Erasmus+ Project: Outdoor 4 MI – KA220- SCH – Cooperation Partnerships in School Education

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The main objective of this Erasmus+ project is to promote outdoor education within the younger generation of EU citizens so as to create an awareness of our natural environment from a young age.

The aim of this project is reached through the divulging Early Childhood Education and Care teachers. In this way, the obstacles which are present in this sector can be observed, as well as providing the teachers with the means necessary to enable the implementation of these Outdoor Education activities among students between the age of 3 and 5.

In light of this, special attention is given to those students who have a physical impairments, since for these students it is more difficult to enjoy the Outdoor Education activities, however through this project this limitation is dealt with, so that no student will be in at a disadvantage, and every student has an equal opportunity to experience Outdoor Education Activities.

Throughout this project, there are a number of multiplier events so that these activities are further promoted. Furthermore, through this project a number of outcomes are expected, namely that the ECEC teachers adapt and are well equipped when it comes to these activities; that teachers are upskilled with regard to mobility impaired children in light of these activities; as well as creating awareness of the importance of Outdoor Education among the families of children, and stakeholders.

This project is co-ordinated by a partner from Tuscany, a region in Italy. The other partners in this project are from Portugal, Cyprus, Romania, Spain, Malta and Lombardy, another region in Italy.

 

English – Newsletter Outdoor4mi #1

Flyer – English

Erasmus+ Project: Let’s Play It Again

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Let’s Play It Again

2023-1-PL01-KA220-SCH-00158550

 

The aim of the project is to strengthen the language skills of young people and to acquire key competences in the field of social, cultural, technology and communication competences.

The aim is also to change PE curricula by introducing traditional games based on seniors’ memories.

During the project, the schools will produce films from meetings with seniors.

There will also be a publication containing 24 scenarios of educational and integration games and activities – both in paper and electronic versions, organization of 6 festivals of traditional games and activities for the local community, conducting 12 sessions of  2 hours duration on the use of games in the physical education of students.

There will be the  participation of 48 students (8 from each country) in mobilities in the different countries.

The project is co-ordinated by a school in Poland.

The partners are from Crete, Cyprus, North Macedonia, Lithuania and Malta.

The project is for two years and will finish in 2025.

Erasmus+ Project: LINNEO

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LINNEO is framed in the field of Technology Enhanced Learning and aims to innovate Natural Sciences (NS) education by
creating a web-based platform nurtured with high quality and engaging Digital Educational Resources (DER) for primary
education. It will target 2 categories of users: teachers and students in primary education. The platform will support formal
and non-formal learning experiences, and it will be developed with appropriate gamification features (Deterding et al., 2011)
to guide children in the exploration of the available DER. This approach will guarantee access to the DER to a wide number
of children, especially to those who cannot access on site educational experiences (due to health problems, social
disadvantage, etc.) and enrich their digital competences. The platform will be also endowed with resources for supporting
teachers in its use, to sustain the uptake of innovative methods and tools beyond the project boundaries
SUPPORTING TEACHERS, SCHOOL LEADERS AND OTHER TEACHING PROFESSIONS

The pandemic made even more evident that teachers should be able to effectively integrate digital technologies in their
teaching practice (OECD, 2021). This process needs a redefinition of the overall teaching methodology and an accurate
design of learning activities (Ott et al., 2015). LINNEO aims to train teachers in adopting the digital resources developed
through:
– an online course, piloted with the teachers of the partner schools, that will remain available for future users.
– a set of reusable activities and lesson plans for the design and implementation of blended or distance lessons integrating
LINNEO digital resources.

Finally, LINNEO will foster teachers’ collaboration by supporting the creation of a community for primary school teachers
that will build up on the e-Twinning platform. This aligns with one of the principles of successful professional training
programmes, that is to encourage the development of teachers’ learning communities (Schleicher, 2016).

PROMOTING INTEREST AND EXCELLENCE IN STEM AND STEM APPROACH
Technology has already been recognized as a key component of education in STEM (Dogan&Robin, 2015), and has
become even more important recently. Limited access to on-site education (due to emergency measures, children’s health
issues or social disadvantage) prevents students from experiential learning (Kolb, 1984), particularly important in the NS
field (Gorghiu&Santi, 2016). LINNEO grounds on the collaboration of Natural Sciences Edutainment Institutions with
educational institutions and a digital company to develop a student-centered system supporting technology-based NS
education. The project will provide teachers with resources aimed at involving students in educational experiences based on
exploration, discovery, and active participation. Resources will be tailored to the diverse students’ needs and support
conceptual change that is fundamental to science learning (Nadelson et al., 2018).

