deutsch.info – didactic adaptation for classroom use Erasmus Project

Project Title

deutsch.info – didactic adaptation for classroom use

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 2016

Project Topics

This project is related with these Project Topics: ICT – new technologies – digital competences; Open and distance learning; Teaching and learning of foreign languages

Project Summary

Since 2011, the language learning platform deutsch.info has been developed within different partnerships and funding programs by the European Commission. In this project the online platform has been expanded to include a teacher portal with teaching materials for German lessons in schools worldwide. 6 institutions from 5 European countries worked on the project, bringing together their relevant expertise and know-how for the elaboration of teaching materials and thus further developing the very popular online language learning resource deutsch.info.

So far deutsch.info was a free platform for learning German, focusing on self-learners and providing the possibility to train and enhance one’s vocabulary and grammar skills as well as reading and listening competencies by providing full online courses on the levels A1-B2. All content is available in 19 languages and learners have the choice to see translations of texts, words and exercises into their chosen language. This way motivation of self-learners on a basic level is preserved and they are given assistance in the learning process. The online courses incorporate specifics of life in Germany and Austria and moreover deal with different varieties of the German language as spoken in Germany, Austria and Switzerland in order to be as authentic as possible. The courses comprise 31 topics, 129 lessons and over 1187 learning units.

This project was aiming on creating additional teaching materials for German lessons in schools, that could be combined with the already existing online courses of the platform. In order to integrate the online courses meaningfully into school lessons for children and adolescents, a total of 35 downloadable lesson packages have been developed for the teacher portal, which forms a new section of the portal. It is a connection between offline school lessons and online courses. A lesson package consists of a workbook with texts, exercises and didactical explanations as well as of additional materials and audio files. The lesson packages follow most relevant topics for school children and train speaking and writing skills in the first place. In all workbooks teachers and pupils find links and references to the respective online courses, that can additionally be completed in class or at home. The online courses mainly train listening and reading skills as well as vocabulary. All lesson packages were developed by professional German teachers and pedagogues from different European countries and tested with the target group of German learners in different European schools, providing an European access as well as the correspondence of materials and relevant topics with the target groups.

Furthermore, the teacher portal contains additional teaching materials such as posters and games as well as seven so called quiz generators, which allow for creating individual riddles and quizzes and open a playful approach to learning German. A teacher’s manual explains the possibilities of using the materials and all parts of the platform in class and thus makes it easier for teachers to integrate ICT into their lessons. Also already existing parts of the platform have been partially revised or supplemented and are well usable for school lessons. Parts of the regular platform, that can be used in school classes, are: a media library with authentic audio, video and text types, the grammar section and practical information on living and working in Austria and Germany. In addition, general knowledge about Germany and Austria can be tested in interactive tests, which were created on the basis of genuine questions from the naturalization tests. The special feature here are additional explanations after each question, which gives detailed background information as well as translations of the entire test.

The previous target group of deutsch.info, which comprises motivated learners of German, who are interested in language, culture, country and people, as well as employees with different qualifications, students, pupils, tourists, residents of border regions and all those who need the German language for their profession, was expanded: The main target groups of the new section are formal and non formal German language teachers (German as foreign, German as second language) and pupils in German-speaking and non-German-speaking countries.

EU Grant (Eur)

Funding of the project from EU: 226929 Eur

Project Coordinator

Österreich Institut GmbH & Country: AT

Project Partners

• Osnovna sola Janka Glazerja Ruse
• E@I
• Klaipedos Hermano Zudermano gimnazija
• INTER-KULTURO MEDNARODNI KULTURNO IZOBRAZEVALNI CENTER DOO
• STUDIO GAUS GMBH