eLearning award winners announced
Projects from eight different countries picked up eLearning awards in Lisbon on 6 December, at a ceremony attended by representatives of governments, businesses and education. The projects from Belgium, Denmark, Finland, France, Iceland, Israel, Italy and Norway were selected from 900 entrants. They focused on issues such as the role of Europe, how to use the Internet to learn English, as well as nature, history, medical and literary themes. All the award winners received either 10,000 euro or a laptop for their school. They also had the opportunity to participate in ICT (information communication technology) workshops while in Lisbon, as well as being able to discuss their projects with Portuguese school teachers. Meanwhile, the latest survey on the use of Internet in schools in Italy shows that the country is slightly behind the European average for school website development, but that they have newer computers. Some 49 per cent of EU schools have their own website, while the figure in Italy is 42 per cent. But the number of schools using computers less than three years old in Italy is higher than the EU average, standing at 59 per cent compared to the 51 per cent found across the EU. But there are less of these computers per pupil in Italy than in the EU average, with one computer per 18 students in Italy compared with one per 12 across the EU. The overall usage of the Internet by students in Italy stands at 80 per cent according to respondents, while 89 per cent of institutions claim to work online.