The project will pursue the following OBJECTIVES:
1. To increase the availability of high quality and engaging digital educational resources in NSs, targeting primary school
students.
2. To reduce the gap in the teachers’ competence as to the integration of digital technologies in their teaching practice from
the technological and methodological viewpoint
3. To increase the access to educational activities organised by NSEIs due to restrictions linked to societal emergencies or
specific disadvantages
4. To increase the cooperation opportunities between NSEIs, educational institutions and digital companies
The LINNEO platform ADDRESS DIGITAL TRASFORMATION by strengthening the readiness of Primary Schools [PSs] to
implement effective digital education in NS. This will be done supporting the implementation of a longer-term approach by
making available innovative resources and SUPPORTING TEACHERS in the process of integration. Finally the project will
PROMOTE INTEREST AND EXCELLENCE IN STEMS by making available resources aimed at involving students in
educational experiences based on exploration, discovery, and active participation also for those who cannot visit NSEIs
onsite.

The partners in this project are:

ITALY – Costa Edutainment SPA

ITALY – SI4LIFE – Scienza E Impresa Insiemeper Migliorare La Qualita’ Della Vita SCRL

LITHUANIA – Vilniaus Universitetas

LITHUANIA – Gedimino Miesto Mokykla

ITALY – Consiglio Nazionale Delle Ricerche

ITALY – Istituto Comprensivo Staglieno

MALTA – Be2Bit

MALTA – Newark School Malta

Erasmus+ Project: Explore, Learn and Protect our World

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The main objective of this project is to equip students with necessary the knowledge and tools to find real solutions to combat climate change, and to make contributions towards the achievement of Sustainable Development Goals, on a local, regional, national and European level.

The partners participating in this project are:

  1. Basque Country (Colegio de Educación Infantil y PrimariaOrokieta/Zarautz)– coordinator
  2. Romania (Școala Gimnazială Petriș) – partner
  3. Turkey (Mezitli Anaokulu/ Mersin)– partner
  4. Malta (Newark School ) – partner
  5. Bulgaria (Purvo Osnovno Uchilishte “Sveti Kliment
  6. Ohridski” /Sandanski) – partner
  7. Latvia (Jūrmalas pirmsskolas izglītības iestāde “Lācītis” ) – partner

The project objectives for the students are:

1. To develop awareness of global issues while experimenting scientific phenomena throug
real world examples in real environments.
2..To explore the environment in non formal areas such as forests, the countryside, parks.
3. To respect and protect nature and the living environments, which lays the foundations for
an environmentally responsible adulthood.
4. To stimulate the children’s motivation for environmental protection, by creative activities
done outside the classroom.
5. To lean how to protect the living environments, by finding real solutions to real problems.
6. To develop the children’s inquiry skills, by doing research in order to learn the cause and
effects of climate change.
7. To reduce the negative impacts of the long periods of lockdown on the children’s well being,
by increasing the level of learning activities in outdoor spaces.

The project objectives for the teachers are:

1. To develop early childhood environmental educational programmes outside the
classroom.
2. To specialize themselves into delivering environmental education lessons outside
the classroom for a variety of subjects, such as math, art and science, games,
literature and geography.
3. To increase the number of outdoors lessons taught in each partner school.
4. To develop interdisciplinary collaborations among different departments in each
school.
5. To make an exchange of good practices among all the partner schools, by
observing lessons, face to face, meetings and virtual exchanges.
6. To increase the amount of time the teachers get actively involved in outdoor
envirinmental learning with students.
7. To design and use materials for environmental education in outdoor spaces.
8. To promote the internationalization of each institution and specialization of
teachers on this topic by taking part into an international project.

