Unesco Institute for Information Technologies in Education

IITE NEWSLETTER

UNESCO INSTITUTE FOR INFORMATION TECHNOLOGIES IN EDUCATION

No 2’2000April-June

Editorial

Dear reader,

The UNESCO Institute for Information Technologies in Education develops its programme activities in three correlated areas: applied research, training and dissemination, and some results of our activities in this field were presented in the 1st issue of the IITE Newsletter. We are glad to inform you that this year a number of projects launched earlier will be continued at the new level, among them:

• "ICTs in Education: State-of-the-art, Needs and Perspectives",
• "Education via the Internet" (in co-operation with the UNESCO Sector CII),
• "ICTs in Education for People with Special Needs",
• "Distance Education: Structure, Methodology, Staff Development, Legal Aspects",
• "Ethical, Psychological, Medical and Legal Problems of the Application of Information and Communication Technologies in Education",
• "Establishment of the IITE Network of Focal Points",
• Preparation of the IITE modular educational programme,
• "Informatics in Primary Education. Recommendations" (in partnership with IFIP),
• “Elementary ICT Curriculum for Teacher Training” (in partnership with IFIP).

IITE strives to base its forming educational programme at the stable applied research activities (including holding expert meetings and research seminars, preparation of Analytical surveys and policy papers) with consideration of the needs of various UNESCO Member States. Thus, the applied research accomplished in the previous biennium made it possible for IITE to start with the series of workshops and to launch preparation of some training and re-training modules in the field of the IITE competence for teachers and decision-makers in education.

As usual, IITE prepares for dissemination of the results of its programme activities, e.g. Analytical surveys, final reports and collected materials of the expert meetings and workshops, and brief information in the IITE Newsletter. In this issue you can get some information on five IITE projects from those listed above. As far as all of them will be continued in various forms, we shall be glad to receive your comments and proposals, your requests and ideas concerning the main trends of our programme activities. Let us know your opinion using the IITE Newsletter or the IITE Web-site (

IITE ON-LINE NEWS

18 to 19 May 2000: Workshop “New Information Technologies for Education”

21 to 23 July 2000: Research Seminar “Teacher Training for Information Society”

Congress on New Information Technologies

Moscow, 19-21 January 2000

Ministry of Education of the Russian Federation, Goethe Institute in Moscow, Peoples' Friendship University of Russia (PFUR) and the UNESCO Institute for Information Technologies in Education (IITE) held the International Congress "Internet in Education, Economics and Art (Congress on New Information Technologies)" in Moscow 19-21 January 2000.

Ministry of Education
of the Russian Federation / Goethe Institute in Moscow / Peoples' FriendshipUniversity of Russia / UNESCO Institute for Information Technologies in Education

It is clear that the Internet is becoming one of the remarkable features of the new millennium which undoubtedly will be used in all spheres of human life including education, economics and art. That was the reason why for the first time this Congress covered such different areas. It was an effort to discuss issues of the day between specialists from different countries on a basis of the quickly developing Internet segment in Russia.

PROGRAMME OF THE CONGRESS

In keeping with the adopted agenda, the Congress conducted its work in plenary sessions and sections. More than 170 reports were presented at four parallel sections:

1. Education (four subsections):
2. Education possibilities of the Internet.
3. Informatisation of humanity subjects and electronic textbooks.
4. Internet: pro et contra.
5. Internet and studying foreign languages.
6. Economics (two subsections).
7. Art (three subsections).
8. Libraries.

PLENARY SESSIONS

The Congress was opened on 19 January 2000 in the Conference Hall of the Peoples' Friendship University of Russia by Prof. D.P.Bilibin, Rector of the University. The Congress began with a welcome address on behalf of the Ministry of Education of Russia by Prof. V.M. Filippov. Then participants were welcomed by Mr M.Kahn-Ackermann, Director of the German Culture Centre in Moscow, Dr E.-Y. von Studnitz, the Ambassador of Germany to Russia, Mr G.Wibiral, Siemens Executive director for Eastern Europe and many others. Prof. V.Kinelev, IITE Director, conveyed the UNESCO greetings to the participants. The opening session was attended by more than six hundred representatives from different countries (mainly from Russia and Germany).

Plenary reports were made by Prof. V.M. Filippov, Ministry of Education of Russia, and Dr H.Hoffman, President of Goethe Institute. Prof. Filippov pointed out that the idea of continuous education is the demand of the XXI century, and the Internet's taking off obstacles of time and space will help people to make lighter education. Dr Hoffman stressed the role of the Goethe Institute in cultural co-operation and the role the Internet plays in culture and art.

As an invited speaker, Prof. Kinelev made a plenary report "Education in the Information Society" at the Education section. He said it seemed to him that all people were convinced (Vinner's conviction) in the following: to live means living with correct information. The objective of education is to teach people to live in the information society, creating grounds and conditions for their continuous education.

The plenary report "Information for All — New Technology and Ethics" at the Libraries section was presented by Prof. P.Canisius, Chairman of the IITE Governing Board. He stressed two major fields of action with respect to the Internet: "Access" and "Content". Particularly the latter where there are questions of truth and it's control.

