According to Europe 2020 smart, sustainable and inclusive growth strategy, the priority fields are innovation, education, learning and lifelong education, as well as digital society, and according to the demands elaborated in the normative acts of the Republic of Latvia for teachers within the activity direction "Improvement of teachers’ education and lifelong education system” defined in the education development guidelines of the Republic of Latvia for 2014 – 2020, to increase their professional competences in professional development educational programs in one of 3 modules, choosing the module of teacher’s general competences, management of educational contents and the process of didactics or education. In this context the topical issue is the supply and demand in the field of lifelong education as well as use of e-resource opportunities in educational process to provide quality not only in e-learning, but also face-to-face and blended learning.
Quality in higher education institutions are mostly characterized in terms of students’ satisfactions, cost-effectiveness, and graduation rates (Jung, 2011; cited in Mahdiuon, et al., 2017).
The new reality of e-technologies of the 21st century faces new challenges in order to asses the technological, pedagogical and organisational consequences of e-learning and to find the most optimal way to fully benefit from the potential of e-learning (Garrison, 2011).
E-learning does not exclude traditional mixed learning methods (Garrison & Vaughan, 2008; Garrison, 2011; Wiley & Nowell, 2011; Polman, 2013), but both adult trainers and the teachers being educated have become more professional, their self-control and self-assessment of educational quality promotes achievement of personal aims, which are based on the theories of new learning technologies (Laurillard, 2013) and on the expectation factors influencing the achieved results (Pinto & Anderson, 2013).
The resources in the project of Leonardo da Vinci “Quality management of teachers’ education in Europe” (Managing Quality of Adult Education in Europe, 2006) along with such quality fields as principles, main activity processes, management, communication, assessment and marketing are mentioned as one component of the quality model.
Assessment of e-resources is based on e-learning system model, which is formed by 8 dimensions (Khan, 2003; Slaidins, 2004):
- Institutional dimension is related to administrative (needs analysis, assessment, development, budget, collaboration with other organisations, marketing etc.), academic (accreditation, learning quality, support of academic staff etc.) activities and student related services (libraries, social services etc.);
- Pedagogical dimension is related to teaching and learning (contents analysis, aim analysis, learning methods and strategy);
- Technological dimension is related to technological infrastructure of e-learning environment (infrastructure planning, equipment, software);
- Interface design dimension is related to the general look and impression of e-learning programs (page design, placement of contents, navigation, applicability, accessibility);
- Assessment dimension is related to both the assessment of student achieved results and the assessment of learning process and study environment;
- Management dimension is related to maintenance of study and learning environment and to dissemination of information;
- Resource support dimension is related to direct support (study and technical support, career counselling);
- E-learning system ethical dimension is related to social and political influence, cultural diversity, prejudices, information accessibility, etiquette and legal matters (confidentiality, plagiarism, copyright etc.).
Aim of the research: To analyse e-resources for improving teachers’ professional competences within Latvian educational programs for professional development.
Research issues:
- What is the relevance of teachers’ professional development supply in respect to the demand of target audience (needs and interests), accessibility, educational quality and competence of adult education?
- How e-resources influence the relevance of the teachers’ professional development service supply in respect to target audience demand and supply, accessibility and education quality?
- Which are the determining e-resource quality and efficiency criteria?