The Erasmus+ project „Flexible Tailored Learning Pathway for Everyone“ (FlexLearn) is the partnership of 4 European VET institutions, whose objective is to contribute by sharing the best practices in the educational field, to improve the skills of the teachers, trainers and the key persons in Inclusive and Tailored Learning process. As a result of this cooperation, they create a web-based Competence Collection of educational approaches and methods and increase the capacity of operating at a transnational level.Period: 24 monthsParticipants: European VET institutions; the Key persons of arranging the teaching/training process, Educators.Aim: To improve the flexibility, accessibility and inclusion in education through tailored pathways, to promote the quality of VET through increasing the skills of the people who are responsible for putting it into practice – educators, education specialists, key-persons in Educational leadership.Necessity: The Project is called into life by Haapsalu Vocational Education and Training Centre. Due to the statistics, about 22% of the students drop out of VET schools in Estonia every year. There are a lot of students whom it is difficult to access and maintain in studies in mainstream ways, especially the risk groups (SEN-students, low-skilled adults and students, who are living in the countryside and are difficult to reach). To find out the ways to make learning more flexible and reachable for these groups, the project concentrates on topics, which are relevant in all of the participating countries. Due to the pre-project communication between the partners, we have found out the strengths of each country, which has been the general base for working out the topics for LTTA meetings. Together created web-based Competence Collection Box will be a necessary working tool for Educators’ in Inclusive and Tailored Learning process. International experiences that the participants gain from the meetings would extend and develop their educators' competences and improve the quality and accessibility of Education in every participating country.Main activities:3 Transnational project meetings, 2 specialists from every country to monitor and evaluate the progress of the project, share feedback and work with the Competence Collection4 Training Activities, 4 participants (Teachers, Education specialists and leaders) from each partner organization. Every partner organizes one LTTA meeting which includes the teaching program for 5 days. Every Training Activity is focused on a certain topic due to the strengths and experiences of the partner organization:Finland - Tailored Learning Pathways for different students. Ireland - RPL - Recognition of Prior Learning and work experiences according to curricula and learning outcomesNetherlands - Learning Methods focused on developing student`s self-management, study and activity skills (project training, simulation, group work)Estonia - Digital approaches and Flexible Long-distance Learning Solutions (e-learning, development of digital competences, digital environments, and digital security).During every activity:The host partner introduces the Educational system and the learning process at their organization and generally in their country. The host institution gives an overview of the focus topic and the approaches implemented in their school and country. Each partner presents the activities and approaches of their school according to the topic. Additional activities according to the choice of the hosting partner, to expand the background of the topic - involving experts, visits to local organizations, practical workshops/teamwork activities to share the best practices in use. As a result of the activities, the best approaches according to the topic are worked out and added to the web-based Competence Collection. Participating teams will evaluate the gained knowledge of LTTA and make conclusions. After the training activity, every participating institution organizes an evaluation activity with the staff (round table forum, discussion, presentation etc) to find out how to implement it. The Coordinator of every participating organisation is responsible for completing the electronic feedback.The main impact of this project will occur in the rise of the quality of teaching and educational management in every participating country. As a result, the participating organizations and the participants have more knowledge and skills in the Inclusive and Tailored Learning process and implementation of necessary approaches, they are experts in every relevant topic the project activities covered. As an additional value, they have created a widely available web-based Competence Collection, which is a freeware tool and will be shared with other VET institutions.

