MOOC Design and Heritage Education. Developing Soft and Work-based Skills in Higher Education Students

The present paper describes one of the pilot activities foreseen by the Erasmus+ project DICHE (Digital Innovation in Cultural and Heritage Education in the light of 21st century learning). The above mentioned pilot activity was carried out at the undergraduate course in Educational sciences – University Roma TRE, as an internal training module for the conception, implementation and evaluation of MOOC courses in museum education. Main objective of the module was to develop design and realisation skills in Educational science students. Those engaged in the module were asked to create cultural and heritage education courses for primary school in training and in service teachers. The two main pillars of the DICHE pilot, “MOOCs conception and delivery” and “heritage education”, are in line with the most recent national and international field literature research and with the Italian education system directions, aiming at integrating museum education in primary school curricula and a more aware use of technology, in order to develop pivotal skills in active citizenship building. The present paper presents the methodology adopted and the results collected during the training module carried out.