Improving European education, “enhancing the performance of education systems”, working towards a more sustainable Union, have been set as two of the key targets in Europe’s strategy “ to become a smart, sustainable and inclusive economy” by 2020.In this scenario the members of the project “A sustainable future, from the Ideal City to the Sustainable City” are committed to developing the quality of education, to providing all the students with the competences necessary to reach their potential, to succeed in a global and changing community and at the same time they are committed to promoting sustainable education in the curriculum subjects.The objectives of the project are derived from the above listed current challenges of education in Europe and in the singular countries, from the limits of some of the actual didactic procedures and are derived from the needs outlined by teachers and students of the single institutions. The needs of implementing the curricula with an approach based on key competences and learning outcomes, the need to develop basic and transversal skills to raise achievement for all pupils, and to break the link between disadvantage and low educational attainment; the wish to enhance the teaching/learning process, empowering high quality professional development, the wish to promote innovative and creative practices, meaningful to children. The common thread that will run through the project (connecting and developing the different skills) is sustainable education whose concepts have a great appeal on children and whose issues can connect students to their community and inspire active citizenship, preparing them to be responsible citizens that will use entrepreneurial values and approaches to solve major sustainability problems, citizens who will build healthier communities while addressing the challenges of the 21st century.At the same time, exploring their countries also from a historical point of view through the analysis of the characteristics of the Ideal City of the past times, and the transformation of their living environment pupils are encouraged to rediscover their own culture, history and traditions to better understand the urban, socio-economic changes of their own countries getting the chance to discover what the European citizens have in common and differs them. The project aims to target and influence 1300 people: lower secondary school students, teaching/ non- teaching staff, students’ families, different aged groups, professionals and experts in the field of sustainability, environmentalists, administrators, members of the world of work.The activities will lead students to explore the Ideal Cities of the past times and analyse pupils’ living environment, their present towns/cities; from the investigation of their urban background and the needs,requirements about their living spaces expressed by the different groups of people interviewed, students will develop and plan visions of a future community, the European city of the future, an inclusive and sustainable Smart City; students will jointly plan, design, re-invent their urban backgrounds to realize a map and a scale model of the“ European city of the future” which will include realistic and utopian features. At the same time through a series of activities children will experience fair, sustainable and equal practices. Motivating, inclusive activities – web quests, action-research activities, classroom debates, web radios -will allow pupils to work in small cooperative groups making extensive use of ICT tools and the CLIL approach in a constant interaction with other actors of their living environment.The expected results are within the transversal competences related to the European Framework with a particular stress on basic skills of core subjects, civic competences, entrepreneurship.Students from all the partner schools will improve their achievement in core subjects, will boost digital competences, foreign languages, soft skills, they will experience active democratic citizenship and entrepreneurship. We expect the project will enhance the European dimension of school education developing greater interest in all the dynamics related to the international planning and project managing, favouring School Action Plans, helping to make curricula more international. The project will empower high quality professional development strengthening teachers’ practices, innovative and creative strategies. Everyone who will be involved in the partnership will have the opportunity to get to know and appreciate different cultural realities developing an open-minded attitude toward the diverse and richly varied global society.Intercultural dialogue, didactic innovation, in-service training for teachers, action-research activities within the classroom provide added value to the project and can produce long term and lasting effects on education programmes.
Improving European education, “enhancing the performance of education systems”, working towards a more sustainable Union, have been set as two of the key targets in Europe’s strategy “ to become a smart, sustainable and inclusive economy” by 2020. In this scenario the 7 members of the project “A sustainable future, from the Ideal City to the Sustainable City” were committed to developing the quality of education, to providing all the students with the competences necessary to reach their potential, to succeed in a global and changing community and at the same time promoting sustainable education in the curriculum subjects. The objectives of the project derived from the above listed current challenges of education in Europe and in the singular countries, from the limits of some of the actual didactic procedures and from the needs outlined by the single institutions. The common thread that ran through the project was sustainable education (whose concepts have a great appeal on young learners) which can connect them to their community inspiring active citizenship, preparing pupils to be responsible citizens that will use entrepreneurial values and approaches to solve major sustainability problems; citizens who will build healthier communities while addressing the challenges of the 21st century. At the same time, exploring their countries also from a historical point of view through the analysis of the characteristics of the Ideal City of the past times, and the transformation of their living environment, the young learners were encouraged to rediscover their own culture, history and traditions to better understand the urban, socio-economic changes of their own countries getting the chance to discover what the European citizens have in common and differs them. The project activities led students to explore the Ideal City of the past times to identify those aspects of good government that could be applied to the Sustainable City of the future; from the investigation of their urban background and the needs about their living spaces expressed by the different groups interviewed, students developed and planned visions of a future community; they jointly planned, designed, re-invented their urban backgrounds to realize a scale model of the“ Sustainable city of the future”, model that was presented to the decision makers together with their Manifesto, a resolution calling for a common effort and real teamwork for the future of our Planet, a document that also aims to spread the Global Goals of the Agenda 2030. The project contributed to enhance the European dimension of school education developing greater interest in all the dynamics related to the international planning and managing; it helped to make School Action Plans and curricula more international rising the standards of proficiency in core subjects. The partnership enriched the ordinary school curricula with embedded modules and practices on Entrepreneurship, ESD, STEM subjects and Clil modules; contents dealt with through international comparative perspectives; new approaches to encourage students to develop a set of cognitive, affective, behavioral and critical skills that support effective and appropriate interaction in a variety of cultural contexts. The students enhanced their cultural awareness, intercultural dialogue being better prepared to become members of a connected and cooperative global community; they experienced and practiced active citizenship strengthening the "sense of belonging" to the social, cultural and environmental context of their territory. The project empowered teachers’ high quality professional development strengthening didactic practices to improve outcomes for learners. Thanks to the exchange and sharing of good practices, staff members developed innovative student's centred, teaching methods and approaches transferable in different contexts that can produce long term effects on education programmes. The project greatly contributed to empower the level of management of the schools in their various members increasing organizational flexibility, improving delivery expertise which supports school-wide global learning enhancement. The involvement of families, local authorities, world of work in a continuous correspondence of cultural enrichment, gave everyone the opportunity to enforce the dialogue and the collaboration with the school institutions fostering joint responsibilities in the educational process. The cross-cultural dialogue enhanced cooperation at all levels, greater understanding and appreciation of diversity; everyone involved had the opportunity to get to know and appreciate different cultural realities creating an open-minded attitude toward the distinct and richly varied global society, a positive signal in the national and international context that seems to give rise to fear, racism, xenophobia, and other forms of intolerance.