle : environments to foster student´s involvement in distance learning

Conferência Internacional realizada em Sevilha de 17-19 de novembro de 2014Web 2.0 has changed our daily lives, and is now part of our society, both professionally and for entertainment. As Education changes, accompanying society, it has evolved to become more personal, focused on knowledge, reflexive, socially connected and involved, as to include not only the digital natives, but also the digital immigrants [1]. Students are now acquiring skills and competences that allow them to use digital tools to research, select information and reflect upon it, work collaboratively and share their created knowledge online. As the use of Web 2.0 tools increases in Higher Education Institutions for learning and knowledge creation, to be connected is now a relevant skill, especially for students in Distance learning, not only to overcome isolation, but also to help create online informal communities using 2.0 tools, giving a sense of belonging, fostering involvement and collectively create and share knowledge. According to Forbes, in December 2013, Facebook is still the online social network with more users “Facebook continues to lead the pack in terms of number of active monthly users (1.15 billion at last count).” [2]. As for Moodle, it is the most used open source LMS in Higher Education Institutions. This paper reflects on the possible implications that the use of formal and informal learning platforms can bring to online distance learning in higher education, and discusses how the complementary use of these two platforms (Facebook and Moodle) can contribute to the students’ involvement and effective learning

Facebook + LMS : cenários para o envolvimento do estudante na aprendizagem a distância

O capítulo apresenta alguns aspetos que enfrentam os estudantes quando estão integrados em contextos de aprendizagem a distância e como o desenvolvimento de cenários agregadores de ambientes virtuais com características diferentes como o Facebook e o Moodle podem potenciar o envolvimento na aprendizagem por parte dos estudantes. Apoiando-se numa revisão da literatura, são apresentadas variáveis que potenciam o envolvimento do estudante na aprendizagem a distância

Student’s digital transformation during higher education: entrance and exit digital profile

Digital technology has entered almost all areas of our daily lives to the point that we call our own society the Digital one. In the last 2 years with the impact of the COVID-19 pandemic, that has forced most of us to work from our homes, connecting online, this aspect of growing more digital has accelerated. This transition to remote work reminded us, once more, of the need to empower students with the required digital skills, or e-skills, to enter the labour market that “demands highly skilled people” [1], to perform lifelong learning, and to help answering the call of the European Commission’s Digital Compass targets of developing digital competences until 2030. This paper is the first part of an ongoing research that aims to understand the Higher Education (HE) Students’ Digital Profile when they enter HE, and then assess if their existing digital profile is correspondent to the labour market´s ideal profile when they finish their studies. This research also and foremost aims to design a research model for Student’s Digital Profile, providing us with the opportunity to assess this on a yearly basis, to the students that enter HE and the ones that are finishing their studies, helping Higher Education Institutions perceive if their studies’ syllabus are adequate to empower students with the needed workforce digital competences each specific field of expertise requires. As this study is correspondent to the first part of this research, this paper will focus on the literature review and research methodology that will lead us to our first results.info:eu-repo/semantics/publishedVersio

Visualyzart Project – The role in education

The VisualYzARt project intends to develop research on mobile platforms, web and social scenarios in order to bring augmented reality and natural interaction for the general public, aiming to study and validate the adequacy of YVision platform in various fields of activity such as digital arts, design, education, culture and leisure. The VisualYzARt project members analysed the components available in YVision platform and are defining new ones that allow the creation of applications to a chosen activity, effectively adding a new language to the domain YVision. In this paper we will present the role of the InstitutoPolitécnico de Santarém which falls into the field of education.VisualYzART is funded by QREN – Sistema de Incentivos à Investigação e Desenvolvimento Tecnológico (SI I&DT), Project n. º 23201 - VisualYzARt (from January 2013 to December 2014). Partners: YDreams Portugal; Instituto Politécnico de Santarém - Gabinete de e-Learning; Universidade de Coimbra - Centro de Informática e Sistemas; Instituto Politécnico de Leiria - Centro de Investigação em Informática e Comunicações; Universidade Católica do Porto - Centro de Investigação em Ciência e Tecnologia das Artes.info:eu-repo/semantics/publishedVersio

