CAS Digital Learning in Emergencies (2022-23)/module4-ibrahimkhatip88
Introduction
This page is part of CAS Digital Learning in Emergencies (module 4) and is prepared by Ibrahim and Abed. Digital Learning in Emergency Certifies Advanced Studies (DLiE CAS) is a studying program launched by the University of Geneva to build the necessary knowledge and skills to understand the strength and complexity of digital learning in emergencies. The course objectives are:
- Develop knowledge about emergency contexts and the educational issues related to them
- Develop knowledge of different pedagogical tools that allow for the distancing of teaching
- Develop skills in program design
- Develop skills in digital literacy
- Critically analyse distance learning projects
- Develop skills in Open Education training design
- Develop cross-disciplinary digital skills
I (https://www.linkedin.com/in/ibrahim-khatip-39a0b8181/) and Abed (https://www.linkedin.com/in/abed-alvahab-debbas-694423239/) are an education specialist working in Education in Emergency sectors for Syria response for ten years. We are responsible for designing educational responses for the crisis-affected children in Syria and Turkey. Our project - Safe Schools learning program - targets humanitarian workers in the education sector in civil society organizations, local authorities, and school principals in northwest Syria. The project meets INEE 2nd domain “access learning environment” -standard 2 protection and well-being – which aims to present that learning environments are secure and safe and promote the protection and the psychosocial well-being of learners, teachers, and other education personnel. Also, the project will contribute to achieving SDG4 -Quality Education-, target 4. a “ Build and upgrade education facilities that are child, disability and gender sensitive and provide safe, non-violent, inclusive and effective learning environments for all”. We aim to design this project as OE and provide OER for the learners. a
Module Learning Outcomes
- The learners will be able to define the concept of OE and OER
- The learners will be able to define Open Licences and Copyright
- The learners will be able to access OER available in the Syrian context
Study Plan
| Activity number | activity | duration | date | product |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | What is OE, challenges, and issues | 5 hours | 28Dec | Summary of challenges are related to OE |
| 2 | What is OER and what are its principles | 6 hours | 29 Dec | a bullet list of OER types |
| 3 | Open licences | 6 hours | 30 Dec | summary of different resources explored with regard to CC and the 5R and different Creative Commons (CC) licences descriped |
| 4 | OE platforms that are availble for workers in Syrian Context | 31 Dec | 3 hours | Summary prepared on different OE platforms available in Syrian context |
Activities
Activity 1
The European Commission's definition of open education is: "a way of carrying out education, often using digital technologies. Its aim is to widen access and participation to everyone by removing barriers and making learning accessible, abundant, and customisable for all. “Open Education is both an umbrella term and a complex ecosystem that operates on a number of very different levels. It is inherently open in the way it functions and cannot be captured by a single definition. It considers knowledge as a common good. It is neither synonymous of free nor of extractive approaches. It is a means to foster knowledge societies by leveraging collective human intelligence” (Baker, 2017). Wikipedia defined Open Education as a collective term to describe institutional practices and programmatic initiatives that broaden access to the learning and training traditionally offered through formal education systems. The qualifier “open” of open education refers to the elimination of barriers that can preclude both opportunities and recognition for participation in institution-based learning. One aspect of openness in or “opening up” education is the development and adoption of open educational resources. It offers multiple ways of teaching and learning, building and sharing knowledge. It also provides a variety of access routes to formal and non-formal education, and connects". (Opening up Education: A Support Framework for Higher Education Institutions, 2016 Open education OE joins resources, tools, and practices that employ a framework of open sharing to improve educational access and effectiveness worldwide. Open Education combines the traditions of knowledge sharing and creation with 21st-century technology to create a vast pool of openly shared educational resources while harnessing today’s collaborative spirit to develop educational approaches that are more responsive to learners’ needs. Why is Open Education important? Open Education OE is a very important tool to access education especially in developing countries or for crisis-affected youth. Education is an essential tool for individuals and society to solve the challenges of the present and seize the opportunities of the future. However, the current provision of education is limited by educational institutions’ capacity, consequently, this resource is available to the few, not the many. The digital revolution offers a potential solution to these limitations, giving a global audience unprecedented access to free, open, and high-quality educational resources.
