Active Learning Blog

Active learning blog

The Active Learning Blog created by the Novigado project focuses on active learning, innovative learning spaces and integration of ICT in present and future classrooms and schools. In this blog we will read stories written by the project partners, Future Classroom Ambassadors, FCL network labs, teacher trainers, invited experts, etc. If you would like to submit a story to be published, please send it to fcl@eun.org.

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Blogs

School at home: an opportunity for change in education

School at home

Changes in education are usually very slow. That is the feeling of most people who work in this field. Is it really true? Nowadays, due to the pandemic, this can be viewed from another angle. Life proved us wrong. The pandemic made changes in schools overnight.

In one day we had students in classrooms everywhere and the next day we had them learning online. With some mistakes on the way, but using resources available, many schools made impressive changes in ways to attend to students’ needs.

Without time to make organised changes, plenty of schools and teachers showed great capacity of adjustment. Emergency climate ruled the way. The distance learning started, with or without technological equipment, with or without Internet access, depending on the reality of each country.

Teachers from all over Europe prepared courses online, videoconferences and TV classes, sent activities by mail, used the local authorities, and any other means available to deliver tasks to the students. They showed a courage never seen and are leading students from the present to the future.

Are they using the same methodologies? It depends, but all over new ways of teaching in new environments are being used.

How does this relate to Active Learning? Which new methodologies are being used?

All over Europe, teachers have the objective of ensuring that all children and students continue to learn whether they are at home or at school. Schools have organised themselves to define strategies to overcome the difficulties of the moment and methodologies to use were one of the focuses of their work.

This could entail for example:

- Improvement on collaborative work between teachers.
- Opening of new communication channels.
- Designing a model of distance learning adapted to each school's reality.
- Designing monitoring plan and changes in the assessment process.
- Debates around methodologies, choice of online platforms, offline strategies and equipment to be used.
- Involvement of stakeholders within the organization and from the community (parents’ associations, municipalities, fire department, social associations, equipment companies, sponsors, NGOs, etc.)
- Strategies to address children with special needs.
- Changing dynamics: this is a new path and has to be analysed through the whole process and according to changing events, which requires constant improvement.

For most teachers this means realising that changes had to be made in the tasks they sent to students, methodologies to keep them working collaboratively, flexibility in the learning process and differentiation, and new ways to access students work.

All these areas are those that active learning is all about. So, yes temporal school closures has given schools and teachers the opportunity to apply and evaluate their advantages and disadvantages. This will allow them to prepare new ways to work on learning strategies and lead us to the future.


Written by Cidália Marques, Deputy Headmaster at the Agrupamento de Escolas Fernando Casimiro Pereira da Silva (AEFCPS), Portugal. Cidalia is also a primary school teacher, educational instructor and researcher. Nowadays she is teaching coding and robotics. Her specializations are ICT in education, E-portfolios, ICT in special education and safer use of Internet.

Key Info

  • Funding: Erasmus+ Programme Key Action 2 (School Education - Cooperation for innovation and the exchange of good practices)
  • Start time: 01-12-2019
  • Duration: 30 months
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Erasmus+ Programme (funded with the support by)

The Novigado project is funded with support from the European Commission's Erasmus+ Programme. This publication/website reflects the views only of the author, and the EC cannot be held responsible for any use which may be made of the information contained therein.