Ambientes híbridos em educação a distância : cenários para a criação de envolvimento do estudante na rede

O estudo referido na presente tese enquadra-se no âmbito do programa doutoral na especialidade de Educação a Distância e eLearning (EDeL) da Universidade Aberta, desenvolvida no contexto da linha de investigação em Educação a Distância e Educação em Rede do Laboratório de Educação a Distância e ELearning, LE@D, da Universidade Aberta, projeto de investigação em Educação Online e Web Social. A Educação a Distância tem sofrido grande desenvolvimento desde as primeiras gerações, possuindo hoje uma capacidade de inovação e de integração de novas plataformas e designs pedagógicos. Contudo é frequente atribuir-se-lhe alguma dificuldade em promover níveis de interação e participação dos estudantes que a frequentam. É neste contexto que esta investigação se propõe compreender a relevância do envolvimento do estudante para uma real construção e apropriação do conhecimento em cenários de educação a distância. Assim, partindo da criação de ambientes de aprendizagem híbridos ou mistos, obtidos, neste caso, conjugando ambientes virtuais formais e as suas características (por exemplo, o Learning Management System, Moodle), e complementado com ambientes virtuais informais e as suas características (por exemplo, a rede social Facebook), pretende-se compreender se e como poderá contribuir para um envolvimento do estudante em cursos do ensino superior a distância. Assim, importa antes de mais refletir e testar não só as plataformas onde o estudo será implementado, mas também as ferramentas que irão ser utilizadas para recolher os dados. O estudo pretende analisar o nível de envolvimento do estudante através do grau de interação, a frequência da colaboração e a qualidade das contribuições, quer em Fóruns de Discussão no Moodle, quer Grupos no Facebook. Os resultados desta análise permitirão identificar como estas ferramentas podem ou não influenciar o envolvimento dos estudantes e, consequentemente, o impacto que este tem no processo de construção do conhecimento. Após uma revisão da literatura, centrada nos estudos e na diversidade de ambientes virtuais disponíveis em contexto educacional, e do papel das redes sociais em contexto educacional, será realizada uma contextualização do estudo e descritos os ambientes virtuais (plataformas e as ferramentas) selecionados e o seu quadro teórico. Em termos metodológicos, uma vez que a base do estudo são a interação e o relacionamento entre o sujeito e as plataformas, adotou-se a Activity Theory como quadro teórico para o estudo, o que permitiu criar um planeamento, onde o cruzamento dos dados de ambas as plataformas foi detalhadamente pensado, definindo todos os elementos necessários ao estudo. Assim, foi possível definir o Moodle e o Facebook como as ferramentas a analisar, os participantes foram definidos como os estudantes e docentes envolvidos, as regras a serem aplicadas durante o estudo definiram-se como as normas de utilização das ferramentas, onde a comunidade se definiu como sendo o Ensino Superior a Distância em Portugal, o motivo entende-se como o objetivo do estudo, conhecer a relevância das ferramentas em estudo para o Ensino Superior a Distância, a divisão das tarefas possibilitou definir o papel que cada participante tem no estudo e o resultado entendeu-se como os dados que resultaram da experiência. O estudo apresenta uma natureza mista, uma vez que se procedeu à recolha de dados quantitativos e qualitativos, para ser possível responder às questões do estudo. Entre as ferramentas utilizadas para a recolha de dados quantitativos, para além dos questionários, houve a necessidade de recorrer a ferramentas de Learning Analytics para a recolha dos dados das plataformas em estudo. Utilizou-se o SNAPP para recolher os dados de interação no Moodle e o Netvizz para a recolha de dados nos grupos do Facebook. Este aspeto levou o estudo a enquadrar-se numa metodologia de Análise de Redes Sociais, ou Social Network Analysis. Esta metodologia, permitiu analisar os dados a diferentes níveis, quer relativamente aos intervenientes, quer a nível de grupo, local ou rede, permitindo compreender o padrão de relação entre indivíduos, os seus perfis de utilizadores e como afetam a rede. Para a visualização e análise dos dados, recorreu-se ao Gephi, que permitiu o tratamento dos dados recolhidos em ambas as plataformas e verificar os indicadores das interações em 