Borut Likar, Richard Messnarz, Jürgen Mack, Evelyn Schröttner, Damjan Ekert, Maria Hartyanyi, Urska Mrgole, Janos Szabo: InnoTEACH – Applying Principles of Innovation in School, Springer International Publishing AG, 2017., J.Stofla et al. (Eds.): EuroSPI 2017, CCIS 748, pp. 294-301, 2017.

1. 123
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4. Jakub Stolfa • Svatopluk Stolfa
Rory V. O’Connor • Richard Messnarz (Eds.)
Systems, Software
and Services Process
Improvement
24th European Conference, EuroSPI 2017
Ostrava, Czech Republic, September 6–8, 2017
Proceedings
123
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5. Editors
Jakub Stolfa
Technical University of Ostrava
Ostrava
Czech Republic
Svatopluk Stolfa
Technical University of Ostrava
Ostrava
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Dublin City University
Dublin
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Richard Messnarz
I.S.C.N. GesmbH
Graz
Austria
ISSN 1865-0929 ISSN 1865-0937 (electronic)
Communications in Computer and Information Science
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6. InnoTEACH – Applying Principles
of Innovation in School
Richard Messnarz2(&)
, Borut Likar3,5
, Jürgen Mack1
,
Evelyn Schröttner1
, Damjan Ekert2
, Maria Hartyanyi4
,
Urska Mrgole3
, and Janos Szabo4
1
ORG Schulschwestern, Graz, Austria
{juergen.mack,evelyn.schroettner}@schulschwestern.at
2
ISCN GesmbH, Graz, Austria
{rmess,dekert}@iscn.com
3
Korona plus d.o.o, Ljubljana, Slovenia
info@innovation.si
4
IT STUDY, Gödöllö, Hungary
maria.hartyanyi@itstudy.hu
5
Faculty of Management, University of Primorska, Koper, Slovenia
Abstract. The research and development of new and improved services, sys-
tems, and products is an important driver for the European market. Innovation
requires people that can interact in innovation teams, innovative and new ideas,
creative environments supporting the creation of innovation, and innovation
processes that support the entire chain from idea creation to the implementation
of an innovation project. Innovation is intimately linked with entrepreneur-
ship. Ideas, Innovation and Entrepreneurship are considered the keys to a
wealthy and sustainable economy [1, 3, 5, 6, 8]. The InnoTEACH project
empowers the innovation mind-set in the European Union by establishing
learning environments in schools which fertilize the grounds for young people to
apply innovation principles in problem solving and learning about
entrepreneurship concepts at the same time. This paper presents “InnoTEACH”,
a European project that transfers the innovation best practices from industry to
the education and certification of school teachers.
Keywords: Innovation Á Entrepreneurship Á Teacher
1 Introduction
Nowadays innovations are of crucial importance for the development and economic
results of the European Union [7, 3, 5, 6, 8] and its members. Slovenia, Austria and
Hungary invest a lot in the field of innovation, yet there are still challenges to be faced
involving innovation in all fields. One of them is related to the educational system [4]
which has to be continuously adapted to the needs of the modern society. It should
address the nowadays needs, e.g. creativity, innovation and entrepreneurship. Creativ-
ity, innovation and entrepreneurship (CI&E) are crucial competences that cannot be
taught in a simple manner. The project’s aim is to trigger different ways of thinking in
© Springer International Publishing AG 2017
J. Stolfa et al. (Eds.): EuroSPI 2017, CCIS 748, pp. 294–301, 2017.
DOI: 10.1007/978-3-319-64218-5_24
info@innovation.si

7. primary and high schools and to show that creativity, innovation and entrepreneurship
are crucial for success - anywhere; in all subjects, in daily situations in school, in real
life challenges, and to teach participants how to implement that in practice.
The InnoTEACH project uses a pool of previous knowledge and project results
which were developed for innovation processes management in industry, and transfers
the principles of innovation from industry into schools [2,8]. E.g. In industry creative
learning environments are used to open the minds and to continuously come up with
new ideas and improvement suggestions. Teachers learn to apply similar project based
tasks for student teams in problem solving situations. E.g. In industry specific team roles
are defined for innovation teams and so teachers will learn how to apply such roles in
student team work. E.g. In industry specific analysis methods are used to identify
strengths, weaknesses, threats and potentials and to identify root causes of problems to
be solved. Teachers will learn how to explain such methods and how to use them with
student teams in problem solving scenarios. InnoTEACH develops the materials
applying European skills definition standards and skills and learning portals [8, 9].
