Aims and objectives of eSTREAM

eSTREAM will be implemented from October 2003 until October 2006. It is funded for 3 years by the European Commission within SOCRATES/MINERVA.
eSTREAM is coordinated by EDUCATION HIGHWAY, Linz , Austria.

ATiT (Belgium), CSP (Italy), Mayo Education Center (Ireland), University of Patras (Greece), Science and Education Center (Greece) and the Swedish Telepedagogic Knowledge Center (Sweden) are the partners.
More information on the partnership is to be found at “Partners”.

Overall objectives of eSTREAM:

1. to promote the exchange of experiences and to share good practice on the use of Streaming media for school education / in classroom practise in Europe, taking into account pedagogical, organisational, economical and technical aspects
   
2. to raise the awareness and to promote a better understanding for the educational potential of Streaming media by disseminating good practise into the school education systems in Europe at various levels
   
3. to address educational/didactical aspects of the use of streaming media by actively involving the end users

Specific objectives of eSTREAM:

I. to test and evaluate the value added on different teaching approaches and didactical strategies, when using streaming media in classroom, in different eLearning contexts

• by collecting and analysing information on the present use of Streaming media in classrooms in Europe and beyond
  
• by evaluating within the schools participating in this project (all of whom are actively involved in one way or the other in applications of Streaming media ), the pedagogical effectiveness and the organisational impact
  
• by undertaking research on the added value and on methods of incorporating Streaming media in the learning process, evaluating the consequences and impact on the learning process and the mechanism of implementation
  
• by testing the compatibility and, indeed, the possible synergies that may develop when interactive streaming is used in the context of a constructivist educational model.

II. to develop support services for schools

• by developing a series of working demonstrators in every country that can be used to support the introduction and wider uptake of Streaming media, adapting the technology to the particular needs and requirements schools have.
  
• by offering an online utilizing service to the wider community of schools, providing support in the form of a helpdesk, guidelines, case studies, training materials for teachers and other supporting information for the concrete implementation of Streaming media in the classroom as well as in distance education
  
• by developing strategies for the large scale deployment of Streaming media in school networks
  

III. to network projects, experienced actors and institutions in Europe in order to create synergies (competence-building and cost reduction by exchange between research and development projects, and by increased take up)

• by organizing a small scale European seminar/ workshop by invitation for leading projects working in similar activities to those of eSTREAM
  
• by supporting an online exchange of experiences and sharing of good practise
  
• by organizing one public European conference for projects and initiatives in the same thematic area (educational use of Streaming media), on all levels from local to European level (the participants will not be funded from resources within this project)
  
• by establishing an online forum to discuss issues around sharing streaming material between the partner institutions (technical, financial, legal and educational aspects, standardisation, multilinguality, cultural and contextual adaptation)
  
• by jointly exploring the forthcoming technical standards and solutions taking into account issues of standardisation and multilinguality and thereby further enhancing the European dimension, and representing the European educational community as much as possible in the fora where streaming media are discussed.
  

IV. to promote awareness and a better understanding of the potential for educational applications of streaming media

• by developing an online information and promotion service containing materials, examples (e.g. videos of actual use in classrooms, changing in lesson preparation processes and as an integrated part of eLearning), tools and links
  
• by disseminating the results of eSTREAM (e.g. teaching methods) into the educational systems in Europe, especially to interested and/ or experienced teachers, teacher educators and trainers , decision makers and multimedia companies

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