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RISE is accepting applications in the Education and Edutainment Group The Interactive Media and Education/Edutainment Group (EdMedia Group) of RISE has research focus on multimodal interaction and learning, emerging technologies for learning and entertainment/ edutainment, and learning theory (see http://www.rise.org.cy/en-gb/vacancies/mrgs/#mrg-2) We are looking for outstanding, recent PhD graduates or early-years postdoctoral candidates, or MA/MSc holder who already have or aspire to…   For researchers, ·      engage in relevant research and development of EdMedia products ·      be active in research communities related to EdMedia ·       propose and implement research projects within EdMedia ·       engage with grant-writing and/or project management ·       engage with industry, e.g., work on a product or service that might be developed within EdMedia   For designers or developers, ·       engage in relevant to EdMedia work (i.e., programming languages/ development platforms or environments, previous …

The 2nd INTELed project meeting was successfully hosted by the University of Piraeus Research Center (UPRC) at Piraeus, Greece, on the 7th and 8th May 2018 at the premises of the University of Piraeus. During the meeting, all project partners were represented and the agenda included the presentation of the project progress. In particular, partners discussed about the activities that have been accomplished so far on the last six months of the project lifecycle, as well as, about the forthcoming activities of the second year.   In this context, the work that has been done in relation to the INTELed Pedagogical Framework for SEN Education and the Methodological approach model for the teacher training has been presented. In addition, partners thoroughly discussed their plans in relation to the INTELed teachers’ recruitment process, the teacher training events and the school pilots that will take place from September 2018 onwards. The dissemination …

Πότε: 2 Ιουνίου, Σάββατο, 17:30-21:30 Πού: Πολιτιστικό Κέντρο Λυμπιών Σας περιμένουμε να γιορτάσουμε την Παγκόσμια Μέρα Παιδιού παίζοντας και μαθαίνοντας! Συμμετέχουν με δραστηριότητες: ΑΚΤΗ Cyprus Interaction Lab, Τεχνολογικό Πανεπιστήμιο Κύπρου Κυπριακός Οργανισμός Αστρονομίας LIFE ΜΗΔΕΙΑ, Ιατρική Σχολή, Πανεπιστήμιο Κύπρου PlanBe, Plan it Be it Research in Science and Technology Education Group (ReSciTEG), Τμήμα Επιστημών τη Αγωγής, Πανεπιστήμιο Κύπρου Resilient Lives Foundation Research Centre on Interactive Media Smart Systems and Emerging Technologies (RISE) Stremble Kids Stress Relief Terra Cypria, το Κυπριακό Ίδρυμα Προστασίας του Περιβάλλοντος Το σχολείο της φύσης, Frederick University UCLan Cyprus Ωκεανογραφικό Κέντρο, Πανεπιστήμιο Κύπρου Πρόγραμμα εκδήλωσης: 17:30-18:00 Καλλιτεχνικό πρόγραμμα 18:00-20:00 Δραστηριότητες-παιχνίδια σε σταθμούς 20:00-21:30 Παρατήρηση πλανήτη Δία με τηλεσκόπια του Κυπριακού Οργανισμού Αστρονομίας Στο τέλος της εκδήλωσης θα διενεργηθεί κλήρωση με δώρα (λαχνοί προς 1 ευρώ): Υποτροφία αξίας €200 για μαθήματα πληροφορικής/ ρομποτικής από ESmart Computer Training Center Τηλεσκόπιο Μικροσκόπιο Μοντέλο ηλιακού συστήματος 2 θεραπείες από το φυσικοθεραπευτήριο …

