ROBOTICS THROUGH SIGN LANGUAGE: ENSURING ACCESS AND ENGAGEMENT OF STUDENTS WITH DISABILITIES (DEAF OR WITH HEARING IMPAIRMENT) TO THE DIGITAL WORLD OF CODING AND ROBOTICS – ROBOTICS4DEAF Erasmus Project

Project Title

ROBOTICS THROUGH SIGN LANGUAGE: ENSURING ACCESS AND ENGAGEMENT OF STUDENTS WITH DISABILITIES (DEAF OR WITH HEARING IMPAIRMENT) TO THE DIGITAL WORLD OF CODING AND ROBOTICS – ROBOTICS4DEAF

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 2019

Project Topics

This project is related with these Project Topics: New innovative curricula/educational methods/development of training courses; ICT – new technologies – digital competences; Disabilities – special needs

Project Summary

“Everybody should learn how to program because it teaches you how to think…” Steve Jobs
Digital access is a right and not a privilege, and as such the consortium pioneers to address the right for access and participation of a neglected group of young people/students with deafness and/or hearing impairment to introduce them to the world of coding and robotics thus opening up for them new routes for careers orientation and further studies.

Programming and computational thinking skills are becoming ever more important in our society and working life. Today, a growing number of countries in Europe and internationally are refocusing their ICT curricula on developing students’ computer programming and coding skills, and introducing the topic in national, regional or school curricula.

The European Commission’s European Disability Strategy 2010-2020, adopted in 2010, builds on the UNCRPD which emphasis is that accessibility, participation, equality, education and training and others aspects are of great importance.

Based on the above the project addresse the following priorities:

HORIZONTAL: Strengthening the profiles of the teaching profession

The target group of school teachers (mainly IT or from related fields or any other interested in the field of coding and robotics) who work with students-young people with deafness or hearing impariment either in formal schools (mainstream schools or special schools or school for deaf or special units as per the regulations in each partner country) or in non-formal settings. In this group, the consortium includes sign language teacher who are interested to be educated to support and help students with deafness to learn how to code and how to program a robot, who can have various backgrounds.
The profiles of the above teachers will be upgraded and strengthened through the professional development programme to be developed to acquire the digital, coding and robotics skills to support students. All the material to be developed as part of the INCLUSIVE DUAL ROBOTICS4DEAF PACK both on-line and off-line accompanied with multi-media tools and resources to target the needs and requiement of students with deafness will support teachers’ practices.

HORIZONTAL: Social inclusion
The project targets students with deafness and hearing impairments. Deaf people are very different in their way to communicate with the hearing world; however they share a common barrier in the language. Language is not developed as typically in childhood, due to the lack of input, both from a quantitative (bilateral neurosensory hearing loss in the volume of sound perceived in decibels), and from a qualitative point of view (type of sounds perceived on frequencies measured in hertz). As a result language of deaf and hard of hearing children is often insufficient, both in comprehension and in production. In understanding, deaf people can use a compensatory strategy for the impairment (such as hearing aids, cochlear implants, subtitles), and/or with a real alternative language, the Sign Language.
Disability is thus not just a health problem. It is a complex phenomenon, reflecting the interaction between features of a person’s body and features of the society in which he or she lives. Overcoming the difficulties interventions to remove environmental and social barriers. As a result the main aims of the project are to:
– ensure access, participation and inclusion of students in the digitalised labour market as purported by the 2018 Digital Education Action Plan
– ensure gender equality and non-discrimination for girls in relation to supporting the access to digital technologies and skills.

The project aims to equip the above group of young people/students with digital, robotics and coding skills in order to support their employability prospects and ensure social inclusion in the digitalisation of the labour market.

HORIZONTAL: Supporting individuals in acquiring and developing basic skills and key competences
HORIZONTAL: Open education and innovative practices in a digital era
In the above context the project comes to address the recommendation of the recent EC Report titled “New priorities for EU cooperation ET 2020” Report (COM 2015- 408), which stresses that “knowing how to code is empowering. It allows to understand the digital world we live in and to shape it. Basic coding skills are essential for accessing the jobs of tomorrow and today” and for achieving a better skills-match between education and the world of work. “Coding is seen as the red thread that runs through future professions”.

The 2016 ‘Digital Skills and Jobs Coalition’ reinforces the need of all to help meet the high demand for digital skills in Europe which are essential in today’s job market and society. Europe is lacking digitally skilled persons to fill job vacancies in all sectors, missing out on up to 750,000 Information and Communication Technologies (ICT) professional jobs by 2020.

Project Website

http://robotics4deaf.eu/

EU Grant (Eur)

Funding of the project from EU: 185388 Eur

Project Coordinator

SPOLECZNA AKADEMIA NAUK & Country: PL

Project Partners

• Polski Zwiazek Gluchych Oddzial Lodzki
• NATIONAL CENTER FOR SCIENTIFIC RESEARCH “DEMOKRITOS”
• DeafStudio
• Fondazione Istituto dei Sordi di Torino ONLUS
• REZEKNES TEHNOLOGIJU AKADEMIJA
• A & A Emphasys Interactive Solutions Ltd