PREFACE
The importance of ensuring cultural pluralism in an emerging information society is recognized by many states and is stressed in many forums, conferences and documents of UNESCO. Cultural and linguistic diversity can be considered a fundamental social right and a treasure of humanity. However, some tendencies created by technological advances are seen as a threat to unique cultures and languages.
At the same time, advances in information technology provide many opportunities for the development of specialized services for various and diverse cultural needs and could serve as a vehicle of cultural empowerment. For example, information technologies offer new opportunities to safeguard cultural values and create the means for worldwide dissemination directly to a great number of Internet users. The number of such users may already reach several hundred million throughout the world and is constantly growing.
However, translating opportunities into real things is no easy task. For that purpose it is necessary that part of our society - intellectuals, specialists in the humanities - become active participants in the information society - as users and, most importantly, as content providers. They are the people who can provide the most valuable and interesting information. They are the experts who can select the materials for preservation and dissemination. At the same time many of them are not aware of the possibilities of information technology, or they do not know how to use information technology. Also, they have not enough basic knowledge and experience in management and entrepreneurship to promote the spread of cultural values by means of new Internet-based tools. That's why teaching and training users and trainers on information technology applications in the fields of cultural education has become one of the most important challenges in
developing an information society - a popular slogan of the last few years.
In response to the enormous changes created by the spread of the Internet into all fields of human activity and by the fusion of
information technology and culture, the UNESCO Chair in Informatics for the Humanities at the Institute of Mathematics and Informatics initiated the project
Preparation of Courseware for Training of Trainers and Users on the Special Applications of Internet-Based Services in the Fields of Cultural
Education. It is intended as a training program and courses in Internet-based services in the specific fields of UNESCO responsibility: culture, mass media, and education. This project was supported by the UNESCO Informatics Program (June 2000 - November 2000) and resulted in the development of the training material entitled
Courseware for Training of Trainers and Users on the Special Applications of Internet-Based Services in the Fields of Cultural Education.
The training material was developed for trainers and some users who are responsible for the design and delivery of courses and for the creation of special Internet-based services in the fields of cultural education, such as web sites and portals for cultural objects, gateways on the Web, E-publications. The material is intended for a six-day intensive course. It does not focus on the details of developing appropriate software, multimedia, or teaching techniques but gives a concise overview of the latest developments in this field, advanced techniques to be used, and resources to help design and deliver courses. The overriding philosophy is that developing content is the key to a successful program.
The content of this course is strongly dependent on the advance of information technologies and modern techniques, which are rapidly developing all the time. The courseware is constructed on the basis of achievements up to 2000, but new trends, approaches, and software are constantly emerging. Internet-based services are also a constantly developing field, and this training course must follow its lead. Therefore, the course
should be based on the following basic principles:
Organization and Content of the Course Material
The course material consists of a short presentation of
the course, an outline of each theme (an abstract, the target audience and what
will be learned) and core materials: text and demonstration material. The
courseware is presented on this web site and CD-ROM.
The web on Internet enables to download text and demonstration material as pdf
and pps format files. There is also one more web - a specially developed site
demonstrating the possibilities of E-learning and evaluation tools.
The course material on CD-ROM is presented in two ways: as doc and ppt format
files (for copying and editing purposes) and as pdf and pps format files (for
reading and demonstration purposes).
The topics of the training package were considered and approved during the Vilnius workshop
ELECTRONIC MEDIA IN CULTURAL EDUCATION: TRAINING OF TRAINERS AND FUTURE PRODUCERS OF NEW MEDIA,
10-12 October 2000, which was supported by UNESCO and which was attended by the leading experts in this field from Lithuania, Poland, Hungary, Estonia, and Greece. The content of this training package was determined as follows:
Chapters 1, 2, and 3 concern core content and technologies important in the digital presentation of any cultural subject/object. Chapter 4 is a tool to help design efficient and engaging computer-based training. In addition, it has a specially developed web page illustrating the possibilities of E-learning and evaluation tools. Chapters 5 and 6 deal with very important questions concerning the preservation of cultural values and review the objectives and methods of using digitization technologies to facilitate and widen access to unique and vulnerable documents. Each of the core chapters, namely, Chapters 1, 2, 3, and 4, also contains recommendations and comments for teachers. These insertions are printed in blue. Some of the Chapters contain hands-on tasks. The hands-on material is identified by green print.