The project objectives for the school management team:

1. Encouragement, support of kindergardens staff interest in a larger participation in
activities of international cooperation.
2. Improving of the kindergarten policy through developing a European dimension in
education; increasing of quality in environmental education.
3. Establish an outdoor classroom (benches, tables, whiteboard, gadgets that are
constantly present outside, regardless of the weather and can be used to learn the
direction of the sky, dive objects, speaker, etc.)
4. Set policies as a first step in becoming eco schools in the future.

Erasmus+ Project: Colourful School

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Project Title: Colourful School

Project Number: 2022-1-PT01-KA210-SCH-000083857

The main objective of this project is to promote inclusive, fair, and equitable education that values and respects cultural and linguistic diversity, fosters innovation and integration, and is aligned with the United Nations’ Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs). The project has 4 partners from 4 European countries. These include partners from Portugal, Turkey, Spain and Malta.

Our Colourful School Erasmus project will promote inclusive education through a variety of activities. These include cultural workshops using art and digital tools, foreign language learning workshops with digital tools, and the development of a strategy for inclusive education. We will also improve our understanding of common European values and identity and our outputs will be shared on a digital platform.

The project expects to achieve several results. These include the creation of a digital material pool for learning about cultural heritage, the development of resources such as e-books, e-magazines, and animations, and the establishment of an open source code platform for sharing digital materials related to cultural unification. We will also develop a strategic plan and action plan for promoting inclusive education with a focus on European common values.

For more information about this project please follow the link below:

Homepage

 

IDEAS

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The IDEAS project is a project which aims at combining the creative aspect of learning through hand on, practical activities. During the project students will work together in teams to solve real problems together not just through memory but rather through the application of the acquired knowledge students will find ways to be proud of their work.

The IDEAS project is an immense opportunity for schools to focus on education in a way that the learning approach has to be integrative of both theory and practice and where students are able to create value out of these experiences.

Furthermore, Design Thinking as a mindset and work attitude for creative problem solving has become crucial for many activities in education. These methodologies encourage students to think broadly about problems, develop a deep understanding and recognize the value in the contributions of others. This project focuses on the mindset of “how to think” not “what to think”.

The partners in this project are from Sweden, Latvia, Italy, Turkey and Malta

Let’s All Go to the Theatre of Our Dreams – A project to combat and reduce bullying in schools

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According to the UNICEF report released in 2018, half of the 13-15 year old students (approximately 150 million students) around the world are exposed to peer violence in and around the school. UNICEF Executive Director Henrietta Fore, on the subject: Education is the key to peaceful societies; however, he said the school itself might not be a safe place for millions of children around the world. While this situation affects the education of children in the short term, it can lead to depression and anxiety, even suicide in the long term. The most intense security problem in educational environments is all kinds of bullying. With this project, we aim to make our project partners more inclusive and peaceful organizations. Our project will tackle all types of bullying and develop critical-creative-collaborative and caring thinking skills of our target groups. Our basic intervention logic is to achieve sustainable results with effective and innovative methods. The thesis that negative emotions are the basis of negative behaviors and negative thoughts are the basis of negative feelings is an accepted thesis in the academic world. This shows that if we want to change a negative behavior, we will have to change the thinking first by following the opposite path. From this perspective, our project will create sustainable changes in the way individuals think about all kinds of bullying. For this, drama, P4C and non-violent communication techniques will be used separately and together. New training contents will be created. Project publications and campaigns to be carried out with the active participation of target groups are also among our effective tools. Prevention of the types of bullying in educational environments is possible by supporting all factors concerning students. For this reason, educators-students and parents were chosen as the target group as the actors involved in the process in our project. Separate activities were planned for these three target groups and the preventive and sustainability dimensions of the project were strengthened. Our General Goal: To contribute to the goal of creating more inclusive and more peaceful learning environments where each individual has the opportunity to realize their potential.

 

This project is co-ordinated by a partner from Romania. The other partners in this project are from Turkey, Bulgaria, Croatia, UK, Greece and Malta.

theatre of our dreams leaflet (1)

Skilfull & Happy

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As of this school year, Bakar Elementary School is the holder of another Erasmus + project KA210 SMALL PARTNERSHIPS entitled “Skilfull and happy” which, with partner schools, will spend 20 months working on it, from November 1, 2021 to July 1, 2023.

The project team, with the director dr.sc. Tomislav Uzelac-Šćiran, consists of teachers: Maja Babin, Leonarda Ban, Silvija Blažina, Tina Murić, Marina Juretić, Nadija Vidas and Aldena Halilović who is the Project Coordinator.

