CultureShake

Project summary

“Is all good Company here” (Midsummer Night’s Dream Act 1, Scene 2) is the entrance to a European project with its colourful characters and timeless themes. Shakespeare’s plays have enthralled audiences for over 400 years whether as the popular entertainment of their day or the shared culture of modern times performed in dozens of languages and across the world. 2016 is the 400th anniversary of Shakespeare’s death and the project uses “Midsummer Night’s Dream” and “The Tempest” as a focus for an intercultural and multilingual learning project designed by Germany, Sweden, Slovenia and the UK.The fundamental goal of the project “Culture Shake” (CUSHA) is to develop intellectual outputs for intercultural communication in multilingual educational settings as an open access online resource. The topics integration of refugees, inclusion and ICT – new digital competences – are dealt with reaching these goals in the intellectual outputs. Furthermore the project is student-centred as pupils generate multilingual and intercultural teaching material on Shakespeare for their peers. In the strategic framework for European cooperation in education “ET 2020” linguistic competence is seen as one of the key competences to promote mobility within Europe. There is a lack of teaching material bridging the gap between theory and practice in the field of linguistic and cultural diversity. Latest theories of intercultural learning or transcultural approaches have not been considered for teaching in schools yet. Therefore the CUSHA is innovative in bridging gaps between theory and practice as well as joining multilingual didactics in the teaching material that is to be designed as open source material online. Concepts for the development of peer teaching material, multilingual cultural sensitive school exchanges, multilingual online dictionaries or multilingual theatre methods are designed and in a next step also hands on activities for the classroom based on these concepts are provided. All the above mentioned concepts are created for inclusive schooling as well as integrating refugees e.g. from world classes into regular classes.With regard to “ET 2020” and the “European Language Action Plan” an essential aim is to raise awareness of everyone´s inward plurilingualism in contact with other plurilingual speakers to foster language learning for a mobile Europe, which is promoted by CUSHA.CUSHA’s objectives:• promote foreign language learning, cultural awareness• promote multilingualism and the use of mother tongues• enhance digital learning• develop the European dimension in education particularly through the multilingual focus• use the transnational expertise of the project members• encourage the best use of results, innovative products and processes• produce sustainable development of cooperation between the partner countries and institutions in the field of educationThe project is to develop innovative teaching methods based on cultural theories, theatre pedagogy and multilingual didactics. Approaches socializing into a national culture frame are to be shaken. Shakespeare’s “Midsummer Night’s Dream” and “The Tempest” are chosen as the key tool in the project. Shakespeare not only touches different aspects of intercultural contexts but also enriches an understanding of literature and performance. Multilingual approaches in the classroom match Shakespeare’s multilingual settings. To accomplish this there are four institutions involved with complementing expertise and background. The University of Education Karlsruhe (PH), Germany, as coordinator contributes with theoretical background. The Shakespeare Birthplace Trust (SBT) at Stratford, U.K., as culture centre applying culture to everyday life builds as institution a bridge between theory and practice. Primorska University (UP), Slovenia, provides IT expertise. The two schools, i.e. the Friedrich-Wöhler Gymnasium (FWG), Germany, and the English School Gothenburg (ESG), Sweden, support the project with their practical experiences. 15 pupils, secondary level, of each school and four accompanying teachers take part in the learning activities. They are joined by one lecturer from the PH, the SBT and UP. Thus the intellectual outputs can be tested. There are three learning activities producing “Peer Teaching Material”: pupils meet on eTwinning and then face-to-face to work in the SBT archives and upload the findings in a multilingual online dictionary. The intellectual outputs are hosted at the PH website and the SBT website, ensuring the maximum reach to language teachers from different nations. The CUSHA online dictionary is freely accessible on the website Termania. All cooperation partners´ websites are linked.Thus the European vision is fostered:“So we grow together, Like to a double cherry, seeming parted, But yet an union in partition” (Midsummer Night’s Dream Act 3, Scene 2).