Activity 2
Open Educational Resources (OER) are teaching, learning, and research materials that are either (a) in the public domain or (b) licensed in a manner that provides everyone with free and perpetual permission to engage in the 5R activities 5R activities/permissions were proposed by David Wiley, which include:
- Retain – the right to make, own, and control copies of the content (e.g., download, duplicate, store, and manage)
- Reuse – the right to use the content in a wide range of ways (e.g., in a class, in a study group, on a website, in a video)
- Revise – the right to adapt, adjust, modify, or alter the content itself (e.g., translate the content into another language)
- Remix – the right to combine the original or revised content with other material to create something new (e.g., incorporate the content into a mashup)
- Redistribute – the right to share copies of the original content, your revisions, or your remixes with others (e.g., give a copy of the content to a friend)
Activity 3
Open Licenses are a set of conditions applied to an original work that grant permission for anyone to make use of that work as long as they follow the conditions of the license. A work refers to an original creation, such as a video, song, document, or piece of software, that can be copyright protected. The copyright owner – usually the creator of the work, whether an individual, a group, or a company/organization – can choose to openly license their work if they want others to be able to use it freely, build on it, customize it or improve it. Open licenses therefore give permission to anyone to use the work at no cost, and generally allow anyone to modify the work with no or minimal restriction (such as acknowledging the original author’s work). There are six different license types:
- CC BY: This license allows reusers to distribute, remix, adapt, and build upon the material in any medium or format, so long as attribution is given to the creator. The license allows for commercial use.
- CC BY-SA: This license allows reusers to distribute, remix, adapt, and build upon the material in any medium or format, so long as attribution is given to the creator. The license allows for commercial use. If you remix, adapt, or build upon the material, you must license the modified material under identical terms.
- CC BY-NC: This license allows reusers to distribute, remix, adapt, and build upon the material in any medium or format for noncommercial purposes only, and only so long as attribution is given to the creator
- CC BY-NC-SA: This license allows reusers to distribute, remix, adapt, and build upon the material in any medium or format for noncommercial purposes only, and only so long as attribution is given to the creator. If you remix, adapt, or build upon the material, you must license the modified material under identical terms.
- CC BY-ND: This license allows reusers to copy and distribute the material in any medium or format in unadapted form only, and only so long as attribution is given to the creator. The license allows for commercial use.
- CC BY-NC-ND: This license allows reusers to copy and distribute the material in any medium or format in unadapted form only, for noncommercial purposes only, and only so long as attribution is given to the creator.
Activity 4
12 years of the ongoing crisis in Syria and many sources of education were destroyed, tens of thousands of schools are out of service, and educational teaching staff from all levels (basic education teachers till university teachers and lecturers) left the country. many universities and educational bodies were also partially destroyed or stopped from providing their educational services. In addition before the war, no OER was available in Syria. On the other hand, there are many resources and online platforms available and reachable from over all the world, many of these resources are available even in the Arabic language such as:
- Syrian Digital School: https://www.digitalschoolsy.com/
- udemy: https://www.udemy.com/?utm=08557735da4a7e0bb36e45c77f6dfc16&track=1&pt=2
- Coursera, https://www.coursera.org/
- Kaya: https://kayaconnect.org/
- Shams: Saudi Open education resource: https://shms.sa/
The 1st resource is available for all children from 6 to 18 years old to receive formal education online and have all needed resources for free. The rest of the resources provide training in the Arabic language and it contributes a lot to raising the capacities of Syrian youth during the war.
Project Safe School OE Learning Outcomes
According to Assistance Coordination Unit (ACU) thematic report “Schools in Syria” 2022, 31% (1,452 teachers) of teachers reported that students told them that they did not feel safe at school. Children's access to safe learning environments free of physical or psychological risks in northwest Syria is one of the core objectives of our institution. The absence of legal regulations and policies due to the war in Syria has neglected this aspect and therefore schools have become unsafe places for children and increasing school drop-out ratios.
The aim of the Safe Schools Project is to improve the safety and protection of children in and around the schools in which attendees are working through inquiry-based learning, which in turn will provide concrete inputs into existing School Improvement Plans. In addition, successful work at the school level will support advocacy efforts to replicate and scale up the approach through national policies and systems Learners will be able to:
- Identify protection activities in school
- List protection activities in a safe school
- Integrate protection activities in their school/projects
- Generate plans for safe schools to react if a dangerous event occurs
Time necessary
16 Hours
Detailed description
The project is composed of 9 steps:
- Describing the learning resources
- Setting learning objectives
- Targeting the audience
- Designing learning activities.
- Choosing a learning environment.
- Identifying learning assessments.
- Finding relevant OER for the project
- Designing evaluation criteria to create an Open Badge.
- Sharing the project on an Open platform.
