medienBAR – self-service for media competence of trainers

The promotion of media competence among trainers has become a high priority over the last five years, even if the need has not always been seen to the same extent in industry, crafts and trade.

However, the current situation clearly shows us that there is hardly any area of work for educational staff that cannot benefit from a high level of media competence. The rapid reaction of educational providers, chambers and companies to offer training content online and thus avoid extensive delays in qualification processes shows the potential.

Nevertheless, the relevant qualifications of teaching staff remain well below current and presumably future needs.

With the offer “mediaBAR“ the Chamber of Crafts Dresden, together with the Media Center of the TU Dresden, developed a practical basic qualification for dealing with digital media in training in 2017. medienBAR was a Federal Ministry of Education and Research funded project. The training staff should be enabled to use and learn with digital media, as well as to use digital media in educational contexts (vocational training).

The following qualification objectives are based on the four dimensions of media competence according to Baacke (1997).

Qualification objectives are now:

• to be able to operate digital applications yourself,
• to be able to evaluate and use digital applications for their suitability in the training process,
• to survey the media environment of the trainees and to react to it,
• To complete online self-learning courses in a self-organized and self-directed manner.

In order to enable intensive engagement with the content, the learning offer was also implemented in a blended learning format and supported by interactive self-study units on the qualification goals. The self-study learning modules take into account the prior knowledge of the individual and convey the necessary knowledge through texts, diagrams, audio commentaries and videos. The course concludes with a quiz to provide basic feedback on your own learning success.

Communication in the online phases was encouraged through the use of wikis and forums within a learning management system. Conducting an event as an online meeting also showed participants the advantages and disadvantages of this scenario.

The contact person for this offer from the HWK Dresden is:

Literature:
Baacke, D. (1997). Media education. In D. Baacke, Fundamentals of media communication 1. (pp. 96–102). Berlin: De Gruyter.