Skills set/skills card. The skills set is defined for a job role and a job role contains
areas of knowledge (skills units), specific skill topics (learning elements), and tasks a
student can perform after acquiring the knowledge per learning element (learning
objectives, performance criteria). This structure is based on the NVQ (National
Vocational Qualification Program) of UK and has been adapted and mapped to the
EQF (European Qualification Framework). Every learning element has ECTS (Euro-
pean Credit Transfer System) and ECVET points (European Credits for Vocational
Education Training). The skills set has been developed for teachers and mentors of
teachers.
Job Role. A job role is a specific role which a person can play at the work place. It can
be understood as an upgrade of skills to play a specific role and it is certified by the
ECQA (European Certification and Qualification Association, www.ecqa.org). In case
of InnoTEACH teachers, their additional job role will be related to CI&E training
within school and support to innovative activities of students.
Certified Training Structure. To fulfil the ECQA guidelines the training material
must be consistent with the skills set. This means that learning elements and perfor-
mance criteria are mapped onto the training material.
Certified Test Questions Pool. To fulfil the ECQA guidelines the test questions are
developed as a pool to be shared among the regions in Europe and are mapped onto the
skills set and training material.
Job Role Committee. At the end of the project an ECQA job role committee is
formed with training bodies, schools and innovators to maintain the skills card and the
network between the educational institutions.
The objectives are to connect InnoTEACH with existing other European initiatives
to form a comprehensive framework for innovation in European schools, universities,
and industry.
Figure 1 illustrates that InnoTEACH is part of an overall innovation framework
which has been set up in various EU initiatives in the past years.
InnoTEACH – Applying Principles of Innovation in School 295
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8. InnoTEACH is an EU project in the Erasmus+ program (2010–2018) which trains
and certifies teachers to apply innovation methods in their teaching classes. Teachers
will receive an ECQA certificate. Idea to Enterprise was an EU LLP (Life Long
Learning) project (2012–2014) which developed an ECQA certificate and training
material for students to apply innovation methods [7].
ResEUr (Researcher Entrepreneur) was an EU LLP (Life Long Learning) project
(2010–2011) which developed an ECQA certificate and training material for
researchers and PhD students to apply innovation methods [8].
Innovation manager (2003–2005) was an EU Leonardo da Vinci project which
developed training materials and an ECQA certificate for industrial innovation man-
agers which manage innovation processes in leading industry [9].
InnoTEACH (Fig. 1) has a core role in this innovation framework because teachers
are empowering the students that later become researchers and eventually become
innovators in industry.
2 InnoTEACH Skills Set
The InnoTEACH skills set structure is outlined in Fig. 2 below. There are three main
skills units: U1 Development of Innovation, U2 Innovative Teaching, and U3 Making
Innovation Work. U stands for Skills Unit.
InnoTEACH
next project?
secondary schools
I2E
Idea to Enterprise
ResEUr
Innovation
Manager
Fig. 1. Innovation layers: teachers – students – researchers - industry
Fig. 2. InnoTEACH skills set architecture
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9. The skills unit U1 Development of Innovation contains the following learning
elements (specific skills areas):
• U1.E1 Identification of Opportunities and Problems
• U1.E2 Production and Evaluation of Ideas
• U1.E3 Research and Development Work, Prototyping, and Presentation
The skills unit U2 Innovative Teaching contains the following learning elements
(specific skills areas):
• U2.E1 Innovative Teacher and Innovative Teaching Methods
• U2.E2 Innovative Use of ICT in Learning
• U2.E3 Practice Oriented Teaching
The skills unit U3 Making Innovation Work contains the following learning ele-
ments (specific skills areas):
• U3.E1 Guidelines for Leading the Innovative Project
• U3.E2 Supporting Facilities
For each learning element performance criteria are defined which relate to task
based learning. For each performance criteria the teachers must be able to demonstrate
skills to perform a task correctly applying the criteria. In InnoTeach 2 skills sets are
developed, one for teachers and a second one for mentors of teachers.
Figure 3 below shows the sample performance criteria table for the skills element
“U1.E1 Identification of Opportunities and Problems” for the teachers:
2.1 U1.E1 Identification of Opportunities and Problems (for Teachers)
Innovation starts with identifying an opportunity to change an existing process, pro-
duct, service and in most cases it starts with identifying a problem to solve. Identified
problems and opportunities often need to be analysed to identify root causes for the
problems. This relates to methods such as:
• Sources of innovations
• Innovation Cube
• Ishikava diagram
• Quadim method
2.1.1 Related I2E Element: U1.E2
The performance criteria for this element are:
INNOTEACH.U1.E1.PC1 The teachers is able to use methods and tools to identify
problems and opportunities.