The goals of the Project are: introducing children and parents to healthy eating and living habits, encouraging them to engage in daily physical activities, encouraging the creativity of students and teachers, cooperation with partners from other countries, opening the doors of the School to action in the European environment, encouraging the active involvement of students from participating schools in activities outside compulsory education and creating the value of EU citizenship.

Partner schools from Spain, Malta and Lithuania are participating in the project. The project plans the mobility of teachers from participating schools.

The project is intended for children aged 8 and 9, ie 2nd and 3rd grade students. At that age in the Republic of Croatia a large percentage of overweight or obese children have been reported. Activities will be conducted in classes,

class teachers, in extracurricular activities and extended stays, through socializing online. Some of the activities will be done by the students

independently, at home, with the support of parents without whose support it is impossible to realize activities and projects as much as they are well designed.

The project consists of activities:

▪ “From the school garden to the plate full of health”,

▪ “Handicraft”,

▪ “Days without technology”,

▪ “I practice, you practice, we practice!”

The goal of the activity “From the school garden to the plate of full health” is to instruct students in the importance organic gardening and improve education for sustainable development in primary school. The students will, along with the teachers, in environment of the school to choose a suitable place for the school garden where they will grow vegetables and spices that will use in everyday life, nutrition at school and at home.

Working in the garden has a positive effect on children by developing work habits, social and motor skills, encourages them to be precise, responsibility, preservation of nature and heritage, strengthens self-confidence and concentration, reduces stress, develops environmental awareness, etc.

Through organic gardening, children are encouraged to take care of their health and learn to live in a sustainable way. School gardens are a solution to overweight children, according to reports from schools that have had gardens, because students improved their eating habits by working in the school garden.

During the implementation of project activities, all partners will publish videos of their activities in the show on a monthly basis Cheers on the YouTube channel.

In addition, during the implementation of the planned activities, a small manual will be created: Gardener and cook “From school garden to a plate of full health ”. It will include garden care tips and recipes for healthy meals. The manual will be bilingual, and it will be designed by students with the help of teachers.

 

Through the activity “Handicraft” students will independently create objects by recycling and using various natural material. Crafted items will be used in everyday use. Handmade stimulates the child’s imagination, cognitive development, has a relaxing and calming effect, improves the ability to focus attention and focus on the task, encourages perseverance and development, develops coordination.

 

Conducting the activity “Days without technology”, students will choose a few days each month when they will not use any form of technology. They will spend their free time with various activities that will be offered to them by the teachers or they will devise independently, in their families. He will record his activities in the diary and save the works that were created in the days without technology.

 

The aim of this activity is to acquaint children with the harmful effects of technology. The activities offered should encourage students and empowered them to design and realize days in which they will spend their free time without technology, and the contents can be found, among other things, in staying in nature, working on the land and in various physical activities.

The project activity “I exercise, you exercise, we exercise!” Is aimed at developing the habit of regular physical exercise to raise the level of health and quality of life.

We started the implementation of the Project with students in January 2022 by surveying students about eating habits, frequency and form of physical exercise, use of technology and determination of body mass index. Implementation monitoring activities will take place through direct observation during the activity and checklists for each activity, which students will self-fulfill.

 

The “Smart and Happy” team came together and worked to reduce the number of overweight or overweight children threatened. By conducting activities, we want to offer students knowledge and skills for a healthier future. It is important in children to realize that health is the main reason for taking care of the body. We believe that by changing the life habits of children, with the support of parents, to influence the change of life habits of the whole family, ie the whole community.

At the end of the activity with students, we will repeat the survey of students and the calculation of body mass index. Processing results and by comparison with the initial values ​​we will determine the progress and effects we have achieved.

The picture book “Smart and Happy” will connect all project activities into one whole.

Teachers from the partner countries will be guests of the Bakar Elementary School in October 2022. Mobility of teachers, ie travel partners, are planned for 2023 in the following order: February – Malta, April – Lithuania, May – Spain.

 

The aim of the teacher meeting, during the mobility, is to show examples of good practice and enrich the teaching experience, knowledge and examples of practice that teachers will successfully incorporate into their activities and teaching at school in which they work.

