B.I Exploring online labs with visually impaired students (WS03), Lina Canas and Rosa Doran

Abstract: Online lab Faulkes Telescope offers a database of astronomical pictures as well as the opportunity for the students to remotely operate the telescope and to take their own pictures of the cosmos. Since Astronomy is a very visual science most often visually impaired students are excluded from these activities, so the question is: how can we engage visually impaired students in such activities while promoting collaborative work with their peers?

Using image editing software the images collected by the students in the remotely operated telescope may be printed on a swelling paper (a special type of paper that allows its inked areas to swell when heated) and then printed on a thermal printer. This allows visually impaired students to be able to perceive the objects being observed in real time alongside their classroom companions.

With this workshop we plan to present a step by step guide to the participant teachers on how to conduct an in-class implementation of such activity in a joint and enriching experience, allowing visually impaired students to access these online personalised scientific experiments alongside their classmates.

B.II Zondle – ICT game-based learning (WS05), Bosiljko Derek

Abstract: Zondle is a GBL (Game-Based Learning) platform focused on delivering a game-based learning environment. The platform can be accessed on PCs, laptops, iPad and Android devices; it has also been designed for use on interactive whiteboards or with computer projectors and screens.

The basic objective of the workshop will be to familiarise participants in the workshop with the Zondle platform. The aim is to allow teachers to create content for the game to suit the goals of teaching and the needs of their students – to determine what has been learned in school, as a formative or summative assessment or as preparation for complex verification and testing.

At the end of this workshop, participants should be able to:

1. Register, add students and teachers, manage classes
2. Manage content, assigning topics and tasks to students, use ready-made themes made by other teachers
3. Monitor student progress, class statistics, team play.