Early childhood education and care (ECEC) with E-learning support Erasmus Project

Project Title

Early childhood education and care (ECEC) with E-learning support

Project Key Action

This project related with these key action: Cooperation for innovation and the exchange of good practices

Project Action Type

This project related with this action type : Strategic Partnerships for school education

Project Call Year

This project’s Call Year is 2018

Project Topics

This project is related with these Project Topics: Disabilities – special needs; New innovative curricula/educational methods/development of training courses; Inclusion – equity

Project Summary

In order to make early development accessible to even more atypically developing or disabled children, experts from three countries work together. The Rejtett Kincsek Down Association from Nyíregyháza, Caritas Organization of the Diocese Satu Mare and Centrum Liberta from Košice undertook to develop an e-learning program within the framework of the Erasmus + program “Early childhood education and care (ECEC) with E-learning support” implemented between November 2018 and November 2020. The online platform is available in Hungarian, Romanian, Slovak and English. (www.edumodul.hu / www.edumodul.com / www.edumodul.ro / www.edumodul.sk )
The content of the 6 intellectual products developed during the project, focused on early childhood education, mainly on the intervention of children with special needs. In the partner countries the system faces big gapes like families have to travel hours in order to receive early intervention or this kind of service is not available. According to Hungarian data – where the situation is the best in the region – not even one-fifth of children in need of care receive early intervention.
The e-learning interface available in four languages ​​is actually a method that supports the work of educators. A kind of extended “arm” that helps to make interventions even more efficient. The developed modules can be accessed grouped around six development areas, which are autonomy, communication, socialization, thinking, fine and gross motor skills. The intellectual products created during the implementation of the project are the following:
• E-learning module system to support the early development of children with different educational needs (HU, SK, RO, ENG)
• E-learning module: 12 weeks word recognition training for children with learning difficulties (HU)
• E-learning module: social skills development in children with autism (HU)
• Social skills – rhythm module (Who plays this?) (HU)
• Eating problems in infancy and early childhood (RO)
• Fine motor skills development curriculum for children with reduced mobility (SK)
Prior to its development, the E-learning framework was reviewed by 3-3-3 special education professionals from the three partner countries for quality assurance purposes. The 12 weeks word recognition training module for children with learning difficulties (HU) was tested in early 2020, with 33 special education teachers out of a total of 95 users registered and 59 parents from the three partner countries, who took part in the testing. Focus group parental testing was conducted online due to the COVID prevention measures taken in the spring of 2020, with a total of 14 parents able to participate. Based on their answers and ideas, the e-learning interface was further developed.
After the further development and the uploading of the other 4 modules within the framework of the project, the completed e-learning interface was tested. A total of 349 users have been registered on the site so far from which more than forty percent are educators and special teachers. The summary of the survey-answers shows that most of the visited module was word recognition one (26 assignments), followed by “Who plays this?”, module with lessons containing rhymes and songs (26 assignments) and the “Social skills development in children with autism” module which was completed by 21 people. The Romanian-language nutrition curriculum was marked as completed by three, and the Slovak-language fine motor skills module by seven (but the surface shows that 21 people completed the Romanian language module in Romania and 15 people completed the Slovak language module in Slovakia.). More than eighty percent of the users indicate that they are highly satisfied about the platform. The weekly satisfaction scale shows that no one was totally dissatisfied, the rate of very dissatisfied people is negligible (2.3 percent) and more than 70 percent of those who completed the modules recommend the e-learning platform to others potential users.
The “PROTOCOL or Practical guide for creating an online support platform and developing specialized content” developed during the implementation of the project is available in Hungarian, Slovak, Romanian and English on the Edumodul interface. In November the three partner organizations held their online conference on the ZOOM interface. During the conference, we focused to provide a comprehensive insight to the structure and use of the Edumodul e-learning platform developed by the Erasmus + project for those specialists who are working in the fields of education, health and social care with typical children and those who are disabled. In total, more than 300 people attended the conferences.
Later, possibly in the framework of a new project, we plan to make accessible all modules in several languages, to adapt and develop them to local conditions, and to create new modules and continuously update them (English, Hungarian, Romanian, Slovak).

EU Grant (Eur)

Funding of the project from EU: 241494,79 Eur

Project Coordinator

Rejtett Kincsek Down Egyesület & Country: HU

Project Partners

• Liberta, n.o.
• Asociatia Organizatia Caritas a Diecezei Satu Mare