Scouring the Internet to find the best educational resources in different languages to improve language and content learning in higher education is the objective of a research group at the University of Córdoba within the framework of the QuILL (Quality in Language Learning) international project.
Videos, web pages, applications, teaching innovation projects and infographics are just some examples of the open educational resources that are being compiled as part of this project aimed at education in different disciplines in 18 European languages. QuILL aims to improve both the way students learn and the teaching methods used by university professors.
The team, made up of David Bullejos, Cristina María Gámez and Leonor María Martínez, led by María Elena Gómez Parra, has spent almost a year carrying out this exhaustive search for teaching materials in 3 of the 18 languages on which the project is focused: Spanish, French and Norwegian. Their work researching and compiling resources does not end with the storage of this information, but goes beyond this, including analysis and testing of the resources to ensure their utility, as well as classifying them by language and discipline.
The QuILL project aims to create a database of open resources for learning in different languages that can be viewed on the project's web page (http://quill.pixel-online.org), both by university students and teaching staff. QuILL also includes training for teachers to provide them with the knowledge necessary to identify and select the teaching material best suited to their academic subjects, and to know how to use it effectively.
The Córdoba team was charged with organizing the event launching this project, held at the UCO in October 2021 and attended by representatives of the seven European universities involved: Alexandru Ioan Cuza University of Iasi (Romania), Karoli Gáspár University (Hungary), the University of Bologna (Italy), the University of Vilnius (Lithuania), Bragança Polytechnic Institute (Portugal), which leads the project, Karoli Gáspár University (Hungary), the University of Bologna (Italy), the University of Vilnius (Lithuania) and the Polytechnic Institute of Bragança in Portugal, which is leading the project, as well as Pixel, an institution located in Florence (Italy), which is the administrative coordinator.
The Córdoba team's task is rounded out by work at the Bragança Polytechnic Institute, together with members of the Karoli Gáspár University, designing and teaching an intensive course aimed at training teachers to identify the quality of the educational resources collected and made available to them, as well as to use this type of teaching material in the classroom.
The final phase of the project will include a testing phase in which students from the University of Córdoba will gauge the effectiveness of the resources selected.
The project supervisor at the UCO, Mª Elena Gómez Parra, describes the University of Cordoba's participation in this part of the project as "highly beneficial," as "it offers us the opportunity to be exposed to other European languages, which would otherwise be difficult to achieve, as well as to collaborate with higher education institutions in other countries." In Gómez's opinion, this project is also very positive for UCO students because "it allows them access to resources they did not know about before, as well as to teaching methodologies used in other countries."
This project has been funded with support from the European Commission. This publication reflects the views only of the author, and the Commission cannot be held responsible for any use which may be made of the information contained therein.