1. CONTEXT & AIM

The increasing availability of online professional development (PD) for teachers, in particular at a European and international level, offers teachers plenty of opportunities to conveniently and effectively improve their professional practice. eTwinning and the School Education Gateway are two prominent examples of European platforms which offer a diverse range of professional development formats to teachers. While participation and engagement in these PD formats is high, there remains a gap between those teachers who have the capacity to benefit from these opportunities and those who lack the competences and confidence to engage with them. These teachers do not feel confident to engage with fellow educators in a foreign language, lack the digital competence required to complete the course activities, or fail to effectively self-regulate their learning as is required in online environments.

To address this situation and to ensure that the School Education Gateway and eTwinning online professional development offer remains at the forefront of innovation and effectiveness, we aim to setup a group of 10 pilot teachers to support the development and testing of new initiatives that are designed to increase engagement, accessibility, and impact of the School Education Gateway and eTwinning professional development offer at school level. The work of this group of teachers will continue the work of a previous group of pilot teachers who tested the use of school-based study groups alongside MOOCs. The new group will continue the testing of this approach in the context of the schools who have obtained the eTwinning Schools Label but also develop new ideas that cover a broader range of online learning formats.

2. PILOTING ACTIONS

The group of pilot teachers will focus on defining and implementing actions supporting teachers who lack relevant skills to benefit from the School Education Gateway and eTwinning online professional development offer, encourage those who would normally be less interested in participating in such professional development formats, and recognise the work of those who successfully do. Examples of possible actions are:

- School-based study groups taking an online training together and supporting each other to benefit more from it.

- Incentive schemes to encourage more colleagues to participate in an online professional development offer.

- Recognition schemes to recognise and value the work of colleagues completing an online training.

- Dissemination schemes to ensure what has been learned by those participating in an online training is disseminated successfully throughout the school.

- Support schemes to help teachers to implement what has been learned in their classroom practice.

- Training follow-up and implementation activities to ensure what has been learned is actually implemented and evaluated at school level.

PILOT SCHOOL: AGRUPAMENTO DE ESCOLAS MARTINHO ÁRIAS - SOURE | PORTUGAL