All sections worked very effectively. Almost each report was followed by the demonstration and active discussion. Some reports were followed later by the workshops. At the Libraries section and Education section much attention was devoted to the ethics problems of the Internet using, electronic textbooks and distance education. Unexpectedly the Internet and studying foreign languages subsection was the most attended. It should be noted that IITE presented five reports to this Congress including the results of the Analytical survey "The Experience of the Internet Usage in Education" (Dr Verzbitsky). At the Art section, philosophy and the trends of the new electronic visual art and the Internet possibilities for performance were discussed.

Should be noted as an accompanying event the Simens multimedia project "Youth and Knowledge". Among the winners of this project there were many schools from all regions of Russia; particularly a group of students from school for blinds students should be marked.

Mr Kahn-Ackermann, Director of the German Culture Centre in Moscow and Mr H.W.Rissom, UNESCO Director of the Bureau for Programme Co-ordination made their closing remarks at the Congress. Mr Rissom gave a very high appreciation of this Congress and said about the UNESCO tasks linked with using ICTs for education and culture.

LEARNING FOR ALL: OVERCOMING BARRIERS

The Expert Meeting “Information and Communication Technologies in Education for People with Special Needs”, IITE, Moscow, 18-19 February 2000

In 1994, more than 300 participants representing 92 governments and 25 international organizations met in Salamanca, Spain, at the World Conference on Special Needs Education. The participants called upon the academic community to intensify efforts for establishing regional centres of information and documentation for special educational needs. The necessity to take steps in ensuring that the concerns of person with disabilities will be reflected throughout the UNESCO activities, especially in policy and planning, was also confirmed. Six years passed since then, and now we are facing the International Conference on Computers Helping People with Special Needs (ICCHP 2000). UNESCO decided that ICCHP 2000 in Karlsruhe (Germany) would be held under the auspices of UNESCO. Director-General Mr Koichiro Matsuura wrote in his official letter: “….I fully recognize the importance of this Conference which is in keeping with the Organization’s mission to foster the use of information and communication technologies in education and, in particular, education for people with special needs, as set out in UNESCO Salamanca Declaration on Special Needs Education”.

As we move towards the Information Society, it is of the utmost importance to understand and to influence the fundamental changes brought about by “the communication and information revolution”.

The modern level and perspectives of the information and communication technologies’ development allow to tackle one of the most important and humane tasks — teaching and guaranteeing the full integration in the world of knowledge, art, culture and labour of the people who because of some innate or acquired physical and other defects did not have this possibility earlier. The latest achievements in the field of ICTs should be addressed to them, and with the help of a virtual and artificial world they should return to these people things they are deprived of owing to various circumstances. That is why IITE UNESCO considers the information and communication technologies in education for people with special needs as one of its major programme activities.

Following the decision of the 30thSession of the General Conference of UNESCO (Paris, November 1999) IITE UNESCO launched an international project "ICTs in Education: State-of-the-art, Needs and Perspectives" which will comprise several specialized data and knowledge bases. Taking into account that UNESCO Member States showed their increasing interest in the problems concerning education of people with special needs, IITE plans to include the relevant sub-system in the above-mentioned project and develop the IITE’s training and re-training modules for educational staff on the subject.

Collecting and systematizing information on the ICTs application in Special Needs Education (SNE) seems to be the most important and complex task at the first stage. Stocking and analysing this information should become a basis for effective recommendations for policy-makers, educators, learners and designers of soft and hardware and teaching/learning methodology.

In order to determine the UNESCO role and policy in the field of the ICTs application in education for people with special needs for the Information Society, UNESCO Institute for Information Technologies in Education organized the international expert meeting on information and communication technologies for people with special needs. The meeting was held by the IITE UNESCO in Moscow on 18-19 February 2000.

Starting the preparation of the expert meeting, IITE prepared theDraft materials of the Analytical survey “ICTs in Education for People with Special Needs”. Specialists in the field of special needs education and information technologies from Great Britain, Sweden, USA and Russia participated in preparing these materials.

The meeting was prepared by IITE in co-operation with the Ministry of Education of the Russian Federation and International Ware Centre for Higher Education International Links, Peoples’ Friendship University of Russia. Before the meeting IITE established contacts with the high-class specialists in the field of ICTs usage in education for people with special needs from UNESCOMemberStates and USA and invited them to take part in the meeting or in the preparation of its working documents.

In January, 2000 UNESCO Institute for Information Technologies in Education invited the specialists in the field of special needs education. Participants from 6 countries (UK, Slovenia, Italy, Netherlands, Japan, Russia) including several representatives from the Ministry of Education of the Russian Federation and International Federation for Information Processing (IFIP) and National Commission of the Russian Federation for UNESCO took part at the meeting.

Dr A.Edwards, Chairman of the of expert meeting

The participants and observers were high-ranking representatives from the universities, Academy of sciences, research institutes, educational staff and Russian policymakers. Specialists in the field of special needs education from Great Britain, Sweden and USA took part in preparing the working materials of the expert meeting.

