26 April

Albanian vocational education is already a step forward. ‘Skills for Jobs’ together with the Industrial School ‘Pavarësia’ in Vlora launched a ‘Blended Learning Classroom’, the first of its kind in the country. This high-tech classroom opens up possibilities for learning through informatics. Thus, learning becomes not only more contemporary and engaging, but also more effective. The innovation is not simply about the latest technology with interactive whiteboards or screens. It is also the reconceptualization of the classroom, with environments unlike the traditional ones and an increased supporting role of the teacher. In a colorful, inspiring environment for young people, students can work in groups or individually, they have access to the online contents, and can learn while playing games.

And the first results are showing. ‘There was a lot of curiosity among the students when the work for the new classroom started’ says Lorena File, an ICT teacher at the school. ‘I have seldom seen my students so motivated as when they entered the recent remodeled classroom’. The excitement to use the new equipment and the desire to have the lesson using various presentation programs was great.  ‘Some of the students did not even go out on their main break, they continued to work and explore the classroom and the new laptops,’ she says enthusiastically. 

Lorena File herself, is one of the teachers who are intensively trained by ‘Skills for Jobs’ with the intent that she will be one of the teachers who will lead the scaling-up process of the virtual didactics in the vocational education. 

Ing. Gentian Boçi, Director of ‘Pavarësia’ School, says that the new classroom is moving even those teachers who are ‘more resilient’ to new teaching/learning methods. Some of them are being helped by excellent ICT students to make traditional teaching contents more attractive, e.g. making videos. According to him, this increases students’ concentration and desire to learn more; thus, increasing their learning outcomes. 

All of this support is part of the ‘Learn Differently’ package introduced by ‘Skills for Jobs’. This package of new teaching and learning methods is being implemented largely in the ‘Blended Learning Classroom’ at ‘Pavarësia’ School. Following its success, ‘Skills for Jobs’ has opened 2 more new classrooms of this kind in the partner vocational schools in Lezha and Vlora. Berat is another city that will benefit from this innovation; namely, Vocational School ‘Kristo Isak’.