INNOTEACH.U1.E1.PC2 The teacher knows the principles of decomposing the
problem and identify real roots of the problem.
Fig. 3. InnoTEACH performance criteria for teachers for U1.E1
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10. Figure 4 below shows the sample performance criteria table for the skills element
“U1.E1 Identification of Opportunities and Problems” for the mentors: U1.E1 Iden-
tification of Opportunities and Problems (for mentors). Innovation starts with
identifying an opportunity to change an existing process, product, service and in most
cases it starts with identifying a problem to solve. Identified problems and opportunities
often need to be analysed to identify root causes for the problems. This relates to
methods such as:
• Sources of innovations
• Innovation Cube
• Ishikava diagram
• Quadim method
The role of the mentor is to coach teachers in applying this element of knowledge in
the classroom.
2.1.2 Related I2E Element: U1.E2
The performance criteria for this element are:
3 InnoTEACH Training Strategy
For each learning element there is a set of training materials. Each unit has an
underlying teaching workflow and strategy. Figure 5 illustrates the teaching workflow
for unit 1 “Development of Innovation” [2]. First teachers learn how to form student
teams and to use creative methods to identify problems and opportunities (U1.E1). In
U1.E2 teachers learn about creative methods to produce and evaluate ideas to solve the
problems which they could apply with their student teams. And in U1.E3 teachers are
trained about how research the selected ideas, come up with potential solutions and
present them.
Figure 6 shows the teaching workflow for unit 2 “Innovative Teaching”. First
teachers learn how to use innovative teaching methods (U2.E1). Some of the inno-
vative teaching methods are based on the use of ICT tools for teamwork and teaching
(U2.E2). And U2.E3 trains teachers in task based and practice based teaching methods
where students get tasks and upload results into the ICT infrastructure and their work
gets rated and is the basis for the next tasks to be performed.
Figure 7 shows the teaching workflow for unit 3 “Making Innovation Work”. In the
learning workflow the unit 3 is after the units 1 and 2. Once the ideas and potential
solutions have been analysed in unit 1 and once the teachers have applied the course of
the training the innovative teaching environment and methods an innovation project is
INNOTEACH.U1.E1.PC1 The mentor is able to use & coach teachers in using
methods and tools to identify problems and opportunities.
INNOTEACH.U1.E1.PC2 The mentor is able to use & coach teachers to know the
principles of decomposing the problem and identify real
roots of the problem
Fig. 4. InnoTEACH performance criteria for mentors for U1.E1
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11. Fig. 5. InnoTEACH workflow for unit 1 development of innovation
Fig. 6. InnoTEACH workflow for unit 2 innovative teaching
Fig. 7. InnoTEACH workflow for unit 3 making innovation work
InnoTEACH – Applying Principles of Innovation in School 299
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12. set up to implement the innovation (U3.E1). Also the teachers get trained on how such
innovation projects are supported in the EU (U3.E2).
4 InnoTEACH Teacher Certification
The ECQA (European Certification and Qualification Association) offers 2 types of test
and certification: 1. The test based approach generates an exam from a pool of test
questions and attendees of the exam must fulfil a minimum of 67% of each learning
element area; 2. The evidence based skills assessment approach offers an interface for
teachers to upload evidences of their work (in this case the exercises from units 1 to 3)
which get assessed by an assessor panel (see job role committee in the introduction
part). When assessors rate a minimum of good (the rating scale comprises poor, fair,
good, excellent) in all skills elements the teacher passes the exam and a certificate is
provided by the ECQA to the teacher.
The InnoTEACH project decided to implement the evidence based skills assess-
ment approach. As an additional value for the InnoTEACH teachers, the InnoTEACH
project will follow the Europass methodology and guidelines. InnoTEACH Teacher
Mentors trained within the Joint International Trainings for Teachers from Participating
Schools (C1) will be awarded with the Europass Mobility Certificate.
The InnoTEACH projects starts with EU funded training of teachers in July 2017.
If teachers from different EU countries are interested they can be invited to the
InnoTEACH classes and disseminate the InnoTEACH approach across Europe. In the
exploitation it is planned to establish a job role committee to which different schools
from different regions of Europe can join.
Acknowledgements. The “InnoTEACH” project has been funded with support from the
European Commission under the Programme: Erasmus+, KA2, Strategic Partnerships for school
education with the Project No. 2016-1-SI01-KA201-021641.
The European Commission support for the production of this publication does not constitute
endorsement of the contents which reflects the views only of the authors, and the Commission
cannot be held responsible for any use which may be made of the information contained therein.
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