Project Open Educational Resources
All resources are open and have been selected to fit with the context - Syrian context- which is easy to reach and all participants are familiar with INEE and save the children resources. Another resource that is provided is Syrian Digital School which is considered an OER for Syrian students during the crisis. For the project, the following Open Education Resources OER were chosen:
Project Description
The aim of Safe Schools learning program is to improve the safety and protection of children in and around the schools in which attendees are working through inquiry-based learning, which in turn will provide concrete inputs into existing School Improvement Plans. In addition, successful work at the school level will support advocacy efforts to replicate and scale up the approach through national policies and systems.
The project – Safe Schools learning program -targets humanitarian workers in the education sector in civil society organizations, local authorities, and school principals in northwest Syria. The project meets INEE 2nd domain “access learning environment” -standard 2 protection and well-being – which aims to present that learning environments are secure and safe and promote the protection and the psychosocial well-being of learners, teachers, and other education personnel. Also, the project will contribute to achieving SDG4 -Quality Education-, target 4. a “ Build and upgrade education facilities that are child, disability and gender sensitive and provide safe, non-violent, inclusive and effective learning environments for all”.
The modules are:
- Mod 1: Build a Safe Schools Team
- Mod 2: Welcome Safe School Team
- Mod 3: What is Risk
- Mod 4: Reduce and Mitigate Risks
- Mod 5: Take Action
The whole training will be conducted digitally and materials in this training will be available online, open, and will benefit education practitioners who find themselves working in crisis-affected environments.
Target audience
Education practitioners in Northwest Syria including representatives of the Education Directorate, NGOs, and school principals. Participants' age group is between 25-60. All participants have experience in the education sector in Northwest Syria and they are decision-makers in their contexts. Participants are workers in Education Directorate and NGOs who implement/supervise projects.
Project's objective
Global objective
Global goal 1: Education facilities built and upgraded that were child, disability, and gender sensitive and provide safe, non-violent, inclusive, and effective learning environments for all”. (SDG4 / Target 4. a)
Global goal 2: Learning environments are secure and safe and promote the protection and psychosocial well-being of learners, teachers, and other education personnel. (INEE/domain 2 / standard 2)
Specific objective
By the end of the training, 20 education practitioners will be able to list key activities for safe schools, explain how to contextualize Safe Schools activities in Northwest Syria, and develop a plan for advancing Safe Schools in Northwest Syria.
Project design
The main 5 modules identify their learning objectives. The training consists of module 5, based on 3 theoretical approaches and 2 practical approaches, 11 sessions with 16 hours of instructions that will be divided into 2 training days, 8 hours per day including breaks. The modules are:
- Mod 1: Build a Safe Schools Team (1 Session; 3 hrs)
- Mod 2: Welcome Safe School Team (2 sessions; 3 hrs)
- Mod 3: What is Risk (2 sessions; 3 hrs)
- Mod 4: Reduce and Mitigate Risks(3 sessions; 3 hrs)
- Mod 5: Take Action(2 sessions; 4 hrs)
Each module is made up of 2 sessions designed to introduce educational practitioners to key concepts and tools by modeling participatory, interactive, learner’s centered pedagogies that they can experience and then try in their schools/projects. The training modules will be delivered remotely synchronously on Zoom and asynchronous on Google Docs and Google Drive. Participants will be requested to complete homework assignments in between modules and all homework, materials and tasks will be uploaded on Google Drive.
Evaluation criteria
- Learners will be assessed based on a criteria-based reference and summative assessment model
- Each learner will be asked to submit assignments (individual work) by the end of each module that will summarise the skills and strategies attained by the end of each module. A holistic rubric with 4 criteria and weight scales will be used for grading. The assistant will be grading the learners' assignments.
- Learners will be asked to submit group[ work assignments at the end of the module.
- Learners will conduct summative pre and post-test to assess the gap that the learning program covered
- Learners will be asked to submit a final project by the end of the training and will be assessed according to a grading system. An analytic rubric with 4 criteria and 4 levels will be used for grading. The trainer will grade the learners' assignments.
- Assessments will be used to provide diagnostic analysis of learning. It will also be used as verification for certification at the end of the whole training.
- Feedback and evaluation will be given to learners after each submission and all throughout the training during group activities.
Individual performance in group works Assessment Sample
| Criteria | seldom | sometimes | often |
|---|---|---|---|
| Contributed good ideas | |||
| Contributed meaningfully to group discussions. | |||
| Listened to and respected the ideas of others | |||
| Compromised and cooperated | |||
| Completed assigned tasks on time | |||
| Prepared work in a quality manner. | |||
| Took initiative where needed | |||
| Came to class prepared | |||
| contributed significantly to the success of the project. | |||
| Had a good knowledge of technical requirements and how to implement them | |||
| Found appropriate solutions to technical problems | |||
| Saw tasks through to completion |
Individual Assessment Sample
| Criteria (example for module 4: Unit 4.1: Child Protection in Safe schools | Score scale |
|---|---|
| Importance of Child Protection in School well defined | 0 - 4 |
| Child Protection activities listed | 0 - 4 |
| Children rights identified | 0 - 4 |
| Main components of CoC are identified | 0 - 4 |
| Total | X / 16 |
Generic Technical Assessment
| No | Question | Options |
|---|---|---|
| 1 | Which of the following are considered hazards?