Aφορά στους εκπαιδευτικούς Δημοτικής Εκπαίδευσης δημόσιων και ιδιωτικών σχολείων Το ευρωπαϊκό έργο INTELed [INovative Training via Embodied Learning and multi- sensory techniques for Inclusive Education] (www.inteled.org/) σας προσκαλεί για την υποβολή δηλώσεων ενδιαφέροντος για συμμετοχή σε επιμορφωτικό πρόγραμμα με θέμα τη χρήση καινοτόμων και διαδραστικών τεχνολογιών, με στόχο την προώθηση παιδαγωγικών προσεγγίσεων που στηρίζονται στην κιναισθητική και ενσώματη μάθηση για την υποστήριξη των μαθητών με μαθησιακές δυσκολίες στη σχολική τάξη όπως και την ένταξη μαθητών με αναπηρία ή/και ειδικές εκπαιδευτικές ανάγκες από τις ειδικές μονάδες στην γενική εκπαίδευση. Στόχος του ευρωπαϊκού έργου INTELed είναι η επιμόρφωση των εκπαιδευτικών με ειδικότητα ή ιδιαίτερο ενδιαφέρον στην Ειδική και Ενιαία Εκπαίδευση και η ανάπτυξη δεξιοτήτων στη χρήση καινοτόμων και διαδραστικών τεχνολογιών, με στόχο την προώθηση παιδαγωγικών προσεγγίσεων που στηρίζονται στην κιναισθητική και ενσώματη μάθηση, καθώς και σε πολυαισθητηριακές τεχνικές για την αποδοτικότερη διδασκαλία σε μαθητές που διαγιγνώσκονται με αναπηρία ή/ και ειδικές εκπαιδευτικές …

When: 8-12 June 2018 Where: Platres   The Youth Board of Cyprus organizes the 3rd Youth Leadership Summer School, which aims to empower young people to visualize positive change and progress of society. The program aspires to introduce young people to creative ways of design thinking and to seek out opportunities for leadership that will lead innovative ideas to their implementation. Through the use of lectures, discussions, interactive workshops, practice, experimentation and entertainment, the program offers young people a multidimensional experience and approach to Leadership & Creativity, as well as the opportunity to get acquainted with new tools, ways of thinking. The instructors this year will be Prof. Panayiotis Zaphiris and Andreas Papallas from Cyprus Interaction Lab. The Cyprus Interaction Lab received funding to manage the Youth Makerspace Larnaka of Youth Board of Cyprus and provide academic and research direction/guidance to the project. More information: onek.org.cy/youthleadership/

Οι επιστήμονες ερευνούν αυτό που ήδη υπάρχει… οι μηχανικοί δημιουργούν αυτό που δεν υπήρξε ποτέ… (Albert Einstein) Προετοιμάζοντας τους νέους απόφοιτους μηχανικής για την αγορά εργασίας Ξεκινώντας το άρθρο μας με το εμπνευσμένο αυτό απόφθεγμα του Albert Einstein, θα λέγαμε ότι είναι όντως πραγματικότητα: οι μηχανικοί μπορούν να αλλάξουν τον κόσμο υλοποιώντας καινούριες ιδέες και να πρωτοπορήσουν ενσαρκώνοντας έργα που δεν υπήρχαν πότε προηγουμένως. Ωστόσο, οι νέοι απόφοιτοι μηχανικοί με την ολοκλήρωση των σπουδών τους χρειάζεται να ξεκινήσουν από κάπου. Ποιο θα είναι ωστόσο το σημείο εκκίνησής τους; Είναι άραγε επαρκώς προετοιμασμένοι για να βγουν στην αγορά εργασίας; Οι νέοι απόφοιτοι μηχανικής έχουν συνήθως ένα ισχυρό ακαδημαϊκό υπόβαθρο, ωστόσο αυτό το οποίο τους υπολείπεται είναι η πρακτική εμπειρία σε αυθεντικά συγκείμενα, κάτι το οποίο επιζητούν όλοι οι εργοδότες. Ως εκ τούτου, διαφαίνεται ότι οι νεοεισερχόμενοι στην αγορά εργασίας απόφοιτοι μηχανικής χρειάζονται καθοδήγηση σε συνδυασμό με ένα υποστηρικτικό περιβάλλον, στο οποίο …

