The Facilitator's Toolkit. A Manual for Digital Facilitators of Adults 55+

Being a digital facilitator requires having a set of specific skills, knowledge, abilities and behaviours enabling digital educators to operate effectively in online and offline adult education. According to the DigCompEdu, there are six main areas relevant for digital facilitators, namely: Professional Engagement, Digital Resources, Teaching and Learning, Assessment, Empowering Learners and Facilitating Learners’ Digital Competence (Redecker 2017).

In this manual, the project researchers and adult educators developed a research methodology, implemented it through primary research (survey) and desk research (finding and analysing good practices), fed the research into a competence map, developed an online self-assessment tool for digital facilitators of adults 55+ and curated a toolbox which assists digital facilitators of adults 55+ in bridging their competence gaps.

This manual is part of the Erasmus+ project “DIFA - Digital Facilitator for Adults 55+”, implemented by a consortium of four partners from Romania, Spain and Turkey. The project aims to develop, test and implement an innovative digital education ecosystem with supportive tools to let educators create, share and adapt attractive learning activities for the development of digital skills of adults 55+.

Chapter 1 represents the research methodology developed and implemented by the research consortium, in line with the DIFA55+ project objectives, qualitative and quantitative performance indicators as well as the impact and sustainability ambitions of the project.

Following up on the methodology, in Chapter 2 researchers from Formative Footprint (Spain), TEAM4Excellence (Romania), Voluntariat Pentru Viata (Romania) and Saricam Halk Egitimi Merkezi (Turkey) contributed to the development, data collection and analysis of a survey as a primary research method. The survey aimed to investigate adult learners' readiness for digital media in their surroundings.

In Chapter 3, partners’ researchers approached the research of digital pedagogical practices through instructional design models (ADDIE, 5E) and yet defined the national and European digital educational environment where the 55+ adult educators operate, as a useful need analysis assessment.

As the current research showed, digital facilitators of adults 55+ need a specific competence map and tools to assess their current competence across the competence map. Chapter 4 focuses on the competence map and the online self-assessment instrument designed by the research team to identify competence gaps in the six areas set out by the DigCompEdu framework.

Chapter 5 represents a collection of educational tools which assist digital facilitators of adults 55+ in bridging the competence gaps. It sought to expand the research into the tools that may assist digital facilitators of adults 55+ in rounding their knowledge, attitudes and skills in the six areas that compose the competence map. It is thought that these will further assist field educators in designing and delivering digital courses. For clarity, in the scope of the current manual, digital courses include face-to-face, hybrid and online courses that employ digital technology to support the creation and delivery of non-formal courses for adults 55+. The toolbox assembled by the research team is structured to mirror the competence map.

Finally, the manual formulates conclusions and recommendations, as well as provides a usability and transferability potential outlook of the manual to other target groups and educational contexts.