3 níveis: individual (identificando o grau de centralidade das redes), grupo (identificando os graus de intermedialidade e o grau de coesão) e global (identificando o grau de centralização e o grau de densidade da rede). Foi também possível identificar visualmente os padrões de rede presentes. Para a análise qualitativa, foi necessário estabelecer categorias e subcategorias, para se possível determinar os níveis e dimensões do discurso. Foram tidos em conta diversos modelos para se chegar ao modelo desenhado para este estudo, onde as categorias foram divididas em subcategorias positivas e negativas, e em níveis de grau de envolvimento. Utilizou-se o QDA Miner para a visualização e análise dos dados em detalhe, de forma organizada e metódica. As conclusões apontam para a necessidade de rever o perfil de estudante e docente do Ensino Superior a Distância em Portugal, uma vez que os resultados sugerem uma não conformidade relativamente aos perfis apontados pela literatura atual, que serve de base para a estruturação das ferramentas e design instrucional atualmente utilizado em Portugal. Ainda assim, foi possível estabelecer uma nova proposta de maturação dos perfis e também uma proposta dos que atualmente é possível encontrar no ensino a distância no nosso país. A clara preferência dos perfis mais jovens pela utilização do Facebook como espaço de discussão mostra-se oposto à escolha dos docentes, que na sua maioria continuam a escolher os Fóruns do Moodle. A análise dos dados recolhidos, em ambas as plataformas permitem verificar que não só os níveis de interação são superiores nos Grupos de Facebook, apresentando graus de centralidade baixos e graus de densidade elevados, como qualitativamente os resultados demonstram que é nesta rede social que o debate de ideias, a partilha, e a criação de conhecimento ocorrem. Estes aspetos verificaram-se ser inexistentes nos Fóruns do Moodle analisados, sendo que esta plataforma foi predominantemente utilizada como repositório de documentos. Os resultados obtidos no estudo apontam para a importância da adoção de ferramentas da Web 2.0 como complemento ao Moodle de modo a possibilitar a criação do envolvimento do estudante. É neste contexto que se registou alguma dinâmica e interação nos grupos, tendo ocorrido um elevado grau de envolvimento, a criação e o aprofundamento de conhecimento.The study referred to in this thesis falls within the scope of the doctoral program in the Distance Education and eLearning (EDeL) area of expertise of the Univerisade Aberta, developed in the context of the research scope in Distance Education and Network Education of the Laboratory of Distance Education And ELearning, LE@D, of the Universidade Aberta, research project in Online Education and Social Web. Distance Education has undergone great development since the first generations, and today it has a capacity for innovation and integration of new platforms and pedagogical designs. However, there is often difficulty in promoting levels of interaction and participation of the students who attend it. It is in this context that this research proposes to understand the relevance of student’s involvement for a real construction and appropriation of knowledge in distance education scenarios. Thus, starting from the creation of hybrid or mixed learning environments, in this case, combining formal virtual environments and their characteristics (i.e., the Learning Management System, Moodle), and complemented with informal virtual environments and their characteristics (for example, the social network Facebook), it is intended to understand if and how it could contribute to a student's involvement in distance learning higher education courses. Therefore, it is important to reflect and test not only the platforms where the study will be implemented, but also the tools that will be used to collect the data. The study aims to analyse the level of student’s involvement through the degree of interaction, the frequency of collaboration and the quality of contributions, whether in Moodle Discussion Forums or Facebook Groups. The results of this analysis will allow us to identify how these tools may or may not influence students' involvement and, consequently, their impact on the process of knowledge construction. After a review of the literature, focusing on the studies and the diversity of virtual environments available in an educational context, and the role of social networks in an