Opening theplenary session, Prof.V.Kinelev, IITE Director expressed his views on the main goals and purposes to be achieved as a result of the expert meeting. He stressed that the modern state and prospects of ICT development create conditions for solving one of the most important and humane tasks of the present and future education — the full integration in the world of knowledge, art and culture for those people who because of their physical and other defects had not had this possibility before.

He pointed out that main task of the experts work at the meeting was to determine the role of IITE and UNESCO in the field of application of ICTs in education for people with special needs.

The materials for the Analytical survey “Information and Communication Technologies in Education for People with Special Needs“ were presented by the invited speaker Dr G. Evreinov, Senior Research Scientist, Computer Centre of the RostovStateUniversity. This paper was composed of the materials presented by DrKevin Carey, Director HumanlTy, England, DrKent Saxin Hammarstrom, Researcher, Swedish Institute of Computer Science, Uppsala, and DrMarshall H.Raskind, Educational Consulting, USA.

At the round-table discussion, the participants at the meeting studied two main subjects:

-The UNESCO role and policy in the field of the ICTs application in education for people with special needs and

-Prospects of creation and main characteristics of the information sub-system “ICTs in Education for People with Special Needs” within the framework of the international project “ICTs in Education: State-of-the-art, Needs and Perspectives”.

Great consideration was paid to the problem of training and re-training of personnel for teaching people with special needs and the necessity of creating educational modules for training and self-training of people with special needs.

The experts paid special attention to the necessity of creating the data base reflecting the real application of ICTs in various countries. The participants at the meeting expressed the idea that IITE should serve as the coordinating focal point in fostering the exchange of information and experience in the ICTs for people with special needs.

Within the framework of the meeting, the Special event was held to introduce the Russian experience of the ICTs usage in special needs education to the participants.

The Special event was opened by the speech of Elena Chepurnykh the Deputy Minister of Education. She greeted the participants at the meeting and Russian specialists in the field of education for people with special needs and ICT usage. In her report she familiarized the participants with theRussian experience and possible problems of the Ministry in accelerating the introduction of ICTs in the system of education for people with special needs both at secondary schools and in the system of the professional and higher education.

Mrs Chepurnykh expressed her hope that IITE UNESCO would help to integrate the corresponding structures of UNESCO Member States and to exchange experience in such an important field as the usage of ICTs in education for people with special needs.

The experts visited the Moscow Center of Complex Rehabilitation of Deaf at the BaumanMoscowStateTechnicalUniversity.

At the end of its work the expert meeting adopted the Recommendations addressed to UNESCOMemberStates and UNESCO Institute for Information Technologies in Education ( The experts recommended to continue work under the leadership of Dr A.Edwards, Chairman of the expert meeting, Member of IFIP.

Dr A. Edwards agreed to organize the editor team, to participate in which Grigori Evreinov, Rostov State University, Russia, Kevin Carey, HumanITy, GB, Kent Hammarstrom, Swedish Institute of Computer Science, Sweden and Marshal Raskind, Educational Consulting, USA were invited. They decided to prepare on the basis of the Materials an Analytical survey “ICTs in Education for People with Special Needs”, that would be the main document defining the IITE policy in the field of the ICT application in education of people with special needs. This document can be found at the IITE Web-site (

exchange of Experience of the Internet usage in education: MOVING towardS THE IITE international information system

The Expert Meeting “Education via the Internet”

and the Workshop “Internet Usage in Education”

Minsk, Belarus, 1 – 4 March 2000

The last years of XXth century became the time of the unprecedented development of the Internet technologies. It is hard to say what subject inspires such heated spirited discussions as, for example, the Internet usage in education. This topic attracts strong attention both in developed and developing countries, because the use of the Internet technologies reveals the permanently increasing gap between the North and South, West and East.

This problem could not remain beyond the United Nations Education, Scientific and Cultural Organization (UNESCO) consideration. That is why UNESCO Sector of Communication, Information and Informatics (CII) and UNESCO Institute for Information Technologies in Education (IITE) initiated in close collaboration the intersectoral project “Education via the Internet”. The project goal was the research on the current state of the achievements and problems in the use of the Internet in education and development on the basis of the information system accumulating data in this sphere. At the first stage, IITE in cooperation with “University Knowledge Networks” corporation (UNICOR, Russian Federation) elaborated the Analytical survey “Experience of the Internet Usage in Education”. IITE invited Mr Mike Aston, Advisory Unit: Computers in Education (UK), as a consultant in this project. The drafted survey was reviewed by the expert, Mrs S.Charp, Editor-in-Chief, T.H.E. (Technological Horizons in Education) Journal (USA) and the expert recommended by IFIP — Mrs Z. Lustigova, International Federation for Information Processing Working Group3.6 (IFIP WG3.6), Charles University, Faculty of Mathematics and Physics (Czech Republic). Besides, IITE and CII received reviews and opinions from high-level specialists from the Ministry of Education, IITE focal points, universities, research institutes and centres specialising in ICTs in education such as Prof. J. Piette, Universite de Sherbrooke (Canada), Prof. C. N. Gunawardena, University of New Mexico (USA), Dr H. Kronner (Germany) and others.