This is a Strategic partnership project between Nome vocational college, Norway (mostly called Nome throughout the application), TKNIKA, Spain and Riveria, Finland.The project has the overall goal to change the way vocational education and training supports VET pupils learning by introducing VR and VR-games as teaching methods. Since pupils success at schools depends on accomplished teachers, our focus in this project is VET-teachers and how a group of early adopters can collaborate, develop and exchange knowledge on best practice when introducing Virtual Reality (VR) Educational Technology (Ed Tech) as a supplement to traditional teaching with books and other flat screens. This project is about how a group of approximately 20 teachers during guidance over about two years explore Ed Tech and then also develop guidelines, or a manual, for other VET Teachers in general on how to check relevance when presented for VR software. It will also explore how teachers should plan, conduct and evaluate VET lessons that include VR sessions for the pupils. Finally the project will also present a list of VR games with relevance for different subjects, so that non experienced VET Teachers get a starting kit and a guide for how to introduce VR in their teaching. This relevance will be presented in English, Spanish, Finnish and Norwegian so that it can be shared with Teachers in many countries. If it is a success it might be translated into all EU-languages.There are no requirements that teachers should know anything about VR before they join the project. This is meant for beginners so they will have a good understanding of what other VET teachers may wonder about when it comes to VR. Professors and Ed Tech experts will be invited to the workshops to give lessons on relevant topics, and some of them have already initiated that they are interested. The project has a main focus on how to make things work practically for both teachers and pupils. However, theory on pedagogy, motivational psychology and neuroscience is also a part of this way of taking classroom teaching closer to what the students face in reality. While the real world is three dimensional, traditional class room teaching is based on two dimensional flat screens or flat papers. The difference in experience for the pupil can be compared with the difference between watching a movie and actually walk into the story and interact in the plot. This digital reality is simulation reality, either it is anatomy and physiology in humans, it can be about how to drive big forestry machines, how to prevent or handle risky situations when working with electricity or it can be like walking into geometry when learning that in mathematics. The interaction between human and machine may be very different between different games, and we guess that teachers need to learn what the VR Ed Tech can offer. We think this is comparable with gaming except from that the software content and actions has to do with situations or subjects, like Health Care, Constructions, Forestry or Milling and Turning. Our goal is to let VET Teachers test VR in their own VET classrooms/workshops and then exchange experiences with their partners in this project. So, they will, during the project period, develop some common guidelines for best practice for VET Teachers in general about 1) Checking if VR is relevant, and if so 2) present a guide for inexperienced VET Teachers about how to plan, do and evaluate VET lessons with VR.Students on different levels of higher education will be invited to use parts of this as fieldwork or parts of their grades. This project will most likely be a subject of study for both technical and pedagogical students.The project will end in an international conference on VR in VET education. This conference will be held in the Vestfold and Telemark region in Norway.

"DIG IT project focused on cooperation for innovation and exchange of good practices between educators, schools and organizations. The project covered a variety of topics which link to labour market issues, youth unemployment, early school leaving, combating failure in education, entrepreneurial learning, implementing ICT technologies and digital tools and social media into education, enhancing both teachers’ and students’ digital competences. DIG IT project specifically targeted students and continued the ""Repérer-Réparer-Raccrocher"" (RRR) Project (2013-2015) which aimed to prevent dropout. RRR project trained teachers in Finland, Greece, Romania and other countries with innovative teaching and learning methods focused on the theory of multiple intelligences.The objectives of DIG IT project were linked with different strategic frameworks such as Education & Training 2020: Making lifelong learning and mobility a reality, improving the quality and efficiency of education and training, promoting equity, social cohesion, and active citizenship and enhancing creativity and innovation, including entrepreneurship, at all levels of education and training.The key element of the project was the method of Digital Storytelling which was used as a way to reflect and document the workplace visits students executed during the transnational events. Students gained knowledge about the labour market skills and entrepreneurship through interviews and discussions with professionals and high-profile decision makers in Europe. These experiences were shared with Digital Stories. Digital Storytelling combines the art of telling stories with a variety of digital multimedia, such as images, audio and video.DIG IT activities can be divided into five phases:1. Planning and training for the mobilities in home school. Use of social media and digital tools to connect with the partners.2. Visits in the companies and social partner organizations. Interviews and discussions with professionals and high-profile decision makers in Europe.
