Working Group:Early InquiryCountry:Austria, Belgium, Cyprus, Estonia, Greece, Netherlands, Portugal, Spain, Switzerland, United KingdomLanguages:Czech, Dutch, English, French, German, Greek, ItalianAge of students (target group/s):13-14, 15-18Links, resources:http://www.go-lab-project.eu/
Go-Lab creates an infrastructure (the Go-Lab Portal) to provide access to online laboratories run by research centres and universities worldwide in the areas of Astronomy, Biology, Chemistry, Earth science, Electronics, Engineering, Environmental sciences, Materials science, Maths, Physics and Technology . These online labs can be used, among others, by schools, instructors and students to extend regular learning activities with scientific experiments, giving students a real experience of research work. The Go-Lab Project offers a federation of remote laboratories, virtual experiments, and data-sets (together referred to as "online labs"), as well as facilities for teachers to embed these online labs in pedagogically structured learning spaces. Go-Lab also provides teachers with pedagogical and technical plug (ease of integration), play (ease of use), and share (ease of consolidation) methodologies and infrastructures. Go-Lab's resources come from large scientific organisations, universities and research institutions, as well as from dedicated companies. Go-Lab offers these lab-owners to easily plug their real experiments online and construct their virtual didactic counterparts. To further support teachers in using online labs, Go-Lab offers workshops to introduce online virtual experimentations and remote laboratories as well as inquiry-based science teaching techniques.Strong points and opportunities:• The project's approach promotes a reversal of school science teaching pedagogy from mainly deductive to inquiry-based methods, which is more likely to increase students' interest and attainment in science.
• The direct interaction with science reflects a fundamental pedagogy of the Go-Lab project to provide learners with personal and direct experiences they can build upon in their own ways.
• The Go-Lab Portal - offers students the opportunity to perform personalizsd scientific experiments with online labs, whereas teachers may enrich their classroom activities with demonstrations and disseminate best practices in a web-based pedagogic community.Limitations:The programme has just completed its first pilot phase. Αssessment and /or evaluation data may not yet be available.Added value with regards to the 3 topics of the MASS project:Τhe provision of tools that familiarize students with research work and allows them to create knowledge through inquiry is very important for their motivation to science. Furthermore the inclusion of pedagogy structures allows for the better exploitation of the means provided by teachers, for the benefit of their students.Any prerequisites needed:Joining the project online _schools wanted for the second base pilot activity- PCs and Internet connection.
Working Group:Early InquiryCountry:Austria, Belgium, Cyprus, Estonia, Greece, Netherlands, Portugal, Spain, Switzerland, United KingdomLanguages:Czech, Dutch, English, French, German, Greek, ItalianAge of students (target group/s):13-14, 15-18Links, resources:http://www.go-lab-project.eu/