Demographic change is one of the great societal challenges that European states currently face, however, in schools’ curricula this topic hasn’t been very present yet. Having stated this, the project’s aim is to develop innovative multilingual-learning materials that permit students (and any other person interested in the subject) to learn about the everyday life of people over 65 years in four EU member states. In every one of the four schools, an ERASMUS+team is formed by at least two teachers and ten students aged between 14 and 17 years. The teachers involved teach different subjects. The project unites schools with various profiles; intending to benefit from their own diversity. In their respective home towns, every national ERASMUS+team has already created a network of institutions and people ready to become integrated into the project: nursery homes, centres proposing older adult activities, people in charge for seniors in local administration and researchers at university (statistics, demography). The studying technique is the so-called peer-to-peer learning involving teachers and students, favoring interaction between all participants. It permits various exchanges and learning about elderly people’s life, living conditions in other EU member states, cultural differences and similarities and how to create interactive teaching material, to name just a few examples. To assure that we will reach our targets, a “road map” combining a timeline with the work targets is fixed at the first project meeting of the ERASMUS+teams in 10/2016. A second meeting is scheduled for 10/2017 to verify the implementation of the road map. Four mobilities including six students and two teachers from every country are planned. The participants meet once in every city and work on the following main products: - a MOODLE platform providing learning modules in five languages (DE, EN, IT, NL, PL) containing statistics, texts, portraits, interviews (as texts, films, podcasts with transcripts), films or film extracts (with exercises and questionnaires), scientific treatises, various exercises and general information on demographic trends in Belgium, Germany, Italy and Poland. Working with the platform students learn about e.g. life in nursing homes, seniors’ leisure activities, their economic situation (pension levels) and integration into society. The students involved in the project create these exercises, test them, write the transcriptions of interviews, and write the translations of the text materiel. The platform will live on and be presented to colleagues in the participating and other schools. Schools commit to use the platform in class. - A website (title: “Seniors in the city, seniors everywhere: elderly people in Bologna, Köpenick, Mokotów and Roelaere”) created by students presents the participants and all the project activities, a blog on this website also testifies to all the activities taking place deploying photos, podcasts and videos.- A film will also be shot by the students documenting the project activities and the four meetings and published on the website. - A series of portrait pictures is made by the students. It’ll be exhibited in some of the institutions integrated into the project.The planning provides the following activities (multinational teams) for the period between the four planned meetings and while the meetings take place: - students develop questionnaires for the interviews, for the project and the meetings evaluation - students meet seniors, interview them, produce a series of portrait pictures that will be shown in e.g. the places the seniors live in- students meet the people in charge in nursery homes, centres proposing older adult activities and interview them- students meet researchers and people in charge in local administrations and interview them about demographic changes and actions taken/ to take - students research information - students and teachers communicate permanently via e-mail, edmodo, eTwinning (our TwinSpace exists), exchange documents via GoogleDrive- students (helped by teachers) develop the teaching material. - the national teams inform the school public permanently about their activities. The students and teachers participating in this Erasmus+project thus delve into the everyday life of their grandparents’ or parents’ generation, show greater understanding and learn to be more tolerant towards these people’s needs and other social and cultural contexts. They learn about the challenges society has to cope with, at both a national and a European level and they thereby acquire knowledge about seniors’ life. Additionally, students and teachers experience life in other EU member states, meet their peers, develop a more positive attitude towards the EU, improve their foreign language skills which motivates them to further language learning, improve their ICT skills, discover new professional perspectives, which improves their professional qualification profile.
Demographic change is one of the great changes in society that European states currently face, however, in schools’ curricula this topic hasn’t been very present yet. There’s still a lack of current teaching material permitting a European vision of the topic. Before we started our project, we did a survey among teachers and students of the project schools about this problem: less than 50 percent of the students surveyed had already delved into the senior topic, 80 percent of the teachers said that the topic didn’t appear often enough in the classroom. So the teachers of the project schools defined and focused on the topic "Elderly people’s life“, the project focused on the rising awareness about the problems and challenges associated with the topic, the reflection on a possible and common teaching approach for the classroom and the elaboration of teaching material as a framework for the conception and the realization of the project. Given this background, we defined the aims of the project: 1. Make learners and teachers aware of seniors, promote the feeling of intergenerational justice as well as social tolerance, active citizenship and open-mindedness for social, linguistic and cultural diversity and challenges related to this diversity. 2. By doing research and by interviewing seniors, responsibles for seniors in care facilities and other specialists for seniors (scientists etc.) the participants in the project acquire knowledge about the following topics: self- and external perception of people in the "third phase” of life, care offers, socio-economic situation. 3. Learners and teachers improve their language skills and motivation to learn languages, their digital skills and media literacy, they acquire intercultural knowledge and a more positive attitude towards the European project. 4. Thus, learners discover possible career prospects in this sector and inform themselves about the reality of everyday working life. Initially conceived by four schools, the project had to be realized by three schools: shortly after the project’s start the Belgian partner quit and the remaining partners had to modify their “road map“ and adapt the distribution of tasks. The project coordination was under the responsability of the "Evangelische Schule Köpenick“ (D), characterized by fairness and tolerance with one another. The "Szkoła podstawowa nr 157 im. Adama Mickiewicza“ (PL) – the former, in the meantime completely reorganized "Gimnazjum nr 1 im. Roberta Schumana“– has a European profile and aims to promote interdisciplinary courses. The "Liceo scientifico Augusto Righi“ (I) is characterized by its rich experience and expertise in the field of school exchanges. The local project manager is a computer expert. In the two years following the start of the project, the local teams concentrated on: - regular meetings with seniors - took portrait photos of seniors. The exhibitions based on the photos shown were a great succes at different places (project schools, nursery homes, municipal library, centres proposing older adult activities) (cf. attachment). - interviews with seniors und people in charge in nursery homes - workshops with researchers at university (e.g. Prof. Kuszak from Poznan University, Dr. Kubicki from the Warsaw School of Economics, Prof. Gräske from the University of Applied Sciences in Saarbrücken, Prof. Mignani from the University of Bologna) - make contact and keep in touch with the local network (e.g. D: ˮSeniorenheim Müggelschlösschenweg“, PL: ˮDzienny Dom Pomocy Społecznej na Ursynowie“,I: ˮCentro sociale Rosa Marchi“) - research of information (statistics, further reading, films etc.) - dissemination of the results at regional level (e.g. during the ˮEuropean afternoon“ at AUL1 and AUL C3) - create and disseminate the created teaching material on the MOODLE platform (lsrighi.com/moddle16/) and the web site (https://www.seniorsinthecity.eu) - preparation of the AUL: especially as a host The studying technique was the so-called peer-to-peer learning involving teachers and students, favoring interaction between all participants. As results and products and long-term benefit of the projects should be mentioned - several successful photo exhibitions in the project towns (cf. attachment) - the web site (providing all the created teaching material) and the MOODLE platform (also providing the created teaching material) - regular intergenerational meetings, providing increased knowledge about the project’s topic in the country the participants come from and the two other participating countries, improved language skills and an increased motivation for further language learning, improved digital skills and media literacy, greater understanding and learn to be more tolerant towards elderly people’s needs and other social and cultural contexts