3. Digital Storytelling workshops for reflecting and documenting the visits. Editing the recorded interviews.4. Evaluation, feedback, reflection at the home institution with the use of social media, digital tools etc. 5. Dissemination.Educators’ activities also included: project meetings, hands-on workshops on Digital Storytelling and social media tools & virtual worlds in education, group discussions etc. During the visits to work places students and teachers had an insight in the life of entrepreneurs. Conversations and the material gathered for the digital stories made the experiences deep and lead the students and teachers into a profound understanding of the skills needed in labour market. This has affected the way DIG IT teachers teach and to the updating of the contents of our vocational studies. Representatives of the labour market have had influence in many positive ways to students’ attitude towards studies and teachers’ way of approaching vocational subjects. The cooperation between students, teachers and representatives has been genuine and rewarding.Approximately 170 students and 50 teachers from five countries worked together in four transnational training events and in two transnational meetings. A kick off meeting with an educators’ workshop in Finland in October 2015 started the activities and an evaluation & dissemination meeting in Thessaloniki, Greece in May 2017 closed the project. Two teachers from each participating organization took part in these meetings.DIG IT ensured access to the transnational training events on an equal basis, especially for individuals at risk of being excluded and from disadvantaged backgrounds. The opportunity to participate in the project workshops and mobilities was especially given to those students that had challenges in staying at school, had less opportunities to participate in multicultural activities, had economical challenges to participate or felt insecure to travel alone.DIG IT – project aimed to empower students and teachers, raise students’ awareness of their character and abilities, to improve their IT and digital skills while working on Digital Storytelling, to raise attainment of underachieving students, to increase the knowledge of the labor market and broaden their horizons about the variety of jobs available.The results can be seen in changes in individuals; in the way they work, collaborate in everyday life and also being able work in an international environment. The process of empowerment in individuals included encouraging and developing the skills for self-sufficiency, independent decision making and in the way how students approach learning.The project benefited advanced use of digital tools and adaptation of the use Digital Storytelling model, which has been maintained and spread in the partner network as well as outside the network. Handbook of Digital Storytelling has created sustainability. DIG IT videos will be found in Youtube: https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCSSIFQC52u0EFgiacbgN1AADIG IT FB: https://www.facebook.com/pg/digiterasmus/about/?ref=page_internalDIG IT guide in different languages & guide videos and information about DIG IT- project will be found in project web page: http://digitproject.weebly.com/guides---portuguese.html DIG IT photos and descriptions of workshops: http://digit-erasmus.tumblr.com"

"DIG IT 2 is continuing the work of the previous project, DIG IT, in promoting ownership of shared values, equality and non- discrimination through innovative and integrated approaches. DIG IT covered a variety of topics which link to labor market issues, youth unemployment, early school leaving, entrepreneurial learning and implementing digital tools and social media into education. DIG IT specifically targeted students and it continued the ""Repérer-Réparer-Raccrocher"" (RRR) Project (2013-2015) which aimed to prevent dropout. DIG IT 2 follows the same steps with additional activities such as teacher training and elements of career guidance and entrepreneurship education integrated in the project activities. Students, educational and student services staff from Finland, Greece, Germany Italy, Spain, Portugal and Romania will work together in 5 workshops and 2 transnational meetings. The number of stakeholders who are affected by the execution and outcomes of the project are significantly larger than in previous project. The number of partner organizations has grown and more units inside organizations are taking part in the project. Together approximately 100 students and 40 staff members will be participating in the project workshops. Participating students are of all ages and diverse cultural-socio-economic backgrounds; this diversity underlines that lifelong learning is a way of thinking, praising learning in all ages. Students will visit enterprises with a specific theme and create a digital story of the experience. Each country will introduce an inspiring keynote speaker with entrepreneurship/ start up theme.The key element is the method of Digital Storytelling which is used as a way to reflect, document and share the workplace visits students execute during the transnational events. In DIG IT 2 the work place visits concentrate on the element of entrepreneurship. Visits will be executed in small innovative enterprises, where one-to-one encounters between the entrepreneurs and the students will happen. The topics raised during DIG IT will be further enhanced in DIG IT 2: How to provide skills for employability, how to bring the learning experience closer to the reality of the working environment, how