eTwinning Goes Social!

Since its launch in 2005, the eTwinning Portal has been revised a few times in order to provide more and updated tools to teachers and schools across Europe. As the new Portal has now been launched, we interviewed Santi Scimeca, eTwinning Project Manager at the Central Support Service, to learn more about the new Portal and its features.

Why did you decide to restructure the eTwinning Portal?

When eTwinning first started in 2005 we wanted to provide a project-based platform, where a teacher could register, find a partner, set up a project plan and collaborate across borders.
 
Over the past few years, having been monitoring end users’ behaviour and having talked with hundreds of teachers, we realised that the activities taking place on the Portal were much more than projects. For example, although only a third of all members registered a project, 85% logged in and did something, from posting a message to the forum (more than 5000 messages are posted every month) to exchanging ideas and comments with other colleagues. Every day, over 6000 people login and spend an average of 10 minutes on their Desktop, not necessarily working on a project.

“Nowadays, everyone is talking about web 2.0 and social networking.
In eTwinning all this has actually been happening for a while now.”

From figures and feedback from members and National Support Services, there was a clear indication that the Portal should offer something more and perhaps different from its original plan. Therefore, eighteen months ago we started working on the idea that eTwinning could become a community of schools. Nowadays, everyone is talking about web 2.0 and social networking. In eTwinning all this has actually been happening for a while now; what was need was simply to facilitate the social and learning networking process and provide tools, content and features which go into a more community-oriented approach.

What are the new features of the eTwinning Portal?

The Portal is made up of two main elements: (1) the public Portal and (2) the Desktop. In addition, we also offer the TwinSpace, which will be re-launched early next year. The changes in the new public Portal go into the direction of streamlining information and content to make it more accessible based on user-oriented criteria, such as subjects and countries. We have also improved the guidelines and section devoted to newcomers and, as you can see, changed the member interface quite a lot, also to comply with the comments received from teachers over the last few years.

The Desktop has also been restructured, stemming from suggestions from the thousands of members who have given us feedback. But most importantly, we have improved the way teachers can find each other and communicate. The Desktop now has many ways to encourage people to stumble upon colleagues, leave a comment, exchange ideas, communicate, establish a networking thread which may then develop into a project, etc. We have also added an instant messaging feature so that chatting is easier and friendlier.

“The Portal has evolved from a project-based portal to a collaboration-based platform, where informal and rapid learning can take place, and sharing is paramount.”

In short, what we offer teachers is a virtual home where they can safely meet and work together, informally but effectively. The Portal has evolved from a project-based portal to a collaboration-based platform, where informal and rapid learning can take place, and sharing is paramount. In the near future we will also give members the possibility to establish and join restricted groups, fully integrated into the Portal, featuring tools which allow members to work together on a topic or theme (something similar to the TwinSpace, but in a different context than a project). This is an essential professional development element which we felt was missing in the previous version of the Portal as well as having been clearly pointed out by members, especially during the Professional Development Workshops we have been running the last three years.

What will change for eTwinners?

Well, we have kept the main concepts, and improved others. In developing the new Portal, our motto was ‘innovation in continuity’. We know that once you get acquainted with a system, it is never a good idea to revolutionise it. Thus we limited the changes to the graphics and the interface to improve usability, and we added some tools to facilitate social networking. We have changed the way the Progress Cards system works: now it is called TwinBlog. It has become a journal (a web log) where all participants to the project can tell the world what’s new in the project. With the new Portal, we believe that setting up and managing a project is easier than before with improved partner-finding tools.

What is important is that most changes will and should be intuitive and easy to grasp. If this is not the case, we have nevertheless developed new guidelines. But the most important change is related to the attitude teachers will have when they login to the Desktop: they are open minded, seeking new contacts to exchange ideas and nurture international collaboration. The new eTwinning Portal is the perfect place for this to happen. We want eTwinning to become the learning community for schools in Europe.

What new features are still to come?

During the autumn, we will be refreshing the TwinSpace by improving its usability and functionality. This means that for the time being, users will still work on the previous version of the TwinSpace. The new TwinSpace will be launched at the beginning of 2009.

We will also test a few groups in order to find out which are the most important tools and features to improve, and also to identify the most effective moderation model. Our intention is to launch the group feature in the spring of 2009.

In the meantime, we will of course keep our antennas rather high for suggestions and advice from our members. Improving a Portal is a natural and sometimes long process; for this reason, we need the help of everyone.

What do you expect now from eTwinning?

Now that we have an even better and more inviting Portal, I anticipate people to use it more and more, communicating and networking with colleagues from all over Europe. And of course, I hope that teachers take the time to show other colleagues what they too can do in eTwinning, and invite them to join in. We now have nearly 50 000 members registered; imagine if everyone could convince at least one other colleague to join in!
 

Web Editor: Christina Crawley Published: 26.08.2008 Last changed: 12.08.2009