13/10/2008
eTwinning: Europe’s schools take on social networking

Schools in Europe can now use web 2.0 tools to cooperate, via the new eTwinning portal (www.etwinning.net). Building on the success of the eTwinning Action since its launch in 2005, the new version of the portal serves over 45,000 schools across the EU. eTwinning supports schools in the process of setting up pedagogical projects involving two or more schools in Europe.

For the last four years, eTwinning has focused its efforts on encouraging teachers to register on the portal, set up partnerships, register and run an eTwinning project. From this original goal, the Action has reached above and beyond expectations as it now involves almost 50,000 individual teachers from 29 countries. New are registered daily. In some cases, teachers even manage to run two or more projects simultaneously. More than 200,000 people visit the portal per month. Based on its strength and success, eTwinning has become a well-established, important Comenius action within the EU’s Lifelong Learning Programme.

While eTwinning has continuously grown over the years, it became evident that teachers are interested in participating, even outside registered projects. For example, although only a third of all members register a project, 85% log in and work online regularly. For instance, they post over 5,000 messages per month in the forum, exchange ideas and comments with others. In this way, eTwinning members themselves helped the eTwinning portal evolve into a social network.

Through its new online platform, eTwinning has therefore officially made a move from being a project-based initiative to a collaboration-based one where schools share knowledge and participate in discussion, and peer-to-peer support, in addition to running projects. Through numerous collaboration-based activities and tools, eTwinning is now a true platform for European cooperation in education.

To complement the launch of the new eTwinning portal, the “eTwinning Weeks” autumn campaign will take place during the month of October to encourage schools to run eTwinning projects in this new school year and use the new online tools.

The new eTwinning Portal can be accessed at: www.etwinning.net

Background

eTwinning was launched in 2005 and is an established action in the Lifelong Learning Programme (http://ec.europa.eu/education/lifelong-learning-programme). Its Central Support Service is operated by European Schoolnet.

European Schoolnet (www.eun.org) is an international partnership of 31 European Ministries of Education developing learning opportunities for schools, teachers and pupils across Europe.

For further information, please contact:

Christina Crawley, European Schoolnet

Tel: +32 2 790 8602

christina.crawley@eun.org