AppMentor project continues the work that began during the Leonardo da Vinci Project WorkMentor (2011-1-IS1-LEO05-01263) chosen to be a "success story" by a panel of experts from the Directorate-General for Education and Culture of the European Commission and WorkQual (2014-1-IS01-KA202-O00180). The need for AppMentor in VET has arisen as an increasing partof the learning is conducted during work based learning and during workplacements away from the VET provider. Sometimes it is impossible to travel to the companies and have mentoring sessions on the spot. Many work mentors & mentoring teachers already see the benefits of using mobile technology in mentoring. Also reporting and registering is already done online in many sectors of industry and service. In order to do this work mentors and mentoring techers need tools and encouragement to guide and support them to start using mobile technology when mentoring. They don’t want to be made feel inferior to the students who use different forms of mobile technology and social media. By implementing the outcomes of Appmentor we will give work mentors and teachers the tools needed in order to start using mobile technology when mentoring. This will make mentoring more flexible and it will create a learning experience which is user friendly, meaningful and up to date with the working environment.Students used to using mobile technology (blogs, facebook, Instagram, chats etc) use it because it is useful, flexible, instant and a way to keep track on what is going on. Students might however need support and encouragement to use these forms of mobile technology in a “new” way, a way that encourages and supports learning. Appmentor will provide teachers and work mentors with tools and ideas on how to guide students to use mobile technology and social media as a tool for learningAppmentor aims to: 1) transfer & implement mobile learning to work placements. 2) encourage work mentors to use mobile technology (e.g. apps, social media, virtual learning platforms) when mentoring students/apprentices during work based learning 3) deepen the cooperation as well as information and data sharing between work mentor and mentoring teacher during placement by introducing tools for mobile technology. 3) ensure that all students regardless of where they have their work placement receive continuous mentoring & feedback through mobile technology and thus raising the quality of learning received during work placements.4) introduce tools, methods & materials that support the work mentor and student during work placementsThe project lifespan is 24 months and Appmentor partners will host five transnational project meetings during this period. Each meeting will last for 3 days. In order to ensure time to work on the intellectual outputs there will be 1 meeting held every 5-6 months, the first meeting will be held in September 2016. Throughout the project each partner will cooperate closely with a local Steering group that consists of employers, work mentors, teachers and students. The steering group will meet between the transnational projects to work on the following intellectual outcomes (=tangible results): 1) Online Micro Learning mentoring course, 2) Manual of mobile technology and social media that can be used to facilitate and strengthen the quality of the mentoring process and 3) Guidelines for mentoring students online using mobile technologyAppmentor will result in the following intangible results/impact 1) Better cooperation between the work mentor and teacher, 2) Improved communication between student, work mentor and mentoring teacher, 3) Raised quality of work based learning abroad, 4) Flexible and qualitative mentoring fit for the 21st century and 5) A cultural attitude change towards the idea that learning and training is a copperative task.Dissemination is an important part of the project and all partners will be active in disseminating the project though social media such as Facebook, Twitter, LinkedIn and Instagram. This will also serve as a training for the teachers taking part in the project to use the social media for work . Appmentor will also have a project web page where all intellectual outcomes will be available by the end of the project along with the up to date info on the project work. Appmentor project partners are:P1 = Axxell, Finland (coordinator)P2 = Broadshoulders, UKP3 = IFSAT, NetherlandsP4 = Charlottenlund Upper Secondary School, NorwayP5 = Nantes Terre Atlantique, FranceP6 = Verkmenntaskolinn a Akureyri, IcelandP7 =Education and Mobility, Spain
AppMentor project continues the work that began during the Leonardo da Vinci Project WorkMentor (2011-1-IS1-LEO05-01263) chosen to be a "success story" by a panel of experts from the Directorate-General for Education and Culture of the European Commission and WorkQual (2014-1-IS01-KA202-O00180). The need for AppMentor in VET has arisen as an increasing part of the learning is conducted during work based learning (WBL) away from the VET provider. Sometimes it is impossible to travel to the companies and have mentoring sessions on the spot. Many work mentors & mentoring teachers already see the benefits of using mobile technology (=SOME) in mentoring. Also reporting and registering is already done online in many sectors of industry and service. In order to do this work mentors and mentoring teachers need tools and encouragement to guide and support them to start using SOME when mentoring. They don’t want to be made feel inferior to the students who use different forms of mobile technology and social media. By implementing the outcomes of Appmentor we will give work mentors and teachers the tools needed in order to start using SOME when mentoring. This will make mentoring more flexible and it will create a learning experience which is user friendly, meaningful and up to date with the working environment. Students used to using mobile technology (blogs, facebook, Instagram, chats etc) use it because it is useful, flexible, instant and a way to keep track on what is going on. Students might however need support and encouragement to use these forms of mobile technology in a “new” way, a way that encourages and supports learning. AppMentor provided teachers and work mentors with tools and ideas on how to guide students to use SOME for learning. AppMentor transferred & implemented mobile learning to work placements. 2) encouraged work mentors to use mobile technology (e.g. apps, social media, virtual learning platforms) when mentoring students/apprentices during WBL, 3) deepened the cooperation as well as information and data sharing between work mentor and mentoring teacher during placement by introducing tools for mobile technology, 4) ensured that all students regardless of where they have their work placement receive continuous mentoring & feedback through mobile technology and thus raising the quality of learning received during work placements, 5) introduced tools, methods & materials that support the work mentor and student during work placements. AppMentor had the following intangible results/impact 1) Better cooperation between the work mentor and teacher, 2) Improved communication between student, work mentor and mentoring teacher, 3) Raised quality of WBL both nationally and abroad, 4) Flexible and qualitative mentoring fit for the 21st century and 5) An attitude change relating to how learning and mentoring should be done. The project lifespan was 24 months + 2 extra months to ensure that the outcome(s) were qualitative and user-friendly. Appmentor partners hosted five transnational project meetings during this period. Each meeting lasted for 3 days. In order to ensure time to work on the intellectual outputs there was 1 meeting every 5-6 months, the first meeting was held in December 2016. Throughout the project each partner cooperated closely with employers, work mentors and students and develop the Intellectual Outcomes: 1) Online Micro Learning mentoring course, 2) Manual of mobile technology and social media that can be used to facilitate and strengthen the quality of the mentoring process and 3) Guidelines for mentoring students online using mobile technology. All 3 IOs are included in the AppMentor - An online course for coaching and mentoring at work (https://appmentor.weebly.com/). The AppMentor Online Course is open for all interested parties to use and implement and is available in English, Finnish, Swedish, Norwegian, Dutch, Icelandic, French and Spanish. Dissemination was and continues to be an important part of the project and all partners were active in disseminating the project though SOME media such as Facebook, LinkedIn and Instagram and by participating in conferences and seminars as well as other events. AppMentor has a project web page http://thalttun.wixsite.com/appmentor and an open Facebook page https://www.facebook.com/AppMentor.project/ that function as dissemination channels. By the end of the project all partners had implemented the outcomes of the project in their daily activities and are committed to ensure that the outcomes will be sustainable and used in the future. Appmentor project partners are: P1 = Axxell, Finland (coordinator), P2 = Broadshoulders, UK, P4 = Charlottenlund Upper Secondary School, Norway, P5 = Nantes Terre Atlantique, France, P6 = Verkmenntaskolinn a Akureyri, Iceland, P7 =Education and Mobility, Spain and P8 = Het Idee, The Netherlands