Our project is implemented within a professional partnership framework of three kindergartens operating in three Hungarian language areas. Tempo-Legato Oktatásszervező Kft is the professional co-ordinator. The project implements an innovation, the purpose of which is to compile a musical skills development program based on the preservation of Hungarian traditions. Our goal in the course of project preparation was to compile a useful methodological material facilitating everyday kindergarten team work which, in addition to the preservation of Hungarian folklore, can provide help to kindergarten teachers working in the Hungarian language area in the development of the musical skills of the kindergarten age group. The kindergarten teachers of the partner kindergartens assessed what professional content they wanted to implement and what needs they wanted to satisfy. Our colleagues working at all the three institutions first emphasized the role of skills development in kindergarten work. The program’s content is the development of musical skills built on the Hungarian folklore. The aim is to widen the professional methodology of kindergarten teachers. Musical skills are developed within the framework of the preservation of traditions, folklore, memorable days, related popular games, artisanship, learning local customs, regional songs. The folklore elements provide the material for musical skills development. All this is linked to professional methodology, the differences and similarities of approach to bonding with children, from territories within the border (Recsk) and beyond the border (Székelyudvarhely, Fülek), from Palóc and Székely Land. What kinds of answers do we expect? How do you implement the mutually accepted Program in your own kindergarten? What do you add, how do you link it to your everyday work? The colleagues would love to hear about the experiences and methodological practices of their counterparts working in the partner countries. We do not know about any similar initiative. We, the three kindergarten teacher communities, think that this initiative is an exciting gap-filling initiative. The Program to be implemented was developed by Tempo-Legato Kft and the kindergarten teachers from the three partner institutions contribute their own experiences in the course of implementation. This is what makes our innovation feasible and international, as the everyday practices of the partner institutions are combined together into a common methodological material. We are going to discuss the experiences obtained in the recent thematic units at the partnership meetings, which will be documented and processed using an evaluation system. The experiences acquired over the two years will be enhanced with further knowledge during workshops, which will constitute the professional innovation that will be edited into a publication at the end of the project. Our innovation is the compilation of a professional material, which collects the methods of musical skills development in kindergarten practice in the three Hungarian language regions via the processing of Hungarian folk traditions. The involved kindergarten teachers constitute the professional participants in the program. They enhance their professional knowledge in the field of musical skill development by processing the specified topics and enhance their knowledge in the field of the preservation of traditions. They learn about the customs, traditions, artisanship, and songs of other Hungarian regions. Their world view widens, they can visit partner institutions, and at partner meetings, they can learn about settlements and meet colleagues who work there. They can experience the joy of learning from each other during the partnership meetings. The target group of our program is the group of kindergarten teachers, but naturally, the children’s groups at the kindergartens will also benefit from the program. By processing memorable days, the children will learn numerous folk games, and nursery rhymes, and will make numerous objects at the artisan sessions. They will become familiar with folk customs and in the course of program implementation, they will learn about the scope of folk traditions of the whole year. The children’s activities will indirectly have an impact on the life of the families, too. The children will bring the folk song and game treasures home and the parents will see the objects produced at the artisanship sessions. That will deepen the awareness of children and families of their Hungarian roots. The purpose of our project is to spread the professional program we have developed. In this way, not only kindergarten teachers involved in the program will learn about the work and customs of partner kindergartens, but also kindergarten teachers who use the program in a Hungarian language area.
The purpose of this innovative project was to create a musical skills development program for kindergarten, based on the Hungarian cultural heritage. We aimed to compile a methodological source material supporting the day-to-day kindergarten group work, which helps kindergarten teachers working in the Hungarian-speaking areas to sustain Hungarian folk traditions and to develop the musical skills of the kindergarten generation as well. The project had the following objectives: 1. To enrich the kindergarten teachers’ methodological toolbox and to develop musical skills through Hungarian folk traditions and traditional children’s games. 2. To collect elements of Hungarian folk traditions - songs, crafts, customs, children’s games - in the environment of the kindergartens in the three partner countries, which the kindergartens may use in their everyday activities and teach the children in connection with the festive days. 3. To prepare a methodological collection for the 3-6 year-old group according to their abilities, which contains the folk traditions, folk songs, festive day customs and children’s games of the Hungarian-speaking areas of the three countries, thus promoting a more successful kindergarten education. We also prepared a two-year program aiming at musical skills development. The Program defined the themes of the kindergarten activities building on the Hungarian folk heritage in a monthly and weekly breakdown. We touched upon festive days and folk traditions when defining activities. The Program defined the theme of the activities, leaving the choice of activities to the teachers’ discretion. The teachers implemented the theme defined for each week, following the traditions of their own environment. We collected these detailed weekly session plans from the three kindergartens. Thus, we had an entire year’s worth of work program of Hungarian heritage with Transylvanian and Palóc contents from both Upper Hungary and the Recsk regions. In addition, the kindergarten teachers also gave a presentation of the different development methods in the kindergartens of the three countries. While processing the educational content, there were different approaches to teaching songs and conducting musical skills development. We were collecting these skills development methods for publication. The teachers in the program prepared weekly plans, where they explain the theme and the festive day of the week, and prepare a session to be implemented with the children during that week. The sessions contained the local folk songs used, indicating their source, the children’s games and the skills development methods used in the kindergartens. All this will be documented in a template. The innovative content of our project lied in the weekly session plans. The collected plans were reviewed by an ethnographer and a Hungarian proofreader. The plans were then assessed by the project’s professional leader and our quality assurance consultant. At the end we had a package of weekly thematic plans for a whole year. Their purposes include musical skills development based on the treasury of the Hungarian folk music and traditions of the three ethnographic regions. The weekly plans were edited in an electronic format and printed as books as well. The material processed this way was edited and presented in two colourful volumes. These are arranged by themes as Spring/Summer and Autumn/Winter volumes. The two volumes were launched at a multiplication event scheduled in the project. Local professional partners, kindergarten and lower-primary school teachers and local educational representatives were invited to these events held at the partner kindergartens, with close to 400 participants. The publication enjoyed great interest at each event, with several requests to publish further volumes. We hope that our publication based on folk heritage will contribute to the educational work of the kindergartens in the Hungarian-speaking areas. Distribution channels included an electronic format appearing on the partner institutions’ and professional organisations’ websites, as well as the cheaper and simpler production of printed books. This will also continue in the sustainability phase of the project. The partner kindergartens started distribution through their own professional networks. The multiplication event was a good example, as it demonstrated the large-scale interest. In the future, Tempo-Legato Kft, as the project coordinator, will also promote the publication among their partners and through their activities, and we aim to prepare an accredited training for teachers based on the professional material of the innovation.