"In the first phase of the corona pandemic, barriers to education affected nearly 1.5 billion young people worldwide. Even if schools are cautiously reopened, education is no longer possible in the familiar form. Particularly in the limited time span of vocational training, a quick, systematic, and professional approach is important to ensure the quality of training and to keep the chances of the students for their career entries alive.The pandemic has clearly shown the lack of digital structures in our school systems, both on a technical level and on a content-related-didactic level. Accordingly, there is a need to build capacities for online and hybrid learning, for high-quality content and, generally to further develop the skills of students and teachers for remote learning and teaching. New, innovative teaching formats that can be used in various scenarios - virtual, hybrid, or on-site - are therefore essential. The main objective of the project is to improve the digital skills of teachers and students and to provide teachers in vocational education with free resources so that they can react flexibly, with innovative approaches and high-quality concepts in various corona-related scenarios.Practical work is part of general school practice in vocational schools and essential for learning technical, IT, and scientific methods. However, due to Covid-19 measures, a lot of this has now become simply impossible. This is exactly where our project comes in: We want to enable vocational training teachers to carry out classic hands-on student experiments with virtual support in flexible locations - at home, in several locations at the same time, or with appropriate distance in a classroom - depending on the current (hygenic/security) requirements. A second challenge of the pandemic situation is the isolation of people, thus a lack of a 'school community'. By linking experiments as well as students, a shared experimental situation is created that awakens motivation and interest and promotes cohesion - both locally and in Europe. In the search for answers to the Covid-19 crisis, all sides benefit from European cooperation. The project partners cover the full range of expertise needed (hands-on experiments: DM, Copernicus; didactic: TUM, UL; online learning: UL) and will work closely and strategically together to quickly find tailor-made and transnationally applicable solutions. All partners have solid connections to schools and teachers in their respective countries, allowing direct feedback and effective dissemination. The resulting action-oriented concepts should be exemplary for other EU countries. Teachers from vocational schools are the main target group of the project. Through didactically based further training, we comprehensively promote their digital competencies. With having trained around 40-60 professionals at schools in each country, a first spread of the developed resources is ensured. Each country will develop a teaching concept for a different subject resp. a different vocational training. A compact analysis will assess the actual demands of schools and teachers to define the key features of the program. Teachers themselves will be involved as co-creators of resources. Implementation support will not only ease the uptake through the teachers but at the same time allows a continuous quality enhancement of the teaching modules. To enhance the sustainability of the intellectual outputs, the teaching modules will be accompanied by step-by-step instructions that enable independent implementation of the concepts. A standalone guidebook will instruct teachers, who were inspired by the project to develop their own concepts and supply the required framework for developing new units. At the end of the project, we will have at least three tried-and-tested teaching modules on different topics, each in four languages (DE, PL, PT, EN), that allow easy, direct integration into teaching.The dissemination plan is adapted to the current pandemic situation, running multiple smaller events, as well as using participants as co-multipliers. The events will give an overview of the training and an insight into the practical work. With the help of the guidebook, the developmental system established in the project will be made transparent and re-usable for participants. The desired impact is to provide schools, teachers, and ultimately students with high-quality learning opportunities even in pandemic situations. For teachers, the aspired effects are to further enhance their digital competencies, their self-confidence in handling digital technologies, and their self-image as learning guides for their students. For students, the aimed-at effect is a differentiation that enables them to learn according to their needs - with the focus on vocational students especially strengthening practical work. By doing so and fostering the schools' ""community feeling"", we also wish to promote joyful learning processes."

‘Tinkering EU: Addressing the adults’ uses the Tinkering methodology with the goal to foster the socio-educational and personal development of adults, as well as their participation in civic and social life. The project aims to build adults' engagement with science, improve their 21st century skills and address their low science capital. Tinkering is an innovative pedagogy pioneered by the Exploratorium of San Francisco. It supports the construction of knowledge within the context of building personally meaningful artifacts. It designs opportunities for people to “think with their hands” in order to construct meaning and understanding and develop skills useful for a lifetime. Research shows that Tinkering holds key benefits for learning, especially for those who say “they are not good at science”. The project emerges from: -disengagement of many people in Europe with science -Technology/science competence gap increasing among citizens of different generations in Europe-Need for 21st century skills in social and professional lifeThe project addresses adults and their families as well as adult educators (museum staff and community leaders). It will reach directly about 600 individuals through:-development of Tinkering activities that will be tested and integrated in the museums 'offers'.-definition of a methodological framework on the role of Tinkering in adult engagement.-organisation of small-scale and transnational training workshops for museum staff and other adult educators, building their knowledge and skills in Tinkering.-multiplier events for educators and other adults, carried out in the museums and or community centres/other settings. -dissemination actions at local, national and European level.Resultsa) A series of Tinkering activities for adults b) A methodological framework for the use of Tinkering to develop adults’ 21st century skillsc) Small-scale training and transnational training events for museum staff/adult learning organisations.d) Multiplier events for the wide implementation of the activities, carried out with the involvement of adults from different socioeconomic background.e) guidelines for focus groups that will explore the way museum educators work with adult groups and families especially those from disadvantaged communities. f) a website containing all resources and activities from the project available to everybody.g) a Europe-wide community of practice working on Tinkering and AdultsQualitative impactAdults: development of 21st century skills for adults and improvement of their relevance with scienceEducators: improve their expertise in engaging with people from different backgrounds, use of new resources, material on Tinkering in their adult and family groups' workshops.Disadvantaged communities: empowerment of adults through engagement in science.For the communities: development of expertise in using innovative tools such as the tinkering approach in their services and introduction to notions such as the Science Capital concept that could impact on other sectors of their work too Overall the project aims to sustain a community of practice at a European level, contributing to the desire for informal learning organisations to become more inclusive places.

