Abstract:

COVID19 outbreak brought challenges to project management that was beyond our expectations. From 2020 to the present date, Mentortec's team performed four national teachers training, that had to be adapted to online context. This implied that all teaching methodologies, examples of warm-ups, icebreakers, new learning techniques needed to be suddenly switched.

The main objectives were:
(1) to prepare the teachers training and
(2) to assure that teachers could later implement this new knowledge and educational techniques in the context of distance learning, quite different from what teachers are used to.

Both the BePart project and EAR project address the promotion of innovation in the schools’ approach related to citizenship education, assuming the participation and involvement of young people in the process of citizenship and social inclusion. Both rely on a student-centred pedagogy, characterized by promoting active learning by involving learners in the exploration of real-world challenges and problems. If, on the one hand, BePart uses a participatory approach that places youth in the centre of their development and growth, and the teacher emerges as the facilitator of this process; in the EAR project the teacher combines the Socratic method with the theatre techniques to explore themes and concepts that young people feel the need to discuss and that have meaning for them, that is, with which they identify themselves.

The training took place with synchronous and asynchronous moments and more than 120 teachers at the national level participated in the actions. Each project had a specific platform where all the materials were made available so that teachers can continue to have access and explore further the contents if they wish. In addition to the Zoom and Teams platforms, the trainers used collaborative tools (Mentimeter, Miro, Padlet) that allowed teachers to actively participate in the sessions, but also to know how to use them later in their classes with the students. Although both training actions were aimed at lower secondary and secondary level teachers, adherence was significant and we had teachers from primary level to higher education.

The feedback received was quite positive in both cases. All teachers considered it important to receive training in pedagogical and innovative methods and strategies to ensure the involvement of students in activities and the acquisition of knowledge. Teachers also considered it essential to keep them motivated towards teaching. With teachers and students deprived of direct contact, which is the basis of the educational relationship that the school promotes, teacher training has become a challenge in this pandemic period, aiming to respond to the eminent needs that the context itself provided.

The commitment, resilience, responsibility and excellence of the team, schools’ leaders and teachers made it possible that, even at distance and without human contact, teachers reinforced their knowledge and competences on citizenship education, dialectic method, project-based learning methodologies and co-creation processes. These professionals, who are educators by vocation, showed us that different and complementary innovative strategies planned to be implemented face-to-face can work perfectly in an online format when we work with passion.

Keywords:

Teacher training, distance learning, citizenship education, active participation, project-based learning.