Following the ENGINITE kick-off meeting held in Limassol, Cyprus, the second coordination meeting of ENGINITE took place in London, UK in March, followed by a training event on Problem-based Learning (PBL) pedagogy. The coordination meeting and training event were held from Monday the 12th to Thursday the 15th of March 2018, at ThinkUP’s premises in London; one of the project partners in the ENGINITE consortium. In total, one full day was devoted to project coordination and planning. The next three days were fully allocated to the PBL training. The first day of the meeting, started with the coordinator of ENGINITE, Dr Andri Ioannou, presenting the key milestones achieved in the project implementation to date. All partners discussed the next steps. Inorder to successfully develop the ENGINITE innovative training programme, each partner is responsible to develop and deliver eight courses based on the PBL approach. The following 3 days were devoted …

The Research Centre on Interactive Media, Smart System and Emerging Technologies (RISE) is a newly founded research centre in Cyprus, located at Nicosia. This project has received funding from the European Union’s Horizon 2020 research and innovation programme H2020-WIDESPREAD- 01-2016- 2017 (Teaming Phase 2) under grant agreement No. 739578, as well as from the Cypriot Government, local and international partners and other sponsors. RISE is a joint venture between the Municipality of Nicosia (coordinator), Max Planck Institute for Informatics (Germany), University College London (UK), University of Cyprus, Cyprus University of Technology, and Open University of Cyprus. RISE has announced twenty (20) positions (part-time/full- time). For more details, please visit, http://www.rise.org.cy/en-gb/vacancies/

A Workshop on Educational Robotics successfully took place on  24th – 25th February 2018, by the Cyprus Interaction Lab in collaboration with the Forum Private School (Nicosia) and the support of ACM – Women. Women of all ages and girls over 8 years of age participated in the workshops that took place at the Forum Private School. The workshops were done in two full days, including introductory presentations on Educational Robotics and several hours of hands-on per day by Vaso Constantinou, PhD candidate at the  Cyprus Interaction Lab, under the supervision of Dr. Andri Ioannou. Female participants of all ages, mostly mothers with their daughters came together and had the opportunity to participate and program Educational Robots in all three workshops.   A video containing photographs from the event:https://youtu.be/uKhqatqwMCI

Η 1 η συνάντηση της Εθνικής Συμβουλευτικής Επιτροπής (National Advisory Board) του ευρωπαϊκού έργου ENGINITE πραγματοποιήθηκε επιτυχώς την Παρασκευή 16 Φεβρουαρίου, 2018, στο Ερευνητικό Εργαστήριο Αλληλεπίδρασης Cyprus Interaction Lab, του Τεχνολογικού Πανεπιστημίου Κύπρου. Η Εθνική Συμβουλευτική Επιτροπή του ευρωπαϊκού έργου ENGINITE είναι τριμελής και απαρτίζεται από τους: Δρ. Δέσπω Κτωρίδου (Αναπληρώτρια Καθηγήτρια, Πρόεδρος Τμήματος Διοίκησης και Διοικητικής Πληροφοριακών Συστημάτων, Πανεπιστήμιο Λευκωσίας), κ. Σάββα Σαββίδη (Αντιπρόεδρος τοπικού δικτύου IET Engineering Communities στην Κύπρο) και κ. Έλενα Καλλή (Λειτουργός, Οργανισμός Νεολαίας Κύπρου). Στη συνάντηση συμμετείχαν επίσης η συντονίστρια του ευρωπαϊκού έργου ENGINITE Δρ. Άντρη Ιωάννου (Επίκουρη Καθηγήτρια, Τμήμα Πολυμέσων και Γραφικών Τεχνών), ο διαχειριστής του Ευρωπαϊκού έργου Δρ. Γιάννης Γεωργίου (Μεταδιδακτορικός Ερευνητής, Τμήμα Πολυμέσων και Γραφικών Τεχνών) καθώς επίσης και η κ. Χριστίνα Αχιλλέως (Εκπρόσωπος του τοπικού εταίρου GrantXpert). Κατά την έναρξη της συνάντησης, η συντονίστρια του έργου Δρ. Άντρη Ιωάννου παρουσίασε στην Εθνική Συμβουλευτική Επιτροπή το ευρωπαϊκό πρόγραμμα ENGINITE σε συνάρτηση …