educational context, a contextualisation of the study will be carried out and the virtual environments (platforms and tools) selected as well as its theoretical framework. In methodological terms, since the basis of the study is the interaction and the relationship between the subject and the platforms, Activity Theory was adopted as the theoretical framework for the study, which allowed the creation of a planning, where the crossing of the data of both platforms was thoroughly thought out, defining all the elements necessary for the study. Thus, it was possible to define Moodle and Facebook as the tools to analyse, the participants were defined as the students and teachers involved, the rules to be applied during the study were defined as the norms of use of the tools, where the community was defined as Higher Distance Learning in Portugal, the reason is understood as the purpose of the study, to know the relevance of the tools under study for Distance Learning, the division of tasks made it possible to define the role that each participant has in the study, whereas the result was understood as the data that resulted from the experiment. The study has a mixed nature, since quantitative and qualitative data were collected, in order to be able to answer the questions of the study. Among the tools used to collect quantitative data, and in addition to the questionnaires, it was necessary to use Learning. Analytics tools to collect data from the platforms under study. SNAPP was used to collect interaction data in Moodle and Netvizz for the collection of data in Facebook groups. This aspect led the study to fit into a methodology of Social Network Analysis, or Social Network Analysis. This methodology allowed us to analyse the data at different levels, both with regard to the participants, at the group, local or network level, allowing us to understand the pattern of relationship between individuals, their user profiles and how they affect the network. To visualize and analyse the data, we used Gephi, which allowed the data collected in both platforms to be processed, and to verify the indicators of the interactions in three levels: individual (identifying the degree of centrality of the networks), group (identifying the degrees of intermediality and degree of cohesion) and global (identifying the degree of centralization and the degree of density of the network). It was also possible to visually identify the network patterns present. For the qualitative analysis, it was necessary to establish categories and subcategories, in order to determine the levels and dimensions of the discourse. Several models were considered to arrive at the model designed for this study, where the categories were divided into positive and negative subcategories and levels of degree of involvement. The QDA Miner tool was used for the visualization and analysis of the data in detail, in an organized and methodical way. The conclusions point to the need to review the profile of student and teacher of Distance Higher Education in Portugal, since the results suggest a non-compliance with the profiles pointed out in the current literature, which serves as the basis for structuring the tools and design currently used in Portugal. Nevertheless, it was possible to establish a new proposal for the maturation of the profiles and also a proposal of the ones that currently can be found in distance education in our country. The clear preference of the younger profiles for the use of Facebook as a discussion space is opposed to the choice of teachers, who mostly continue to choose Moodle Forums. The analysis of the data collected in both platforms allows the verification that not only the interaction levels are superior in the Facebook Groups, presenting low degrees of centrality and high degrees of density, but qualitatively the results demonstrate that it is in this social network that the debate of ideas, sharing, and knowledge creation occur. These aspects were found to be non-existent in the Moodle Forums analysed, as this platform was predominantly used as a document repository. The results obtained in the study point to the importance of adopting Web 2.0 tools as a complement to Moodle in order to allow the creation of student involvement. It is in this context that some dynamics and interaction were registered in the groups, having occurred a high degree of involvement, as well as creation and deepening of knowledge

