Projects:

Partners:
MAKS vzw – Belgium (Brussels), POD Social Integration – SPP -Intégration Sociale
Funded by the European Union

Because the Belgian government wants to push for digital inclusion for all – including the most vulnerable people who are not or little digitally active – “E-inclusion for Belgium” was created: among the 40 approved and subsidised projects, our project “After the mouse and the keyboard comes ChatGPT” was one of them. Perhaps a bit of an odd name, but one that reflects what is currently happening: because the digital world is changing rapidly and this requires new digital skills from all of us.

Maks is changing too! Because with smartphones and apps and social media and deep fakes and AI… learning how to use a mouse and a keyboard is no longer enough. We are looking for new ways to teach digital skills. The project aims to be a laboratory with new ways of learning, tailored to short-skilled or socially vulnerable groups.

Over the past year, we have been experimenting with new content and new work formats for our activities with adults: coding, AI, digital wellbeing and your role as a parent in the digital age… but also lessons on basic ICT skills for very specific target groups: people in literacy classes, people with mental disabilities…

For us, it was very exciting and inspiring to create tailor-made workshops for these target groups. For this, we also worked intensively with our existing and new partners from the socio-cultural field: basic education and literacy, senior citizens, associations for people with disabilities, etc. During test sessions with their target audience, we were able to experiment with all these forms of work and ask participants about their opinions and learning needs. Why do they find it fun or important to learn these kinds of applications and technologies? What are they afraid of or what do they feel insecure about?

Participants’ enthusiasm was high: the “hands on” approach – where you learn by doing and learn in group – was very much to their liking. As were the group discussions about the learning process itself. But we also noticed which issues were too difficult or abstract, or for which we should take more time in the curriculum. The ultimate goal is to make technology more accessible and demystify it. And to help people become more autonomous and confident in working with digital tools.

After this development and testing phase in 2024, we will start the next phase of the project in 2025: training all the animators in our “adult” team to integrate these modules and ways of working into their courses. Their role will thus increasingly evolve from “teacher” to “digital helper”: by coaching their participants to discover new things in the process and thus continue to learn throughout their lives.