STEM Discovery Week 2018 is a joint international initiative that invites projects, organisations and schools across Europe and around the world, to celebrate careers and studies in the fields of Science, Technology, Engineering and Mathematics (STEM). The tagline for this year’s campaign “say yes to STEM” describes the partners’ open-minded and dedicated support to STEM subjects at school, as well as wide-ranging collaboration among stakeholders in the area. Interested to become a partner? By committing to the STEM Discovery Week 2018, the partners agree to: Organise and share information about activities in STEM education as part of the STEM Discovery Week campaign. Encourage third parties to support and join the initiative by organising STEM activities of their own and share information about them as part of the STEM Discovery Week campaign. Publish on their web page information in support of the STEM Discovery Week campaign, hence facilitating an active exchange of …

Through our ongoing collaboration with Harvard University in the field of immersive technologies and participatory urban planning, we will be organising a Special Interest Group at ACM CHI Conference on Human Factors in Computing Systems, the premier international conference of Human-Computer Interaction, in Montreal, Canada in April 2018. The team leading the Special Interest Group consists of Nektarios Christodoulou (Famagusta Ecocity), Andreas Papallas (Cyprus Interaction Lab),  Zona Kostic (Harvard University) and Lennart Nacke (Waterloo University) and it is titled: “Information Visualisation, Gamification and Immersive Technologies in Participatory Planning”. We encourage everyone interested in the subject and attending CHI this year to join us as we look forward to an engaging and lively session. Abstract: Public participation in the decision-making processes that shape the urban environments we inhabit is an imperative aspect of a democratic society. Recent developments in the fields of Information Visualization, Gamification and Immersive Technologies (AR/VR/MR) offer novel opportunities for civic engagement in the planning process that remain largely unexplored. This SIG aims to identify …

Τα εργαστήρια θα γίνουν στις 24 και 25 Φεβρουαρίου 2018 και θα περιλαμβάνουν εισαγωγή στην Εκπαιδευτική Ρομποτική και εργαστήρια με διάφορους τύπους ρομπότ. Οι ενδιαφερόμενες μπορούν να δηλώσουν συμμετοχή σε ένα ή σε όλα τα εργαστήρια της εκδήλωσης. Τα εργαστήρια θα είναι δωρεάν για όλες τις συμμετέχουσες. Διοργανωτές Cyprus Interaction Lab του ΤΕΠΑΚ, σε συνεργασία με την ACM και την ιδιωτική σχολή Φόρουμ. Περισσότερες πληροφορίες: http://eduroboticscy.com/weedr/

The Cyprus Interaction Lab is the only research facility in Cyprus specialising in Educational Technology and Human Computer Interaction. We are proud to engage in research that helps unpack the potential of emerging technologies to positively influence our society. We hope you will enjoy reading our newsletter which highlights our major achievements of the previous year.  Cyprus Interaction Lab Annual Review-Newsletter 2017

The kick-off meeting of the ERASMUS+ project entitled: ENGINITE: “ENGineering and Industry Innovative Training for Engineers” took place at the Cyprus University of Technology in December 7th and 8th 2017. The project’s consortium is comprised of 7 partners in 4 different European countries: Cyprus University of Technology (Cyprus), Aalborg Universitet (Denmark), CUBEIE L.L.C (Cyprus), London South Bank University (UK), Technical University of Crete (Greece), GrantXpert Consulting (Cyprus), and Useful Simple Projects Limited (UK). Cyprus is represented by the Cyprus University of Technology through the Social Computing Research Center (Social Computing Research Center, which has the responsibility for coordinating the project. The Scientific coordinator of the project is Dr. Andri Ioannou, Assistant Professor at the Department of Multimedia and Graphic Arts, and Director of the Cyprus Interaction Lab (CIL). The ENGINITE group at the Cyprus University of Technology is also composed of Dr Yiannis Georgiou (Project manager), Prof. Panayiotis Zaphiris, Dr …