e-skills, soft skills & social skills - students' competences on a digital age

The demands on today‟s digital society raise the necessity of students to acquire different skills and competences - a new kind of literacy. Besides digital skills, there is also the need of being in possess of social and soft skills. Learning, due to the advent of social Web and collaborative virtual environments, has a lot to do with socialization. This article aims to know if and how these competences and access to digital and virtual tools can change students learning processes, allowing them to be more participative in constructing their knowledge.info:eu-repo/semantics/acceptedVersio

From face-to-face to online learning: designing a pedagogical model for an higher education context

Nowadays, online and virtual platforms play a key role in contemporary society. Digital technology has become ubiquitous and indispensable to our daily routines, whereas the educational field is not an exception. Higher Education Institutions (HEI), due to the transition to emergency remote learning during CoViD-19 pandemia, had to change the way programmes were delivered. At this moment, this fact has triggered on the part of HEIs, decision-makers and the educational community in general, the need to invest in the development and redesign of Pedagogical Models, as a social responsibility of the institution, besides the legal compliance with the accreditation agencies, of courses and institutions that promote distance learning. Online learning became a methodology that was acquired and that, in some situations, prevailed on time. However, delivering online learning has its own specificities and requires certain pedagogical adaptations, to which, sometimes faculty is not aware of. According to Decree-Law 133/2019, which approves the legal system of higher education provided at a distance, certain criteria are required to be reflected in the HEIs' official documents on this teaching-learning modality. Therefore, the design and conception of a pedagogical model for online learning and distance education is crucial, since HEIs have the responsibility, regardless of the contexts, to provide quality and inclusive education. Many online programmes are available for training but HEI have a significant role in providing a formal and certified training, founded on criteria of quality, flexibility and effectiveness and based on virtual learning platforms, grounded on adapted and personalised pedagogical models. This paper aims to present the distance learning pedagogical model of a HEI which is being developed for a quality distance learning offer. An extensive literature review was carried out, which allowed to know different pedagogical models applied in diverse contexts. A comparison of the different models was made, according to a set of defined criteria that emerged from the needs diagnosed in the HEI. This resulted in a proposal for a pedagogical model, based on the following principles: quality and learning experience; ethics and academic integrity; digital inclusion and accessibility; open science and environmental sustainability; flexibility; and interaction. The model will be validated by eLearning and pedagogical experts before it can be implemented as a model in the HEI.info:eu-repo/semantics/publishedVersio

Do ensino presencial ao ensino a distância: desenho e conceção do e-Campus do IPSantarém

Neste poster, iremos apresentar o e-Campus do Instituto Politécnico de Santarém (IPSantarém). Este campus virtual surge da necessidade sentida na Instituição de Ensino Superior (IES) de ministrar cursos a distância, de forma a poder inovar e diversificar a sua oferta formativa, chegando assim a públicos diferenciados.info:eu-repo/semantics/publishedVersio

Modelo Pedagógico para o Ensino a Distância e Modelo do Campus virtual (versão 1.0 _ setembro de 2023)

Numa sociedade global em acelerado processo de transição digital, o Instituto Politécnico de Santarém (IPSantarém) está fortemente empenhado em adequar as suas práticas e modelos pedagógicos às reais aspirações e necessidades das novas gerações de estudantes. Neste sentido, constitui-se como um objetivo institucional relevante, o desenvolvimento de um ecossistema de ensino e aprendizagem digital avançado que aponte à transformação digital do IPSantarém, à luz da exploração das potencialidades das tecnologias digitais inteligentes. Este ecossistema de ensino e aprendizagem digital não se constituiu apenas como uma modalidade alternativa de ensino. Representa também uma resposta a um ensino mais inclusivo permitindo o acesso ao ensino superior a mais estudantes, incluindo aqueles que, por alguma razão, possam não ter possibilidades frequentar o ensino presencial. Por outro lado, a maior diversidade, e flexibilidade, das metodologias de ensino a distância estimula a personalização dos percursos educativos e a adequação aos ritmos de aprendizagem e condicionantes de cada estudante, essenciais para garantir a adesão dos públicos mais adultos a um processo contínuo de aprendizagem ao longo da vida. O modelo pedagógico para o ensino a distância foi desenvolvido pelo grupo de trabalho do eixo EaD do projeto SAMA #eCapacitar - Capacitar para a inclusão digital nas áreas de negócio do IPSantarém, assente no mais atual conhecimento técnico, científico e pedagógico, implicando, desta forma, uma política integrada de formação e capacitação docente para a educação digital. Este processo de transformação digital no ensino será, sem dúvida, um grande desafio para toda a comunidade académica do IPSantarém. No entanto, acredito que com toda a dedicação, vocação e paixão do nosso corpo docente, juntamente com o comprometimento dos nossos estudantes e de toda a comunidade académica, todos os desafios serão superados. Agradeço ao grupo de trabalho responsável pelo desenvolvimento deste modelo, por toda a persistência e pelo importante contributo que dão para o IPSantarém, assim como a todos os quantos contribuíram para a sua melhoria através dos seus contributos e reflexões que fizeram chegar durante o processo de consulta aos orgânicos das escolas superiores do IPSantarém. Considerando que se trata de um processo integrado, envolvente e dinâmico, com fortes implicações no desenvolvimento e aprofundamento da excelência que se pretende para o IPSantarém, convido todos os membros da nossa comunidade académica a juntarem-se a esta iniciativa, contribuindo para moldar o futuro do nosso Instituto e garantindo que o IPSantarém continue a ser uma referência de inovação, inclusão e excelência no ensino superior.info:eu-repo/semantics/publishedVersio