(Correct: D) |
A. A medical center on the school premises
B. Earthquake C. Location of the school next to a busy road D. B&C |
| 2 | A code of conduct should only list unacceptable behaviors for the members of the school community
(Correct: B) |
A. True B. False C. Don’t Know/No Response |
| 3 | In which category will you place ‘Standard Operating Procedures for building evacuation in case of an emergency’?
(Correct: C) |
A. Hazard
B. Risk C. Competency/Capacity D. Vulnerability |
| 4 | A school risk assessment should be conducted at least annually
(Correct: A) |
A. True
B. False C. Don’t |
| 5 | Which of the following will contain information about the Alternative School locations in an emergency?
(Correct: C) |
A. School Improvement Plan
B. Code of Conduct C. School Continuity Plan D. Risk and Capacity Assessment |
| 6 | A code of conduct is only meant to provide behavior guidelines for the following:
(Correct: D) |
A. Students
B. Teachers C. Non-teaching staff in school D. All of the above |
| 7 | Members of the complaint committee related to the referral mechanism must not tell the accused of the individual who made the complaint against them.
(Correct: A) |
A. True
B. False C. Don’t Know/No Response |
| 8 | The Safe Schools team will be more successful if there are more adults in the team than children
(Correct: B) |
A. True
B. False C. Don’t Know/No Response |
| 9 | Which of the following makes a child more vulnerable?
(Correct: D) |
A. Separating children from their caregivers
B. Abduction C. Houses in low-lying areas during heavy rains D. All of the above |
| 10 | A School Improvement Plan should only identify mitigation actions that involve construction or civil work. (Eg: construction of school fences, gender separated bathrooms)
(Correct: B) |
A. True
B. False C. Don’t Know/No Response |
| 11 | A child who cannot see should not be a part of the Safe Schools team since their experiences do not apply to the wider school community
(Correct: B) |
A. True
B. False C. Don’t Know |
| 12 | The School Improvement Plan should identify different risk mitigation actions for adults and children
(Correct: A) |
A. Agree
B. Disagree C. Don’t Know/No Response |
| 13 | Which of the following can we plan for to reduce the harm caused?
(Correct: E) |
A. Natural hazards
B. Technological hazards C. Health hazards D. Conflict & violence hazards E. All of the above |
| 14 | A hazard can only have natural causes.
(correct: B |
A. True
B. False C. Don’t Know |
Create an open badge
An open badge will be created based on the following:
| Image | |
| Name | Safe School |
| Alignment | INEE and Save the Children |
| Criteria | Users are awarded this badge when they complete the final assessment of the safe school learning program |
| Badge outcomes | Learners can list key activities for safe schools, explain how to contextualize Safe Schools activities in NWS, and develop a plan for advancing Safe Schools in NWS. |
| Evidence | Completing the assessment |
| Description | The assessment will measure individual work in groups and individually as well as via project of integrating safe school activties in school or project |
| Issued to | (Name of the learner) |
| Assessment method | The used assessment method is a Holistic rubric with 4 criteria and weight scales. Full marks > 16 points |
| Date of issue | TBD |
References
Assistance Coordination Unit (2022). Available at https://acu-sy.org/wp-content/uploads/2022/08/ACU_IMU_Schools-in-Syria_07_Thematic_050822_Eng_-1.pdf . Accessed on the 16th of Nov 2022.
Baker, F. W. (2017). An Alternative Approach: Openness in Education Over the Last 100 Years. TechTrends, 61(2), 130-140. https://doi.org/10.1007/s11528-016-0095-7
European Commision (2020). What is open education?. Available at https://joint-research-centre.ec.europa.eu/what-open-education_en . Last accessed 6 Jan 2022.
INEE (2010) . MINIMUM STANDARDS FOR EDUCATION: Preparedness, Response, Recovery. Available at https://inee.org/minimum-standards . Accessed on the 16th of Nov 2022.
United Nations (2020). Sustainable Development Goals. Available at https://www.un.org/sustainabledevelopment/education/ . Accessed on the 16th of Nov 2022.
Wikipedia (2020). Open education. Available at https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Open_education#cite_note-1. Last accessed at 16 Jan 2023.