University of Reunion Island Living Lab

Our membership application to the European Network of Living Labs (ENoLL) has been approved by the international expert panel of the 5th wave of Living Labs.

The University of Reunion Island Living Lab for Teaching and Learning (UR.LL.TL) is now an adherent member of ENoLL, and it can be geo localized on the map in the South West of Indian Ocean.

Two transversal thematics were proposed that meet the objectives of enhancing assets of Reunion Island: e-co-bio-tourism and e-teach-play-learn domains.

Both of them put Teaching and Learning as the kernel of a sustainable tourism and education.

Thus, by following the International Consortium for Teaching and Learning Centres (ICTLC) initiative and the European Network of Living Labs, the University of Reunion Island volunteers to create a Teaching and Learning Living Lab for combining the universe sciences and the city sciences (Universe + City = University). Universe sciences are those related to Physics, Mathematics and Biology, i.e. Nature. City sciences are those dealing with Human sciences (Geography, History, Philosophy), i.e. Culture.

As for ICTLC, the main theme of our a University of Reunion Living Lab (UR.LL) is dedicated to Teaching and Learning (UR.LL.TL). However, our source of inspiration comes from the desire to design and use new services on the Web, called e-services, to improve the quality of education. This desire matches the new way of viewing innovation in the 21st Century, which is based on creativity of individuals rather than competitiveness of enterprises.

Our method of conceiving such e-teaching and e-learning services is interdisciplinary, based on a User-Centered Co-Design process, a Creativity Platform and evaluation tools. More specifically, we also want to innovate by emphasizing Playing and Gaming to link both business (Teaching) and usage (Learning) processes. Indeed, the new generation of Learners in the 21th century (Y Gen) are very different from the ones of the 20th century. We need to adapt our Teaching and Learning methods to these new Internet generations that are used to play with video games. A new form of serious game should be enhanced to make Teaching and Learning converge with a Playing-Gaming activity.

The following presentation explains our vision and objectives for our University of Reunion Island Living Lab ... and this video gives a quick look at the concept of Living Lab in the frame of our insular tropical environment.