Digitally enhanced mobility. CIVIS Handbook on Virtual Mobility

Tackling the new teaching and learning paradigms in education, especially at university level, CIVIS proposes an innovative approach to the design and implementation of modern educational activities. Digitally enhanced mobility - CIVIS Handbook on Virtual Mobility offers a detailed exploration of the digitally enhanced (virtual) mobility and educational technology tools that can be used in higher education. The handbook thereby aims to offer support and guidelines for those managing educational activities accompanied by virtual mobility components, whether in fully virtual learning environments or in a blended format. The handbook comprises a complex analysis of the current status and impact of virtual mobility in the educational sector, as well as a variety of distance or blended learning best practices from CIVIS member universities. The handbook envisions the transformations produced by some of the most recent developments in ICT (Information and Communication Technologies) in education and the adaptations that emerged during the pandemic context. The CIVIS Handbook on Virtual Mobility promotes various virtual mobility concepts, identifying different types of virtual mobility practices and formats, as part of the building blocks for a more complex construct, the European degree and the design pathways for connecting universities across Europe in this transformative process. The handbook continues the work and endeavours carried out by the CIVIS Work Package 7 “Teaching Excellence” team, for increasing students' mobility and innovating learning opportunities in the alliance, in a wider European educational context, offering them access to modern and innovative learning opportunities and environments, enhancing cultural exchanges, European citizenship, and active engagement in societal challenges. The handbook offers an adequate place for considering and analyzing the entire virtual mobility ecosystem and its dimensions, such as: pedagogical (course design and curriculum development), technical (tools and innovations to support content creation, course delivery, communication and interaction tools), and administrative (learning pathways, ECTS credit points guidelines, recognition principles and tools). We consider this handbook as a valuable resource for academics, experts, policymakers, stakeholders, and students, as an integrative support document for designing, managing, and delivering teaching and learning in a virtual mobility environment. Considering aspects such as modularisation (as CIVIS’ response to the European approach to micro-credentials), stackability of learning, flexible learning pathways, small units of learning that lead to larger educational components (building blocks), recognition of learning based on ECTS credit points, and a curricular framework that paves the ways for European degrees, the CIVIS Handbook on Virtual Mobility provides a practical perspective on designing and implementing innovative learning activities in the context of a European University Alliance, tackling sustainable and transformative approaches for the future of higher education.
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