TOY - Trainers Online for Youth
This is a reference for Joanna Hoffman
Dig-It Up! is a training course aiming to share and propose ways and techniques of using digital tools and new media in non formal education with youngsters.
These were our main aims:
- getting familiar with popular digital tools
- experiencing various spaces (open-air, analog/digital) to create a supportive learning environment
- fostering an open attitude towards new technologies and the use of internet
- developing innovative methods including digital tools for youth work
- bringing people of different (professional) backgrounds together to share experiences about digitalized youth
Youth workers often complain about the time that youngsters spend online or playing video games etc, so we wanted to address their need to understand what is to be found there by youngsters that they can't find in "normal" non formal education activities, and to find a way to offer youngsters activities and proposals involving them with similar methodologies and tools.
Most of the participants were involved in youth organizations or youth centres / services, so they came with the goal of a better understanding how to deal with youth and technology in their activities, which was our main aim.
The group was make up of 23 participants from these Countries: Austria, Belgium, Croatia, Finland, France, Germany, Greece, Ireland, Italy, Luxembourg, Poland, Portugal, Slovak Republic, Spain, Switzerland, Turkey.
In the team we were 4 from Austria, Greece, Italy, Poland.
We used a wide set of non formal education methods, mostly peer learning sessions, group work and cooperation games, including a number of activities specially designed by us to fit the aims of this course: a treasure-hunt game all around our venue run trough social media, a geocaching session in the parks of Rome, a lip dub movie designing and shooting session through group work.
The activities managed to foster the knowledge of digital tools and digital skills of the participants with the aim of using them in designing new non formal education activities with youngsters.
The final evaluation scored an average value of 4.66 out of 5 regarding overall personal enrichment of participants and all questions in the evaluation form got an average value ranking over 4 out of 5.
Watch our DIG-It up trailer: http://youtu.be/i6QrJSVFSmE
Read the social report (with Storify) including participants posts in various social media: http://sfy.co/f0cCZ
I was a member of the training team, and I worked with my 3 colleagues to design the whole programme and the different activities, to test them in other context before the actual training course, and of course as a full time trainer during the course with the rest of the team.