The project’s primary aim is to increase awareness about 3 SDGs (notably Gender Equality, Life below Water and Quality Education) through the formal and non-formal VET learning of 3 Creative Art Forms - Storytelling, Digital Games and Dance. The project’s secondary aim is to create Train the Trainer Courses for VET Teachers, Trainers, Artists and Science Communicators on Creativity and Problem-solving Skills for the Sustainable Development Goals using the Open Education Resource Packs produced. Target Audience: VET Teachers/Trainers, Adult Educators in Lifelong Learning VET courses, Science Communicators in partner countries, Artists, Creative Young Practitioners and General Public. Applying for Key Action 2 – Strategic Partnerships in the Field of VET Partners involved in the project are coupled in expertise to increase internationalisation: Fondazzjoni Centru Ghall-Kreattivita in Malta (Dance), OFF Foundation [Hodworks] in Hungary (Dance), Seven Stories Centre in UK (Storytelling), Lignin Stories in Malta (Storytelling), University of Malta in Malta (Digital Games), Picapipe in Vienna (Digital Games), Copernicus Science Centre in Poland (Quality Education and Life Below Water) and Malta Council for Science and Technology (Esplora Interactive Science Centre) in Malta (Science Communication and Visitor Services). Duration: 3 year period. This project was extended by another four months due to the impacts of the Covid-19 pandemic which made it difficult to plan the project dissemination events. For this reason, a request for extending the project duration was made to the National Agency. This was approved and the updated end date of the project was moved to 29th of December 2021. Tackling the below parts of our National Priorities identified by EUPA: - Further strengthen key competences in VET, including common methodologies for introducing those competences in curricula; - Enhancing access to training and qualifications for all; - Introducing systematic approaches to, and opportunities for, the initial and continuous professional development of VET teachers, trainers and mentors in both school and work-based settings, with a focus on developing effective open and innovative education through the use of ICT.

Make it Open brings the inquiry-based approaches of science education to meet the expansive philosophy and creative classroom approaches of the maker movement in an accessible and actionable framework. Make it Open will support schools, teachers, educators and students of all ages to make synergies between science, creativity, entrepreneurship and innovation. It will offer tools for collaboration between formal, non-formal and informal educational providers, enterprise and civil society, and support schools in becoming agents of community well-being where families are encouraged to become real partners in the learning process. Importantly it will work closely with teachers and school administrators to set their own vision for open schooling, and tailor a model which will work with their context, needs and opportunities, maximising the potential for successful uptake. The Make it Open team brings together pioneers in maker education with three networks of educators covering both formal and non(in)formal science education. The project will create open schooling hubs in 10 European countries where more than 150 schools will each collaborate with enterprises and civil society organisations in order to run activities where children solve challenges in and with the community using tools and approaches from maker education.

Eye-tracking and AI for Enhanced Teaching (EYE-TEACH) Recent education assessments (PIRLS, PISA) show a significant decline in reading comprehension amongst students in many European countries. The EYE-TEACH project is an initiative integrating artificial intelligence (AI) and eye-tracking (ET) that aims to transform educational practices and empower European teachers with new pedagogical skills for assessing and supporting their students' reading comprehension. The project addresses issues such as the post-COVID-19 educational challenges, mounting teacher workload and teacher shortages across Europe. Eye tracking, although not without limitations, has proven its worth in educational research, offering insights into students' reading behaviours, cognitive load, and emotional engagement. It differentiates between various levels of reader comprehension, making it a valuable tool for personalised education. Complex eye-tracking data translated into intelligible output by AI and supported by a robust ethical and data privacy framework can provide teachers with actionable insights, aiding the selection of effective pedagogical strategies. EYE-TEACH reaches beyond the state of the art by involving teachers and education practitioners early in the development process. By mapping educators' acceptance and readiness to adopt such novel technologies and highlighting the role of perceived ease of use and usefulness, the project has real potential to transform educational practices. The final joint result of the project will be a comprehensive resource of training materials and guidelines for using and implementing this technology in education, including benefit and risk assessments, and considerations of privacy and ethics issues. By empowering teachers with an AI-assisted ET-analytics tool and training materials, the project aims to contribute positively to the future of education in Europe.