1. Workshop IVETTE Teaching/Learning Policy recommendation University of Barcelona Division V- Science Education 16-18 November, 2000

2. Teaching/Learning policy recommendations a)Developing new strategies for teaching/tutoring Implementing teaching in Virtual Learning Environments needs competence in technological (called hard skills) and organisational aspects as well and new skills (called soft skills). in applying relevant didactical methods, moderating, facilitating, etc.

3. Teaching/Learning policy recommendations b) Supporting the development of “innovation units” Integrating interdisciplinary teams made up of academic staff (subject-matter experts), pedagogical advisors and technical support working cooperatively.

4. Teaching/Learning policy recommendations c) Looking for a balance between the pedagogical model and the potential of technological tools. A decision to adopt a given VLE does make specific decisions about the pedagogic model to be adopted by an institution. When a top-down strategy is chosen, the variety of pedagogical functions is reduced to the tools offered by the pre-defined and standardised environment. A bottom-up strategy, however, can entail other problems such as technical instability, incompatibility of the software, etc.

5. Teaching/Learning policy recommendations d) Designing materials specifically for teaching in VLEs Obviously, the other side of the problem in the case we are not adapting already made curriculum materials, is to face a more important investment to create them from scratch. Again, having institutional innovation units should ease the process.

6. Teaching/Learning policy recommendations e) Setting new working conditions for tutors and lecturers and other staff involved in the virtual campus operations. It is necessary to recognise that teaching overload in VLEs is the first step towards managing it. Although it is necessary to consider some technical solutions to this problem (for instance on-line FAQs), reducing the amount of courses and students might be the only way to keep the quality and the interactive “potential” of VLE.