#Inno4Edu
Setting up an enabling environment for improving quality teaching and learning through co-creation and innovation
Summary
The main goal of this initiative is to build a national web-based platform that will assist the improvement in the quality of teaching and learning through co-creation and innovation, involving teachers, parents and children. More specifically, the developed platform will provide an enabling environment that will support socio-emotional development in pre-primary and primary education and will facilitate the implementation of game-based learning.
Indirectly, the project itself will secure a higher level of community engagement, significantly aiding towards achieving national goals and most importantly, the entire methodology promotes a more open, transparent and participative process in creating solutions or/and policy-making.
The intervention aims to create additional/new resources and to collect the existing ones on a single platform that will enable parents and teachers to use multiple tools and approaches to cover the whole spectrum of child learning and development. The project will also enable continued professional development opportunities for pre-school and primary school teachers.
Challenges
The results from the international evaluation of educational systems, shows that the country scores low on learning outcomes as a result of poor quality education. The Strategy for the Development of Education identifies several reasons for weak performance of the education system in the country: educational policies do not rely on data and facts which greatly affect the overall results; the curricula are not upgraded according to the latest research and achievements in science and are often poorly implemented; low motivation of teachers also contributes to the low quality of education.
Another underpinning reason for this intervention can be located in one of the priorities in the Programme for early childhood development, the need to provide support to parents and teachers in terms of materials and information for child development, as well as to improve the collaboration between as to ensure correct and optimal development and learning for all children.
The relevance of this issue was also confirmed from our two previously implemented interventions: 1) #EducationHackathon and 2) #Inno4Edu Camp which emphasized the need for more standardized and instruction-based materials to support the teaching and learning process, as well as the need to provide teachers and parents a “one-stop-shop” for education development and a space where they can interact, share and learn from each other.
Expected results
Developed full framework
of a national web-based platform for education based on extensive UX & UI testing and consultation with end users
Implemented 3 crowdsourcing events
(one with game-developers, one with parents and kids and one with teachers)
Five small scale interactive events
are implemented throughout the country as to promote the new national platform; combined with a national marketing strategy, multiple open challenges and at least 55 field showcase trainings in educational facilities
A national education web-platform
is technically developed which provides standardized and instruction-based materials (schemes, graphics, educational video games, video materials etc.) that support the teaching and learning process
Integrated functionalities
that enable users of the platform to submit their own material/game, which then goes through a standardized verification process in a fast and agile method supported by both Ministries and the Bureau as well as the functionality for professional development via video courses and materials
Developed sustainability model
since the early stage of the project, paired with a smooth on-boarding and take-over of the platform by the Bureau for the Development of Education
The initial platform on its launch
is to have at least 100 co-created materials
Game development team involved
in creating the first content of the platform
In a larger picture, this will be the first platform of its kind on the Balkan and the entire methodology, which dates its beginnings since 2017 will be documented and hopefully replicated by either other UNICEF CO’s or Balkan countries; potentially also setting up a Regional Platform.
Partners
This project is funded by the United Kingdom Government through the British Embassy in Skopje, with the support of the Ministry of Labor and Social Policy, The Ministry of Education and Science, the Bureau for the Development of Education and UNICEF. It is also supported by a plead of organizations, citizens groups and businesses, all aiming to create a lasting mark on the Macedonian educational system.