Head in the Clouds – Digital Learning in Indonesia

From 2015 – 2018 the Vienna University of Technology, together with six partners from five European countries, implemented a strategic partnership targeting ICTs in education entitled “Head in the Clouds – Digital Learning to overcome School Failure”. This project dealt with the prevention of early school leaving, the development of basic and transversal skills and the enhancement of digital literacy and education, primarily targeting children from families with minority backgrounds. In the frame of the Head in the Clouds project, the researchers developed a total of six educational modules, following the MINIMAX Approach (Minimal teacher invasion, Maximum learner autonomy), originally inspired by Sugata Mitra’s SOLE approach (Self-Organized Learning Environments) and constructionist learning theory, both supporting an individual learning process according to a student’s abilities, needs and interests.

Project Initiation and planning

During a visit from Prof. Inggriani Liem (ITB) to the Vienna University of Technology’s Institute of Information Systems Engineering in 2017, Dipl.-Ing. Niina Novak, MSc (TU Wien) who was leading the three-year Head in the Clouds project introduced Prof. Liem to the project, the alternative educational MINIMAX approach and the developed educational modules. As a result, of this initial meeting, Prof. Liem, Dipl.-Ing. Novak and Dr. Ekaputra (TU Wien) developed a plan to implement a selection of the educational modules (e.g. English, EKOPOLIS, IT 101 and Programming Module) with students of different school levels in different locations in Indonesia and to furthermore introduce and train local teachers and researchers in this alternative educational approach and the use of the developed educational modules.

The planned training and implementation in Indonesia is crucial as Prof. Liem is currently working in a team with colleagues from leading universities in Indonesia, including ASEA-UNINET members: UI, IPB and ITS, for „Puskurbuk“ with the purpose of developing a new IT and Informatics curriculum for all levels of school (preschool, elementary school, middle school, high school). “Puskurbuk” is short for “Pusat Kurikulum dan Perbukuan”, which is the „Center of Curriculum development and books“ of the Indonesian Ministry of Education. Noting that the current focus of this team lies on designing implementation methods, the developed educational modules of the Head in the Clouds project are perfectly in line with the team’s work on Informatics curriculum improvement in Indonesia and will thus contribute to the improved implementation model for villages outside Java, and other areas of Indonesia in the following years.

Project implementation

The project implementation in Indonesia took place from March 21st to 31st, 2019, with workshops and seminars in three different cities: Bandung, Jakarta and Balige and over 300 teachers, researchers, children and youth in attendance.
On Monday March 25th, 2019 the first seminar for teachers and researchers took place at ITB Bandung. The morning seminar was split into two parts “Introduction to new Informatics Curricula in Indonesia” by Prof. Liem and “Introduction to Head in the Clouds Project” by Dipl.-Ing. Novak. During the presentation Dipl.-Ing. Novak focused especially on the characteristics and implementation setting of the developed educational MINIMAX approach, the content and background of the individual learning modules and shared a lot of first hand experiences and lessons learned from the implementation of the modules in different locations across Europe. In the afternoon, the participants at ITB had the possibility to experience and work with three of the educational modules: EKOPOLIS, IT 101 and Programming in the frame of a workshop. During the workshop, the participants also got to know, some of the devices and materials used within the boxes including the educational board game EKOPOLIS, focusing on environmental education and awareness raising for issues related to sustainability, the “Ozobot” robots and MaKey MaKey boards.

Head in the Clouds Seminar participants at ITB in Bandung // Head in the Clouds Workshop at ITB: EKOPOLIS Module

Head in the Clouds Workshop at ITB: Programming Module (MaKey MaKey) // Head in the Clouds Workshop at ITB: IT 101 Module & Programming Module (Ozobots)

On Tuesday March 26th, Prof. Liem, Dipl.-Ing. Novak and Dr. Ekaputra travelled to Jakarta by train to hold a four hours seminar at the „Center of Curriculum development and books“ of the Indonesian Ministry of Education (“Puskurbuk”). The seminar was again split into three parts, (1) the introduction to the new informatics curricula in Indonesia. (2) Presentation of the Head in the Clouds project and educational approach as an example of how computer science can be also taught in a non-traditional school setting and in a student-centred approach and (3) experiencing the Head in the Clouds educational modules.

Seminar on new Indonesian Informatics Curriculum and Head in the Clouds Project in Jakarta, Indonesia & Participants

Participants of the Seminar at the Center of Curriculum development and books, Indonesian Ministry of Education in Jakarta, Indonesia

On Wednesday March 27th, Prof. Liem, Dipl.-Ing. Novak and Dr. Ekaputra travelled to Balige, Sumatra, Indonesia. In the afternoon Dipl.-Ing. Novak and Dr. Ekaputra gave a guest lecture on the topic of “Studying in Austria” and “Introduction to Semantic” web for senior students of IT Del, in Balige. On thursday March 28th, Prof. Liem , Dipl.-Ing. Novak and Dr. Ekaputra introduced the teachers of IT Del and surrounding schools to the new informatics curricula in Indonesia and the Head in the Clouds project. The presentation of the Head in the Clouds project was bilingual in Bahasa Indonesia and English language.

Participants of the Seminar for Teachers at IT Del in Balige, Indonesia

On Friday March 29th, in total three consecutive workshops took place all introducing selected modules of the Head in the Clouds project (EKOPOLIS, IT 101, Programming and English) including devices such as Raspberry Pis, Ozobots, the EKOPOLIS board game and MaKey MaKey boards. The first one was exclusively designed for teachers of IT DEL and surrounding schools. The second workshop, was designed for elementary school students and in the third workshop junior and high school students participated. Notably teachers were given the opportunity to observe how the kids interact and work with the modules during the second and third workshop-round.

Head in the Clouds Workshop for teachers at IT DEL: EKOPOLIS Module // Workshop for elementary school students with teachers observing: Programming Module (Ozobots)

Workshop for elementary school students at IT DEL: IT 101 & Programming Module (MaKey, Makey)

Workshop for elementary school students at IT DEL: EKOPOLIS Module

Participants of the Workshop for Junior and Senior High School students at IT Del in Balige, Indonesia

Workshop for junior and senior high school students at IT DEL: Work with the IT 101 & Programming Module (Raspberry Pis, MaKey Makey, Ozobots and presentation of the tasks of the English Module

Head in the Clouds workshop participants and student volunteers from IT Del, Balige, Indonesia

Outlook and further plans

Based on the very positive feedback of participating teachers and students. The Indonesian partners are currently working on the translation of selected tasks of several of the educational modules, which are available as Open Educational Resources (OER) and plan to make them available across Indonesia. In addition, the Indonesian partners are planning to develop a local version of the EKOPOLIS board game for environmental education. The project partners from TU Wien will support with consultation services in the development and translation of the educational modules. Moreover, the implementation of the developed educational materials in a different location in Sanga-Sanga (Borneo, Indonesia), as well as additional seminars and workshops for training teachers and youth workers is envisioned.

Project partners:

Dr. Ir. Inggriani Liem
Institut Teknologi Bandung (ITB), Indonesia
Data and Software Engineering Research Group
inge@informatika.org

Dipl. Ing. Niina Maarit Novak, MSc BSc
TU Wien (Vienna University of Technology), Austria
Institute of Information Systems Engineering
niina.novak@tuwien.ac.at

Dr.techn. Fajar J. Ekaputra, S.T., M.T.
TU Wien (Vienna University of Technology), Austria
Institute of Information Systems Engineering
fajar.ekaputra@tuwien.ac.at