From astrolabes of classical antiquity to the EU Space Agency’s satellite Copernicus, exchanges of ideas and technology come through collaboration among scientists, travellers and the use of a lingua franca, Greek or Latin originally, and English today. Sailing has been a keystone through history to develop long distance mobility, exchanges and human progress. Inventions and discoveries have shaped Europe on history, and many of them come from the maritime world, and are ancestors to most of our current technologies, like mobile telephony and robotics. Europe is a leading power in innovation since the dawn of history, inheriting the precedents of modern technology., Calculation of time and distances are keystones in sea navigation, and our modern technologies are derived from centuries of inventions and discoveries, especially from the Age of Discoveries (s. XVII). All of the participant's countries have in their history figures of prominence in the field of exploration or supporting geographical explorations with their inventions, and our cities are near of the sea. They are the inspiration for a storytelling where these persons travel across time and space to meet each other in their homelands, create artifacts together and find in maritime museums the hidden pieces to be assembled after the journey (the project) finishes. The students will collaborate to be the first to find the pieces and solve problems, riddles or questions. They all will give context to a game taking place in maritime museums created with Augmented Reality (AR) technology, that will frame the storytelling of a gamified project. Educational robotics facilitates the acquisition of skills, and motivation towards STEM learning, and as a secondary outcome, coding matches very well with English classes. Awareness of digital risks and e-safety are a part of the project too.
From astrolabes of classical antiquity to the EU Space Agency’s satellite Copernicus, exchanges of ideas and technology come through collaboration among scientists, travellers and the use of a lingua franca, Greek or Latin originally, so English today. Maritime navigation has been a keystone in history for long distance mobility, exchanges and human progress. Inventions and discoveries have shaped Europe in history, coming most of them from the maritime world, ancestors to most of our current technologies, like mobile telephony and robotics. Europe has been a leading power in innovation since the dawn of history, inheriting the precedents of modern technology. Calculation of time and distances are core in sea navigation, evolving to digital applications that are the legacy of centuries of inventions and discoveries, especially from the Age of Discoveries (s. XVII). Awareness of the extraordinary people and the shared European cultural heritage behind our everyday utilities is behind every learning activity. The partnership is composed of schools placed near the sea featuring very complementary profiles, and sharing common challenges and expectations: to deliver very high quality learning, and also to explore and share good practice about educational uses of digital technology to raise motivation among their students and teachers. The establishment of permanent networks with like-minded foreign schools is the goal in the background: this enables very beneficial mutual learning for everyone involved. All of the participant's countries have prominent historical figures in the field of exploration, as well as inventors supporting geographical explorations. Inventors and discoverers are the inspiration for a storytelling where they travel across time and space to meet each other in their homelands and to find in maritime museums of Athens, Gdansk, Helsinki, Mersin, Barcelona and Amsterdam the hidden pieces to be assembled after the journey (the project) to create artifacts together: robot monsters that will battle against a terrific sea legend living beyond the horizon. International clans of students collaborate with these inventors to find the pieces, by solving problems, riddles or creating questions. This story wraps a game created with Augmented Reality (AR) technology taking place in maritime museums, the background of a gamified methodology. Educational robotics facilitates the acquisition of skills, and motivation towards STEM learning. As a secondary outcome, robotics enriches motivation to acquire English skills by a CLIL approach, and also facilitates the awareness of digital risks and e-safety that is gathered in a cybersecurity recommendations handbook made collaboratively by teenagers, addressed to teenagers. At last, but not least, the awareness of the sea natural environment and also the blue economy was behind the whole project development. Our project website, www.augmentedage.eu, is the e-portfolio of the whole project. Learning activities abroad were the creation of an augmented reality game by using Metaverse platform and mobile technology, study visits to museums related to technology and maritime navigation where students used an hands-on approach to analyze the exhibition by creating sets of questions and answers for the game, built and coded racing robots and used 3D printers to create artifacts to be hidden and found in maritime museums. Where available, study visits in training vessels gave an opportunity to students to first hand experience the blue economy jobs and tasks. Also the production of a cybersecurity recommendations guide from teenagers to teenagers sparked awareness about global digital risks and cybersecurity among young people. After the pandemic declaration, online activities replaced mobilites abroad. A 3D immersive approach was used to tackle the missing learning activities abroad trying to maintain the gamified, hands-on, 3D dimension of the initial planning: digital educational escape rooms based on 3D virtual visits in museums and cities. Students created collaboratively questions and answers related to the study visits, and also bonding activities were good to spark the interest for English learning and curiosity towards each other's experience of remote education and life under covid-19 school curfews (the emotional part was especially taken into account in the planning). A beautiful exchange of virtual books and roses, and a online parte were a nice wrapping of the virtual part. The methodology miniguide aims to share the lesson plans with a wider audience to enable the replication of our project, as individual lessons or as project-based learning plans, very suitable to be used in hybrid contexts.