1. www.aie.it Educational repositories in Italy What’s on and what’s next Stockholm, 4th June 2009 Maria Loi AIE – Associazione Italiana Editori

2. www.aie.it A glance to the future: a new legislation  Tremonti Law - Art. 15 legge 6 agosto 2008 n. 133 within the school year 2011/2012, all textbooks used in Italian schools must have beside the paper version an online and downloadable digital version. Textbooks that can be chosen by teachers should have either a mixed version (paper + digital) or exclusively a digital one. A decree by Ministry of Education (april 2009) determines: -Technological features of textbooks in their mixed and digital version

3. www.aie.it A new scenario for educational publishers Challenges for publishers  COSTS: The idea of the legislator is that the digital version can be less expensive of the paper ones, not taking in consideration all the cost related with the technological infrastructure that must be put in place to deliver digital content and all the cost related to the creation of new kind of interactive content, if needed.  TECH SPECS: The law itself is not very clear in defining what a digital version of a paper book is. A specific set of rules on the characteristics of the digital version has been delivered, but it is still quite vague and the interpretation is up to the publisher.  CHANGE DRIVEN BY LAW AND NOT BY THE MARKET: All the publishers must follow these new rules otherwise their book cannot be chosen by the teachers. This law will then change the strategy of the publisher in providing educational content, all of them are now studying new kind of textbook to be compliant with the new legislation and focusing in providing mixed or digital content aside the paper version. Right now it is not possible to foresee which business models will be chosen by the publishers.

4. www.aie.it A new scenario for educational publishers Criticalities for users: some example  Availability of broad band and appropriate technological devices is still an issue for a very large number of Italian school (and students’ houses)  To print “at home” digital textbooks may results more expensive than buying the paper version

5. www.aie.it Repositories experiences till now Key features:  Public funded market heterogeneous according to different geographical areas and still immature for private initiatives factors affecting the market development: - technological (broadband penetration and availability of ITC infrastructures in schools), -economic (school’s budget constraints) -social (level of awareness and use of digital materials by school teachers)  In place since 2004  Concerned mainly user generated content  Include training facilities/services for teachers  Testing with copyright content limited

6. www.aie.it What’s on : Repositories experiences GOLD (http://gold.indire.it/nazionale/)http://gold.indire.it/nazionale/ Database of best innovative practices in italian schools National Agency for Innovation in Schools (formerly INDIRE) AIM Collect and share best experiences and digital materials and tools produced by teachers of all grades of primary and secondary schools -More than 4,000 experiences included -More than 700 best practices selected at regional level are awarded a prize at national level and the material is further enriched with multimedia features or assignments are given to the school for development of new material INCENTIVES FOR TEACHERS supported in developing the experience and related material; asked to fill metadata records for Los and experience descriptions (LOM)

7. www.aie.it What’s on : Repositories experiences DIGISCUOLA (http://www.digiscuola.it)http://www.digiscuola.it first public funded initiative for the creation of a national repository providing schools with commercial learning objects produced by educational publishers and new digital content producers Pilot phase:  school years 2006-07/2007-08  550 schools, 3.300 teachers and 33.000 students.  each of the 1650 classes involved was provided with 1 interactive wihiteboard, 1 projector and 2 laptops each.  Pupils of each school have been provided with a 30 € virtual purse for each discipline per year to acquire learning objects (curricula subjects available were limited to Italian language and Math) and use them in a virtual collaborative environment.  A total of 4 million euro budget was allocated to school (around 8000 euro per school).

8. www.aie.it What’s on : Repositories experiences Educational publishers involved: represent the actual offer of learning objects on the Italian school market. the main five players (holding an overall market share of 30% ) (Zanichelli, DeAgostini Scuola, RCS Scuola, Edmund Paravia Bruno Mondadori - recently acquired by Pearson Education) newcomers recently entering the digital educational content market segment (e.g. Garamond, Trevi digital media, Giunti Interactive Labs, Cineca)

9. www.aie.it What’s on : Repositories experiences The Digiscuola platform:  The bibliographic catalogue: based on metadata provided by publishers along with learning objects metadata must comply with LOM metadata standard DOI (Digital Object Identifier) have been recommended as the standard identifier for the learning resources uploaded on the platform.  The virtual market place featuring e-commerce services, enabling schools to purchase learning objects thanks to ministry funding;  The virtual learning environment (VLE) within which students use the learning objects; in order to facilitate content re-use on multiple learning platforms, learning objects available on the platforms are SCORM compliant. The project also includes training courses for teachers devoted to foster the use of technologies in their daily teaching activities and a specific training on new didactical approach based on the use of digital content.

10. www.aie.it What’s on : Repositories experiences INNOVASCUOLA (www.innovascuola.gov.it) In September 2007 extension of the project With the academic year 2009-2010, the initiative becomes operative under the new name of InnovaScuola, a more advanced platform with new features and extended number of users. Most important innovations concern:  availability of platform services to primary and secondary schools of the whole national territory  extension of subjects from original two (Italian and Mathematics) to entire national curriculum  inclusion in the VLE of new features for teachers to create and share educational content that will be licensed under Creative Commons; Call for proposals for schools concerned were opened and best educational projects were awarded with a maximum funding per school of 10.000 euro plus 3 interactive whiteboard, 3 laptops and a training course for teachers on how to use provided technological devices. Contents produced within the project should be made available within the platform. The overall budget was 7 million euro of which 3,5 million were dedicated to projects financed and 3,5 million dedicated to purchase of IT devices.

11. www.aie.it The EDRENE contribution in our work A working group gathering educational publishers is coordinated at AIE -To inform and update publishers on innovation, discuss new trends and highlight best practices (in Italy and abroad) -To address policy makers to discuss ongoing legislative initiatives EDRENE experience was brought into this group and among educational publishers members of AIE since the beginning of the project. In particular: -Government policies on repositories and free/commercial content available -Use of digital content in schools and digital content market in EU countries -Standards used for digital content included in repositories -Features of digital content available through repositories -Copyright issues

12. www.aie.it Thanks for your attention maria.loi@aie.it