Abstract:

The topic of rural isolated schools (based on the mountain and in islands) is a common issue in European countries (Italy, Ireland, Scotland and England, Germany and France). The normative situation is different from country to country and this aspect has an impact on the the profile of the school. Nevertheless, a common feature emerges: the “multilevel classroom”, where students of different age and school level work together. In many cases the multilevel classroom is a resource for the whole group of students to carry personalised didactic activities and a model of teaching which needs to abandon the traditional face-to-face lesson.

The issue regarding this kind of school are fourfold: ICT infrastructure, school organisation, teachers’training and innovative didactic.

INDIRE, namely National Institute for the Documentation, Innovation and Research based in Florence, has observed for five years teaching practices of isolated schools widespread all over the Italian territory, with particular attention to the mountain and the small islands where the small schools are mainly based.
From observation of three main network of schools (Marettimo, on the Egadi island; a network of schools in Liguria, a network of school in Friuli Venezia Giulia and a network of school in Emilia Romagna and Toscana) emerged two main models of teaching within this kind of schools: A common learning environment, where two or more classrooms work together on a common school subject project using different kind of technological setting. In this case distance learning is complementary. The joining link between physical place (classroom) and the videoconferencing time is a shared virtual learning environment used to collaborating or sharing of tools and digital contents between students or between teachers.

The shared lesson, is based on every day distance learning activities. Two classrooms (with students of different levels) of different schools using videonferencing system on a daily basis sharing the same lesson. Small size group of students of the same school level work together. In this case technologies are essential and the main methodologies used are the flipped classroom, webquest and some kinds of evaluation and self-evaluation between the two classrooms.

Keywords:

Homeschooling, distance school, VLE, collaborative activities, non-graded classroom.