Diversamente Coding

Publication date: March 18, 2019

by Spyros Blatsios.

Diversamente Coding is an international partnership promotes coding and digital skills to people with hearing difficulties. EU Code Week 2019 will be a good opportunity to showcase that coding is for all, even for people with hearing difficulties.

Diversamente coding is an Erasmus+ project with partners from Italy, Greece, Cyprus, Spain and Austria. The partnership aims to develop a training course enabling people with hearing disabilities to learn digital skills and programming competences, such as can be seen in the video below:

The target group of the project is people aged between 18-55 who are deaf or hard of hearing.

Why has this this target group been chosen? People who are deaf or hard of hearing have additional skills in communication, perception and visualisation. They are used to adopting alternative and creative means to communicate and interact with hearing people. The project will build on this valuable skillset.

Diversamente coding will enable the target group to augment their real-world skills, training them to become producers of digital culture. In fact, the project will simply boost skills the target group already masters. Inclusive teamwork will be a vital element, encouraging great social interaction and building intercultural bridges.

The diversamente coding partners are currently in the process of developing and carrying out a survey to assess the digital training needs of people who are deaf. The survey will be carried out internationally (in Greece, Cyprus, Italy, Spain and Austria) and includes questions such as:

• What is the general level of digital literacy amongst the target group?
• What are the attitudes and perceptions about computer programming?
• How can basic digital skills be applied in everyday life?
• What training methods and tools should be used?

Individuals as well as organisations and associations working in this field, will be asked to complete the survey. The findings of the research will provide an analysis of training needs. These will be used to develop a training methodology and training content. Using a blended learning format, training content will be incorporated into an e-learning platform. Finally, training will be piloted by selected participants.

You can find more information about our project on our website or on our Facebook page.