Με αφορμή την Ευρωπαϊκή Εβδομάδα Ρομποτικής 2017, το Cyprus Interaction Lab σε συνεργασία με το Β΄Δημοτικό Σχολείο Ορμίδειας  οργάνωσαν με επιτυχία την εκδήλωση “Μαθηματικά και Ρομποτική – Ένα μάθημα με τους γονείς μας!”. Την Δευτέρα, 20 Νοεμβρίου 2017, η διδακτορική φοιτήτρια του Cyprus Interaction Lab, Στέλλα Τιμοθέου χάρισε μια διασκεδαστική μαθησιακή εμπειρία ρομποτικής σε μαθητές και γονείς, με τα ρομποτάκια Meet Edison.   On the occasion of the European Robotics Week 2017, the Cyprus Interaction Lab, in collaboration with the Ormidia B Primary School, successfully organized the “Mathematics and Robotics – A Lesson with our parents! “ On Monday, November 20, 2017, Stella Timotheou, PhD student at the Cyprus Interaction Lab gave a fun robotic learning experience to students and their parents, using the  Meet Edison robots.

The kickoff meeting of the INTELed project [INnovative Training via Embodied Learning and multi-sensory techniques for inclusive education] took place with great success on November 20-21, at the Cyprus University of Technology. The INTELed project, which is funded by the European Commission, is composed by four partners (Cyprus University of Technology, CESIE, University of Piraeus, University of Valladolid) in four countries (Cyprus, Italy, Greece, Spain). Cyprus is represented by the Cyprus University of Technology through the Social Computing Research Center (Social Computing Research Center, https://www.socialcomputing.eu/), which has the responsibility for coordinating the project. The Scientific coordinator of the project is Dr. Andri Ioannou, Assistant Professor at the Department of Multimedia and Graphic Arts, and Director of the Cyprus Interaction Lab (CIL, https://www.staging.cyprusinteractionlab.com/). The INTELed group from Cyprus is also composed of Dr. Yiannis Georgiou (Project manager), Prof. Panayiotis Zaphiris, Dr. Antigoni Parmaxi, and Dr. Despina Michael-Gregoriou from the Cyprus University of …

CIL members Andri Ioannou and Vaso Constantinou presented two papers at IMCL 2017, held in Thessaloniki, Greece (30 November – 1 December 2017) – one of which won a Best Special Session Paper Award: Augmented reality supporting deaf students in mainstream schools: Two case studies of practical utility of the technology Andri Ioannou, Vaso Constantinou [Best Paper Award] The study suggests a practical use of augmented reality (AR) in supporting Deaf and Hard of Hearing (DHH) students in mainstream schools. The paper presents two case studies. First, we used AR via wearable glasses to support the communication and feedback loop between the instructor and DHH learner during the lesson. Second, we used AR via a typical tablet to support the DHH students in acquiring vocabulary and subsequently, improving their reading-comprehension capabilities. In the first study, although the wearable AR glasses were not stylish enough to be attractive to the DHH adolescent, who felt uncomfortable wearing them …

5th International Conference on Learning and Collaboration Technologies A Thematic Affiliated Conference of HCI International 2018 Co-chairs: Panayiotis Zaphiris and Andri Ioannou Cyprus Interaction Lab, Cyprus University of Technology, Cyprus In the today’s knowledge society, learning and collaboration are two fundamental and strictly interrelated aspects of knowledge acquisition and creation. Learning technology is the broad range of communication, information and related technologies that can be used to support learning, teaching, and assessment, often in collaborative way. Collaboration technology, on the other hand, is targeted to support individuals working in teams, towards a common goal, which may be an educational one, by providing tools that aid communication, the management of activities as well as the process of problem solving. In this context, interactive technologies do not only affect and improve the existing educational system, but become a transformative force that can generate radically new ways of knowing, learning and collaborating. The …

The Cyprus Interaction Lab and Harvard University have begun a collaboration in the intersection of Urban Design, Participation and Augmented Reality. Urban Design and Planning worldwide have long been criticised for their lack of meaningful public consultation and participation in the process of the making of our cities. Currently, the existing practices of consultation and participation are within the confines or council meetings, complex form filling and survey reports that most often than not carry little weight towards the decisions made by the planning authorities. Moreover, the way information is disseminated to the public regarding potential developments requires a higher level of knowledge and training in architecture and planning. Therefore, a misinformed public can easily feel threatened by developments, disempowered and excluded from the decision-making, especially where private interests are being discussed. The active participation of the users and the public in any design process is in line with the …