 

In this way, teachers will actively contribute to the well-being of the whole community of which the school is an important and indivisible part. That will completely the goals of the Erasmus + project “Smart and Happy” will be achieved.

For the “Smart and Happy” Team Nadija Vidas

 

Link to the project anthem: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BDuLB9wCcUE

Link to the project youtube channel: https://www.youtube.com/@skillfulandhappy8431/videos

Coordinators for the project – Bakar Elementary School: http://os-bakar.skole.hr/erasmus/spretni_i_sretni

Innovative Europe

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Background
Early school leaving is one of the major challenges in education policy within the European Union.
According to Eurostat 2017 statistics of early leavers from education and training population in
percentage for ages between 18-24 age are ; Spain 18,3 %, Turkey 32%, Malta 18,6%, Italy 14%
and Hungary 12,5%. Reducing its incidence to 10% by 2020 has been one of the key benchmarks of
European education policy cooperation. In the partnership Poland will be model country for other
partners because early school leaving rate is under 5 %.

Objectives
General aim of our project is to strengthen and maintain near future “European Dimension” on the
partner schools. Also our aim is to establish a sustainable early school leaving tackling system on the
partner schools through cross-bordering cooperation. Aims are;
-To reduce the school dropout rates in the communities involved in the project
-To enable children with low marks to feel the joy of success in lessons by encouraging them
applying the methods Poland uses and with this to strengthen the connection with school.
-To share best practices for preventing early school leaving
-To prepare sample lesson plans and evaluation documents including inclusive education approach
for all lessons
-To improve knowledge of the pupils and staff on European Union, European languages and cultural
diversity
-To encourage students to learn foreign language and promote respecting other cultures and nations
-To encourage our students´ notion and feeling of active EU citizenship
-To develop a feeling that the students belong to a wide European diverse cultural family

Participants
Target group of the project is especially 12-14 years old students, who are in early school dropout
risk group and, will take part in all project activities. However, educational staff and school managers
will join the local and transnational project activities. Parents will join the local project activities.
Students are coming from poorly educated, social and economic background. Also students have
low marks at school and they have high absenteeism rate. They are strongly in need of support
through extra-curricular activities and mentoring teachers.
At the end of the project 141 students in total will join the short-term exchange groups of pupils, 19
teachers will join the short-term joint staff training events and 49 teachers will join as accompanying
people the short-term pupil exchange activity on partner schools. Besides, more than 450 pupils and
their parents and 120 teachers will join the local project activities.

Methodology
Partners strongly need a comprehensive project work across the entire school community to prevent
ESL through inclusive education approach, motivation of joining EU project and sharing best
practise.

Results
Main result of the project is the action plan which consists of 4 parts. Also Teacher Guide and EU
Science Book will be prepared at the end of the project. The project aims, active participation of the
students and educational staff to all international and local activities. Schools have a very important
role in reducing early school leaving. Schools should be a place where pupil feel comfortable and
supported, feel ownership of their own learning. Our goal is to be a school described above.

Impact
Expected impact of the project on pupils; increasing knowledge of European languages, culture,
history and geography, feeling the active EU citizenship and part of wide European Cultural Diversity
family. Learning about partner countries’ cultures, open a cultural dialogue, which will improve
tolerance and eliminate stereotypes by identifying and respecting the similarities and differences.
Besides the expected impact on educational staff there are; increasing knowledge of European
languages, culture, history and geography, fighting racism and xenophobia, feeling part of wide
European Cultural Diversity family, developing competence in planning and organizing projects.

Longer-term benefits
At the end of the project activity partners will gain a unique action plan which includes best practices
that is prepared by international cooperation to prevent early school dropout so they can benefit from
the plan after the project through their strategic plan for the next generations. The partnership will
provide well-supported citizens to the society on a long term basis.

Participating organisations

Turkey: Sehitler Ortaokulu

Malta: Newark School

Hungary: Üllés, Forráskút, Csólyospálos Községi Általános Iskola és Alapfokú Müvészeti Iskola Fontos Sándor Tagintézménye

Poland: Szkola Podstawowa nr 5 im plk Stanislawa Sitka

Italy: Istituto Comprensivo “Filippo Traina”

First Generation, Second Chance

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