Abstract:

The growing use of information and communication technologies (ICT) has enabled the emergence of new learning environments that aim to meet the needs of modern society, specifically in the online and digital domain.

In this context, e-learning emerged as a recognized mean for the diffusion of education and in-service training, presenting itself as a modality that aims to respond to the current challenges of lifelong learning. It as progressively emerged as a complement to the traditional training systems.

Given the importance and complexity of this topic in the field on professional training, this study aim to support the modernization of training practices in the area of continuous training of magistrates, through the design of a distance education model.

As such, the project is organised around the following research questions:
I) which needs and interests are associated with the implementation of a hybrid model for continuous training of magistrates;
II) which features should a model of this nature present;
III) what is the level of suitability of the proposed model considering this professional context and target audience.

Regarding the previous questions and the characteristics of the agents to be interviewed, 9 interviews were held in a semi structured format, a total of 13 respondents: 3 one-on-one interviews to the direction of the Legal Studies Center; 1 individual interview with the coordination of the Department of training and 5 collective interviews to 9 teachers belonging to several areas of jurisdiction. This phase of the project took place between July 31st and October8th, 2015.

Based on the analysis of the gathered information from respondents, we could see that is widely recognized the usefulness, viability and relevance of the design and implementation of a training model for training of magistrates. For this model, is considered as appropriate the adoption of option a blended-learning scheme, also called hybrid model. Similarly, we identified as essential to the design of this model the specificity of this formative context, training and professional needs of the recipients, the model in question should consider a high level of flexibility regarding: session typology; structure and organization; the sessions duration; strategies and pedagogical practices and evaluation mechanisms.

Regarding the total issues of research undertaken, this work involves also the accomplishment of the following stages: analysis of existing distance education models internationally on similar bodies construction of the proposed training model the distance; evaluation of the model of distance training by experts; and phase 5: improvement of the model of distance training.

Keywords:

Distance learning, e-learning, professional training, magistrates.