to enhance students and educators entrepreneurial skills and labor market knowledge (Riga 2015).DIG IT 2 will add new elements such as team coaching, entrepreneurship training and career guid-ance in the project activities. Team coaching professionals will help the participants see learning in a new way and teachers will be trained in the fundamentals of team coaching. Team coaching will be brought into project activities. Team coaching relies in the key factor that work acts as a way to include all the team members in the activities and in learning. Team coaching principals value all individuals and recognize their diverse contributions to the work. Team coaching enhances many skills: the ability to communicate, listen and share, to work cooperatively and work together towards a common goal. Team coaching promotes democratic values, fundamental rights, intercul-tural understanding and active citizenship. DIG IT 2 promotes and flourishes the entrepreneurial spirit, which we think is something everybody has inside them. It's a way of thinking. This sprit encourages participants find new ways to their own career. Entrepreneurship coach will be actively involved in the project. Career counseling professionals from participating countries will be sharing their best practices in the project workshops. Multi professional team will form a way to collaborate, share expertise in coaching.Special attention is given to the development of social, civic and intercultural competences, online safety, digital well-being in order to tackle discrimination, bullying (including cyberbullying), fake news and other forms of online misinformation. In the core of the team learning are “dialog training sessions”, discussions in dialog circles, which follow these four team coaching principals: 1. Listen 2. Respect 3. Wait for your turn 4. Be sincere when you talk.The results can be seen in changes in individuals; in the way they work, collaborate in everyday life and also being able to work in an international environment. The process of empowerment in individuals, includes encouraging and developing the skills for self-sufficiency, independent decision making and the way students approach learning. Partnership between educators, students and the labor market will strengthen. Teachers will learn how to integrate new technologies in their work. Teachers will gain theoretical and concrete knowledge of new innovative pedagogical approaches such as team coaching and entrepreneur-ship education. These new approaches will advance learners’ critical thinking skills and prepare learners for twenty-first century competencies and skills."

"<< Background >>With the expansion of regional and national economies into a global marketplace, education has critical importance as a primary factor in allowing young adults to enter the workforce and advance economically, as well as to share in the social, health, and other benefits associated with education and productive careers. Vocational education has become increasingly a priority over the last few years, both for the member states as national educational reforms and across E.U.Several countries have re-branded VET to reflect its broader scope and improve its image. In times when following different learning paths in various contexts throughout one’s life becomes the norm, VET’s profile is expanding − sometimes faster, sometimes less rapidly – to anticipate and reflect changes in the world of work, domestically and internationally.The quality of education is considered in all Member States to be a concern of the highest political priority. High levels of knowledge, competencies and skills are considered to be the very basic conditions for active citizenship, employment and social cohesion. A recent CEDEFOP publication (European cooperation in VET: one process, many stops. Developments in vocational education and training policy, 2018 ) mentioned as challenges of VET education the following: the lower quality of VET ((compared to general secondary education), lack of a clearly articulated vision for work-based learning, roles and responsibilities of the different partners in work-based learning are not clearly defined. These issues have been identified in all partner countries and, particularly, for the partners’ context.Within this context the project raises up from the need to improve quality in education and ensure a continuous professional development of VET teachers, careers guidance officers, school counselors. Involving professionals from various perspectives of VET education we aim not only to achieve positive results in career guidance but to ensure a proper comprehensive approach to VET education.The purpose of the project is the elaboration of complex and coherent counseling and guidance programmes regarding the selection of vocational educational pathways by students.Such ideas come as a direct result of identified needs of VET teachers and school counselors, equally.This project addresses the needs of various target groups such as:>School counselors - the need to better cooperate with VET teachers, the need to implement large scale and consistent career guidance programmes in schools, the need to improve cooperation with VET teachers>VET teachers and specialists - the need to use a practical approach in teaching, the need to increase skills related to presenting the real work life opportunities for the VET/ dual education graduates>Participating organisations - the need to improve cooperation between different sectors, in the field of VET education>Students - the need to match skills and