More than 50 speakers from Serbia, the region and the UK prepared interesting presentations about creative ways of using ICT in education.
Apart from the presentations held at the conference (halls 'Space', 'Insert' and 'Alt'), the fair exhibitors organised lectures and presentations at their stands and at the central fair stand Enter ExpoHub.
Here are some of the many speakers that had their sessions at the New Technologies in Education in 2015.
Dejan is a lecturer at the Kingston University in London. He talked about ICT-driven, but also ICT-enabled, transformation which is endemic across the board of activities and roles, for both lecturers and students in the 21st century Higher Education. He also presented the field of Learning Design (LD) which was motivated into existence by the mission to assist in managing this transformation. Key tenet of LD is that of Teaching as Design Science.
Frosina is a defectologyst and a teacher. In her presentation she presented the concept of intercultural education, its advantages and disadvantages. She showed an example of how to incite intercultural activities with students through new technologies.
Gareth is engaged in curriculum innovation and learning design with a successful track record of leading educational change at international, national and local level.
Gareth shared seven key design principles that are the hallmarks of engaging and effective learning. He also illustrated the different ways that ICT can be harnessed to bring these design principles to life.
Too often, education policy is driven by fads and fashions. How can teachers discriminate between passing whims and reliable research? Gareth Mills showed how ICT can be harnessed to enhance what we know makes good learning.
Goran is currently working at the Optoelectronics Research Centre, University of Southampton. In this presentation he described the Peer Instruction method implemented via Electronic Voting. Then, he then briefly introduced the Just-in-Time-Teaching method, used in a form of assignments posted on the Blackboard online environment. Finally, he gave recommendations for interactive teaching of engineering subjects.
Gordana works at the Croatian academic and research network – CARNet in the Department of education support. CARNet has been working on projects introducing ICT into Croatian schools for over 15 years, leading to a massive structural project encompassing approximately 70 per cent of schools and aiming for a digitally mature education system. One of the key projects contributing to digital maturity of Croatian schools is ICT Curricula.
In the presentation Ivan first outlined the characteristics and importance of technology enhanced learning and open educational resources in higher education. Then he presented the BAEKTEL project, "Blending academic and entrepreneurial knowledge in technology enhanced learning", as well as the Centre for e-learning and distance education at the University of Belgrade.
Jaroslaw is an expert in IT and Education sectors and is responsible for technology solutions delivery at Pearson. As a member of the Polish Chamber of Information Technology and Telecommunications he is working closely with other education vendors, government and NGOs. He has been awarded Bronze Cross of Merit of the Republic of Poland in regards to his service in IT and Education sectors.
Jelena is a teaching assistant at the Faculty of Philology in Belgrade. She showed an example of good practice of using e-learning portfolios in university teaching among students with unequal experience with and access to technology. She also gave some advice on how to maximise the benefits of using modern technology despite the technical limitations of the existing conditions in teaching.
Jelena works as a defectologist and pedagogue. In her presentation, she talked about inclusive education in Serbia, autism and its features, the use of ICT in the process of inclusion of children with autism and examples of good practice in the use of ICT in an inclusive process of children with autism.
Kristina is an English language teacher. In her presentation, she talked about how modern technology gives teachers an advantage they have never had before, and how it should be used as a didactical tool to improve the learning process. By using it properly, it will probably encourage students to take more control over their own learning in the future.