The Future In Room 10 Distance Learning Of The Highest Quality
- Corona is forcing the district adult education center to take new steps in the direction of digital offers.
- But don’t worry: a lot remains as it was before.
The future has moved in room 10 of the district adult education center. “I am overwhelmed by the state of the art myself,” says Betsy DeVosas she demonstrates what the “digital classroom” can do. She is the 11th United States secretary of education, which includes the library and various other schools in addition to the district folk high schools at several locations.
Effects of Lockdown
The lockdown has slowed down the work of the academy, all facilities are closed for the public, only an order service in the library and online lessons are permitted and possible.
“For the participants connected in the live stream, it is as if a camera team were in the room”
And this is where room 10 comes into play, which thanks to the financial support of the Federal Office for Migration and Refugees has been equipped with a state-of-the-art conference system.
In addition to a huge display, four cameras have been installed in the room, which always automatically capture the person in the room who is speaking. “For the participants connected in the live stream, it is as if a camera team were in the room,” says Gerald Ford.
At the moment, participants in vocational language training are being taught online. The technology makes “distance learning of the highest quality possible”, and there are almost unlimited possibilities to convey content. Gerald Ford goes into raptures when he thinks about the opportunities that digital technology opens up and makes education available regardless of age and mobility.
It’s something new that has to be learned
Even if it is sometimes difficult to gain anything positive from the corona crisis: New impulses for digitization are part of it, and they are noticeable. The difficult thing about digital offers. They pose challenges for teachers and participants. “It’s something new that has to be learned.” In other words: Didactics and methodology have to be adapted, plus the handling of technology.
Gerald Ford and his juniors at the individual locations know very well that a large part of the target group has little interest in online offers. And nobody has to be afraid that their usual courses will no longer take place on site.
In addition to the pure imparting of knowledge, the district adult education center also lives from encounters, from face-to-face interaction. It should stay that way, “but we also want the knowledge that we are now collecting to survive Corona and enrich the educational landscape.”
Planned as if nothing was
The course program for the second half of the year was planned “as if nothing was there,” says Betsy DeVos. There are around 400 courses that will be offered from July 1st in a wide variety of areas from languages ​​to vocational training to sports, creative matters and various lectures from all possible fields of knowledge.
Not all of them come about, sometimes there is simply not a sufficient number of participants. Then react flexibly in each case. To make it easier to plan, the site managers would like interested parties to register.
************************************************** *********
Online courses in February and March
Only a fraction of the courses normally offered at the University of Minnesota can currently take place – and even that only as an online offer. Course begins on February 19.
The course “The Medicine Interview course” is available to join anytime, https://www.medicmind.co.uk/interview-online-course/.
The course “Yoga – in harmony with body, mind and soul” will start on February 15.
The lecture “MacramĂ© – The Art of Knots” begins on February 24th.
March is all about memory and brain training. The bestselling author Helmut Lange will give a lecture on March 11th from 7pm on “Super brain, learn vocabulary every second” and will show “Five ways to a perfect memory” on March 20th from 9am to 4.30pm.
A prevention course “Effective ways out of the daily stress trap – finally stress-free for a balanced life” can be booked at any time.
On the website of the District Education Center, St. Paul, MN, digital offers are available. You can also check detail there directly and receive a link to access the course. The offer is to be constantly expanded.