interests with the educational offer and the labor market possibilities, the need to increase their motivation for selecting a vocational training<< Objectives >>Consistent with the identified needs and the scope of the project we aim for reaching the following objectives:O1. Development of comprehensive programs for career guidance and counseling, compatible with the educational context of each partner by achieving 4 project results over the 27 months of project lifespan.O2. Improving skills, knowledge and attitudes regarding career guidance and counselling through the participation of 84 VET teachers /school counselors/ career counselors/educational service providers at one of the 3 transnational training events from May 2022 to June 2023.O3. Empowerment of at least 700 teachers- VET teachers and counsellors/school psychologists/economic agents/ VET educational service providers in the use of tools on career guidance and counselling, developed within the project by organizing 7 multiplier events and dissemination activities between September and November 2023.O4. Increase the rate of social inclusion and professional integration by participating of 800 future graduates of vocational/dual education in at least 10 activities of counseling and career guidance according to individual/group needs, between May 2022 and October 2023.There is a multiplier effect in long term due to the implementation of the project. It will not only benefit the participants, participation organisations, target groups and other relevant stakeholders, but there will be a large scale beneficial impact to the society (locally, nationally and among EU member states) because the increase of the rate of professional insertion and social inclusion will boost the creation of new jobs, reduce unemployment and will also contribute to innovation for further economic growth in European level (macro economic effect).This proposal intends to have a major impact at local, national and European levels, as it is designed to provide participants with innovative methods and resources.<< Implementation >>The planned project activities are consistent with the objectives and are:- elaboration of 4 project results- 3 joint staff learning events- 3 transnational project meetings- 7 multiplier events towards the end of the project lifespan- 1 international project conference- local events and training sessions- project documents, reports<< Results >>SOS A Career for Success plans to realize high impact results. Actions and deliverables will focus on the completion of the following project results (in all partner languages), during the project implementation :1. A training programme ,,Innovative guidance and counseling strategies for a successful career” for school counselors in the guidance and career counseling field 2. An online platform ,,SOS A CAREER FOR SUCCESS” for career information and counseling. This platform will include useful tools for VET professionals, e-learning modules, a downloadable vocational counseling toolkit, information for students and teachers.3. A training programme ,,Practically-applied activities for VET professionals” for VET teachers / providers of educational services VET focusing on a more applicative approach and a better response to the learning needs of VET students.4. A practical career guide ,,What will you do tomorrow?"" - directly addressed to students facing the decision of choosing an educational path, especially, in the VET fieldNon tangible results :1. Increase in the quality of vocational counseling activities, as a direct result from enabling school counselor with new and updated competencies and equipping them with tools to doso2. Enhancing the skills of VET teachers3. Improvement in the organizational capacity of project partners to respond to the needs of beneficiaries of education4. Establish cooperation in the field of VET education between organizations from 7 participating countries in the E+ programme of the European Union.5. Provision of positive solutions to the specific requirements of the VET field education professionals, in order to promote better student access to high quality professional educationsystemsPartners will create most of the contents both electronically and physically (where applicable)In addition to the concrete results described in this point and elsewhere, the project is expected to have a fundamental and lasting impact on pedagogy and innovation in practice for VET school teachers across Europe, modernizing and making more relevant and motivating many aspects of the teaching, through the use of technology. The project has major potential for enhancing target group understanding, reflection and collaborative contributions to the creation of knowledge in VET schools.On medium term, all the participants will develop skills and abilities of communicating in English, will become more active European citizens and will develop their will develop their social skills - optimizing skills of cooperation, work in networking, assuming roles in the team but also personal autonomy and self-efficacy - increasing self-confidence and motivation to perform, to learn how to think critically and independently, increasing the desire to learn autonomously.In the long term, it will improve the process of transition from education and training to the labor market; the increase of the degree of insertion on the labor market and the acquired digital and language skills can help them to efficiently insert themselves on the European labor market, increasing their chances of personal and professional development."