Digital technology as an educational tool in youth work

According to the 2017 European Digital Skills Survey more than 90% of jobs require digital skills which goes far beyond traditional office work. These is a worrying percent, considering that most of the teachers, parents and youth workers may lack the digital skills which will allow them to educate young people on digital literacy.

Digital youth work means proactively using or addressing digital media and technology in youth work. As digitalisation is a global phenomenon, it is imperative to facilitate knowledge exchange on digital youth work and young people’s digital cultures on an international level.

COVID crisis provided opportunities for digitalisation of education, but this also proved to be a big challenge for youth workers, so initiatives to push development in this area should be supported at the local, national and European levels.

With this in mind, Euroactive NGO designed the project “DIgital Technology as a TOol”, a training course aiming to increase the quality of Digital Youth Work in Non-Profit Organisations that activate in the field of youth education.

The main activity will be a 9-day mobility in March – April 2022, where 34 Youth Workers and trainers from Bulgaria, Croatia, Greece, Italy, North Macedonia, Poland, Romania, Spain and Turkey will share knowledge and example of good practicies aiming to develop their digital compentencies.

The methodological approach was built on the first chapter of the Digital Competence Framework for Educators focusing on concepts like:

• Digitalisation of Society
• Planning, Designing and Evaluating Digital Youth Work
• Information and Data Literacy
• Digital Communication
• Digital Creativity
• Digital Safety

The methods used will be from a wide range of “nonformals”, like: Demonstration, Illustrated Talk, Group Discussion, Dramatized Presentation, Icebreakers, Role Play, Problem Solving, etc.

The main result of the project will be a digital library encompasing a set of digital tools that can be used in Youth Work, classified in 9 areas:

1. Digital Simulations And Models
2. You Can Now Finish a Degree Online
3. Improved Communication
4. Advanced Research, Quick Information, and eBooks
5. Effective Assessments
6. Learning At One’s Own Pace
7. Fun Learning
8. Online Group Collaboration
9. Open Education

Stay close to finding out more!