Pilots

“The piloting phase will provide participants a better insight of the TRAILER purpose”

Pilots focus

The Pilots objectives are:

  1. Measuring:
    1. How well it helps one to collect evidence of informal learning.
    2. Whether it is easy to organize informal learning experiences in this system.
    3. If and how the system facilitates the visibility/presentation/transparency of informal learning experiences.
  2. Exploring changed perceptions of the value of capturing informal learning.
  3. Modeling the ways in which/to what extent the users see a tool like this as useful in their lives.

Pilots process

The tool piloting phase will be divided into two stages:

  • Pilot P1, exploring the learner’s perspective, which will take place during March 2013.
  • Pilot P2, exploring the institutional perspective, which will take place during April/May 2013.

The Pilots process consists mainly on:

  • A first session where the tool will be presented and the participants are given the opportunity to try it.
  • The following period of one week, where participants have specific tasks to implement. During this period, help will be provided by Skype or email.
  • A final session where participants are asked about their perceptions on using the tool and the added value on documenting informal learning experiences.

Along this period, participants are asked to answer some questionnaires which will also help to provide answers according to the objectives.

In the end of this process, results and conclusions will be provided to participants.

To support participants, an online HOW-TO Guide is available.

Tool structure

The TRAILER tool contains three interconnected stages: the ILC, the portfolio and the institutional environment. These stages have the following functions.

Stage 1: ILC – Informal Learning Collector         http://ilc.trailerproject.eu

Allows storage of activities collected directly from a website through a bookmarklet (to be installed in user browser) or webservices. It also allows manual definition of informal learning activities (ILA’s). The activity can be further described and tagged before sent to Portfolio.

Stage 2: Portfolio http://trailerpilot.ou.nl/

This tool component allows associating competences to an Informal Learning Activity (ILA). The user can also add new competences he considers having developed (user competences) without associate them with ILA’s. Further steps on this component allow defining showcases. A showcase is a set of activities and competences the user decides to make share to his employer/teacher or other people. The public competences will be sent to the Institutional Environment, so that the employer/teacher can decide whether or not validate them.

Stage 3: Institutional Environment       http://grialprojects.usal.es/pilots/ (*) client/loginView.php

(*) this will correspond to each participant’s institution identification

This component is dedicated to the employer/teacher, because it represents the institutional perspective related to the employee/student. It has associated a competence catalogue, which includes a list of general competences, institutional competences and user defined competences. The employer can validate user defined competences and define institutional competences. Some brief analysis related to competences and activities is also presented in this environment in the DSS – Decision Support System.