TECHNOLOGY AS A MOTIVATION AND INTEGRATION TOOL FOR VULNERABLE YOUNG PEOPLE.
GIJÓN/XIXÓN’S Second OPPORTUNITY School was founded in 2001. It is PROMOTED by the municipality of Gijón through the Local Agency FOR Economic Promotion and Employment, the municipality itself and European funding for concrete actions.
GIJÓN/XIXÓN’S Second OPPORTUNITY School defines itself as a transitional resource to help young people between 14 and 25, who have difficulties and want to be helped, giving special attention to EDUCATION and employment as an important resource for socialization. Following the principles of the new “Skills Agenda for Europe”, that states 16 million jobs requiring ICT skills are expected by 2020, and also that nowadays 90% of the jobs need basic ICT skills, we’VE decideD to offer more workshops linked to technology and IT Skills.
We've JOINED the European Project “Make, Learn, Share: Europe” where we HAVE ALREADY developed two Open School Units (OSU):
-VIDEOGAME PROGRAMMING: “Construct 2” is a powerful groundbreaking HTML5 game creator designed specifically for 2D games. It allows anyone to build games, without PRIOR coding knowledge.
-DRONES: THE OSU’S DEVELOPMENT HAS BEEN BASED ON THE ASSEMBLY PROCESS OF A SPECIFIC DO-IT-YOURSELF MODEL OF DRONE. THE YOUNG PARTICIPANTS HAVE BUILT THE DRONE STARTING WITH ELECTRONIC PARTS, INTEGRATING THEM BY FOLLOWING THEIR MENTOR’S GUIDELINES. ONCE FINISHED, THEY CONFIGURATED THE FLIGHT CONSOLE FOLLOWED BY DOING AN EXPERIMENTAL FLIGHT WITH IT. THROUGHOUT THE PROCESS THE PARTICIPANTS HAVE ACQUIRED KNOWLEDGE ABOUT ELECTRONICS, PROGRAMMING AND FLIGHT CONFIGURATIONS.
These two workshops were improved and reinforceD with others that helped SPARK the interest of our young students in BOTH new technologies and IctS, so they can act as IT ambassadors among their families, friends and classmates.
augmented and virtual reality workshop:
augmented reality refers to the technology that allows the inclusion of virtual data (be it through text, hyperlinks, audio, video, multimedia...) taken from one object in real life. thus, a smartphone, table or computer, or other devices.
virtual reality is based on substituting reality through devices that allow us to “feel” we are in another place, but without interacting with objects from the real world.
the themes covered in the workshop were:
the main goal of all this work is to bring technological knowledge closer to the young people participating in the second opportunity school to promote their interest about it and about the professional profiles that work closely with it. the workshops serve as a reason to motivate these young people, who are in risk of early school leaving, to continue their studies and understand the employment potential and future of the technology sector.
Its objectives are:
The individualization of itineraries, a multidisciplinary team, flexibility of the learning processes, the inclusion of specific measures of guidance and advice, SMALL groups (no more than 6 people per workshop/activity), the use of new technologies (computer-equipped rooms with multimedia resources), language learning and the possibility of stays in other countries, and networking with other social and community resources make the GIJÓN/XIXÓN’S Second OPPORTUNITY Schoola A pleasant place to ATTEND and learn, AS WELL AS an important reference for the rest of the educational and social community.
The average of alumni participating in the project monthly ranges from 15 to 17. The preferred workshops are those related to leisure activities instead of the more academic ones. Nonetheless, the project links theory to practice under the “learning by practicing” motto.
Out of the four workshops they have attended, the ones that have been most liked are the drone assembly and piloting ones, since they are the result of work well done.
Moreover, the collaboration with “Gijón Habla” was very well received. It consisted in activities focused on making them speak in public so they would be able to carry out their role as ambassadors.
The teaching methodology they enjoyed the most is the one with active participation and teamworking.
THE Importance to offer appealing workshops to engage young people, specially those at risk of dropping-out.