The main objective of implementing the project was to enhance digital competencies of teachers and teacher candidates and improve their pedagogical digital skills by developing learning materials, ,to improve access to digital competence resources for teachers and educators and develop a micro-credential system. Specifically, we aimed to design a gamified learning management system (LMS) to foster teacher digital competence using the competition, collaboration and engaging features of gamification. In addition to this, we created and embedded a micro-credential system to LMS to recognize as well as assess the progress of the participants and also give them flexibility of choosing the path of competency development that they need. Furthermore, to facilitate knowledge and skill development required for being digitally competent, we have developed 21 lessons across 4 units within the framework of DigCompEdu. To facilitate teachers use of technology in a pedagogically competent ways, we developed a guidebook where we provided teachers technical information about how to navigate through our EmpowerDigiTeach LMS as well as pedagogical suggestions and opportunities for reflection on their digital tool use in their teaching.
The COVID-19 pandemic accelerated a pre-existing need, highlighted by EU and OECD reports (Cachia et al., 2021; Humpl & Anderson, 2022; OECD, 2021), for educators to be digitally competent. The rapid transition to online learning across Europe has raised questions about whether online platforms can truly support deep and meaningful student engagement. Since the quality of online and hybrid education depends heavily on the effectiveness of instructional materials, our project directly addresses this challenge. We aim to empower teachers by enhancing their ability to create effective and innovative digital learning resources that foster student engagement and learning. To achieve this goal, our project involves designing an online platform that integrates gamification and micro-credential features to support the development of teachers’ digital competencies in a flexible and verifiable way. This platform facilitates not only the improvement of teachers' knowledge about digital materials and their applications but also the development and reflective practice of digital teaching strategies.