We are a group of committed schools located in Belgium, Austria, France, Spain, and Finland who share a common interest: multiculturalism. Most of our schools are multilingual and we all work with a wide range of cultures. We face different challenges regarding inclusion of students either at school or outside the school, both now and in the future. Some of us (France and Spain) work with students of all nationalities and we all hope to prepare our students to continue their studies abroad. Our Finnish partner faces the challenge of teaching to a minority and most of us (especially Belgium and Austria), need to broaden opportunities for students in a context of growing migration flows. We believe that a good understanding of languages and their associated codes is essential for inclusion in a culture. Students need to be prepared for European and even international mobility, to continue their education and then engage in the professional world, live in harmony with other people here and abroad, and become active European citizens. The main objective of our project is to prepare young people for this mobility by developing the skills for inclusion into a new culture: communication skills and intercultural competencies. This means identifying the barriers in language and cultural codes which hinder inclusion, and developing activities that will circumvent the difficulties: tools of observation, analysis, strategies using non-verbal language and the five senses, peer transmission strategies. Students will become responsible for their own development because we will be encouraging investment and autonomy throughout the project.The common working language will be English and the activities will be based on the exchange of expertise and the sharing of experience: For Teachers this will involve sharing practices, identifying barriers, co-intervention in classes abroad, theoretical training with external partners. For students this will involve confronting the challenges of interculturality, at home and abroad.The project will use IT to share and evaluate. The use of an innovative “mobile digital logbook” (under test for another KA2 current project) will be a key asset for teachers to evaluate students.The environment of each of the partner institutions, the interdisciplinary nature of the teams involved, the multi-party exchanges whether they are short group exchanges or longer individual immersion experiences, will offer different and complementary opportunities for teachers, and students, to discover other school cultures, experience second language learning in situ, understand non-verbal components of cultural codes through artistic activities or activities dealing with fundamental aspects of intercultural challenges (concepts of space, time, power).Video will be a useful tool for recording and analysing the activities of students and teachers, it will also be essential for the dissemination and sharing of experiences. The use of ICT will be important for partner communication (email, cloud computing, social networks), designing materials and work tools, but also in the dissemination of project-related productions like surveys, analysis, evaluation, and of ready-to-use activities for teachers of any school interested in intercultural management, through the etwinning platform, regional and national educational websites and media. These results will be evaluated by short and long-term observations (quality of activities, impact on the school results and personal development of young people and teachers). The project should produce a reduction in the apprehension related to mobility and the development of an active attitude to appropriate codes. The project aims to broaden our horizons through a better awareness of European and international issues and increase active citizenship, cultural awareness and peer competence sharing.
We are a group of 5 schools which either have students from multicultural backgrounds (France, Spain, Finland) or students who are keen to discover other cultures (Belgium, Austria). All of the establishments agree that students need to be open towards other cultures not only to help them adapt to their local environment (minorities, migration) and /or to help them adapt to the culturally different populations present in their schools, but also to be apt for future mobility as part of their studies or work placements. The project aims to develop students’ communication skills, autonomy, organisational skills and open-mindedness while removing the cultural obstacles which often hinder meetings between individuals from other backgrounds and any other cultural obstacles which might hinder European or even international mobility. To meet these objectives students worked on the following activities: STM Short Term Mobilities: exchange weeks often involving three schools and three objectives: Cultural awareness (family life, visits,presentations) Language skills ( English language immersion during the project week) Theme-based knowledge ( activities related to a specific theme, organized as much as possible by students themselves) B) LTM Long Term Mobilities: 2 month exchanges between schools with 3 objectives Cultural Awareness (family life, schooling in the host country) Language Skills (language of the host country) Dissemination ( activities within the host school organized by the guest student or promotion of exchanges at home) These exchanges qualify students for Europasses An Erasmus student remains an Erasmus student for as long as he/she remains in his/her school and becomes an ambassador for the project There were 4 types of teacher activities in the project: Preparation of STM exchange weeks, encouraging as much student responsibility as possible. Preparation of the trip and its cultural experience. Selection of LTM students and tutorials for students with tutors in both the host and guest countries Participation in bi-annual transnational meetings to share experiences, plan, organize, troubleshoot, manage and train) Project Management for the coordinator STMs mobilised several hundred students (travelling or not) their parents, dozens of teachers, administration and management teams of the different schools as well as local partners. A dozen students took part in the LTMs which involved all of our partners.Transnational meetings were hosted by each partner school which favoured the dissemination of the project in each school. Feedback on the different mobilities was collected at every stage in the project and communicated to the partners during transnational meetings.The group’s initial line of thought broadened to encompass inclusive education in its widest sense which led to two partners (Tielt and Lyon) taking part in a KA1 training course in Lisbon during the second year of the project. Feedback about the mobilities from students and families was very enthusiastic; there were a couple of minor crises but these were dealt with smoothly. We believe our students developed personal skills such as independence and taking initiatives. They also improved their language skills, particularly during LTMs. Students who took part in the project now appear to be more motivated for their school studies and are showing a keener interest in intercultural experiences. The number of teachers involved in the project has grown in each school and the visibility of the project is much stronger. The teachers involved have become more skilled in project management, developed their cultural awareness, especially concerning the different school systems and teaching methods. They have also modified their own teaching style. Both the students and the teachers who have been part of this project have improved their use of English as a means of communication. Sometimes the workload, whether for project management or for the organization of STMs and LTMs, has weighed heavily on the shoulders of the resource persons. Budget control has been managed smoothly thanks to mobility tool. Schools’ local influence has increased through dissemination activities (press, Erasmus anniversary, posters, open days) and because of the participation of local institutions in training and in student activities. The long term effects of this project are firstly the productions available on the eTwinning website and on Learning Designer: ready-to-do classroom activities and a colourful project brochure and secondly the fact that the partners are ready to write a brand new project together.