Each chapter is relatively independent of the other chapters; it has its own table of contents, explanatory text (outline), references, comments, and an independent pagination. The pagination of the whole book is chapter-dependent. For example, the number 1-10 means the 10th page of Chapter 1.
A Glossary of Terms and Abbreviations for all the chapters will help teachers and students use precise and short expressions.
PowerPoint demonstration material has been added to each chapter. The places in the
downloadable text where a slide is to be shown are
marked in red. Therefore, the materials can be easily used for training anywhere in the world.
This courseware was created at the UNESCO Chair in Informatics for the Humanities at the Institute of Mathematics and Informatics, Vilnius, Lithuania, in cooperation with
three other Lithuanian universities (Kaunas University of Technology, Vilnius Gediminas Technical University,
Vilnius University) and foreign partners (Budapest University of Technology and Economics, Hungary; Silesian University of Technology, Poland;
Institute of Informatics & Telecommunication, NCSR, "Demokritos", Greece).
Acknowledgements
A vision of a course born and solutions found due to the constant efforts of Dr.
Nerute Kligiene. She took responsibility for collecting materials, integrating them and editing
texts, to her I offer my thanks. I am very grateful to participants of the International Vilnius Workshop, where during discussions the main accents were determined. Special thanks are owed the authors for their valuable contributions to this training material:
Konstantinos V. Chandrinos, Ieva Cepulkauskaite,
Virginija Limanauskiene, Gediminas Navickas,
Bogdan Smolka, Pal
Vasarhelyi. I express sincere thanks to my colleagues at the Institute of Mathematics and Informatics, especially the informatics engineers
Dr.
Kestutis Juskevicius and Evaldas Ozeraitis; we all benefited greatly from the many stimulating discussions in which we were constantly engaged.
Ideas and inspiration were taken mostly from Internet sources and some advanced projects with the kind permission of their owners. We are grateful to
Anders Ardoe of the Danish Technical Knowledge Center and Library and to
Marie-Therese Varlamoff of the International Federation of Library Associations (IFLA) for their kind permission to use some of the findings published in the Survey on Digitization and Preservation undertaken by IFLA and UNESCO and their Internet sites for the educational purposes of this courseware.
Also I would like to thank the students in Engineering Informatics at the Vilnius Gediminas Technical University
Egidijus Blazevicius and Donatas Saulevicius who have contributed to preparation of this material too.
Special thanks are due Professor Mifodijus Sapagovas, Director of the Institute of Mathematics and Informatics, for providing constant support, work space and an inspiring environment.
All this work would have been impossible without financial support from UNESCO. It was accomplished under a contract between UNESCO and the Institute of Mathematics and Informatics. Because of this support from UNESCO an enormous impact on understanding and the promotion of advanced technologies in the field of cultural education were achieved.
Particularly valuable assistance has been rendered by Mr. Phillipe Quéau, the
Director of Information and Informatics Division, UNESCO.
Professor Laimutis Telksnys
Head of the UNESCO Chair in Informatics for the Humanities
Vilnius, Lithuania, November 2000
Contact information:
Professor Laimutis Telksnys
Head of
the UNESCO Chair in Informatics for the Humanities
Institute of Mathematics and Informatics
A. Gostauto 12, 2600 Vilnius
LITHUANIA
Tel: + (370 2) 610460
Fax: + (370 2) 619905
E-mail: telksnys@ktl.mii.lt
www.unesco.mii.lt