Although the EU has developed into the world´s largest economic power and one of the safest regions worldwide during the sixty years of her existence, she is nonetheless confronted with challenges from the outside and from within. Perhaps the most important of these is the danger of Europe losing the acceptance and the trust of her citizens who feel less and less as Europeans. A European identity, however, is based on the awareness of a person´s own national identity. How can the EU react to these challenges? The main issue of the planned project is to raise the students´ awareness of their own national identities as well as the achievements and the challenges of the Europe of today. Discovering their own and other European nations´ cultural heritage by dealing with (dramatic) texts from different time periods and nations will lead to an appreciation of our common European heritage. The focus is on four different aspects: 1. National Identity – What does it mean to be German/Dutch/Italian/French? 2. Looking over Borders – Other nations´ cultural heritages and our reception 3. Proud to be European! – Finding a (joint?) definition of the term “European Identity“ 4. Eurotopia – Developing ideas for Europe´s future Students will work on these aspects in drama workshops and will create, write and perform their own texts, photos and films on the basis of texts from their own cultural background and from the ones of the other participating students. Different dramatic forms will be explored, experimented with and employed to voice the students´ ideas. There are a lot of advantages in this experimental approach such as fostering the freedom of ideas and creativity and attracting students, parents and local community as audience, thus increasing the impact of this project on the schools and their communities. Over all, this project involves three different layers. The topics (contents) are the four aspects presented above. The teaching methods and the didactics will deal with the questions: What can we learn from each other? Which mode of presentation is best for a given audience? What is the main message of our presentation? Do contents and form correspond with each other? In addition, there is still the point of communicating successfully with each other and dealing with misunderstandings when they happen. The aim is to have the students stage four different productions after a week-long workshop in each of the participating schools. For the first stage production each school focusses on already well-established performance practice from their own school, thus benefiting from what the other schools show as good practice. This first meeting is scheduled to take place in the Netherlands. In the second stage production all of the participating students work together to set up a performance about the second issue, “Looking over Borders“. In preparation the students discuss and decide upon the texts from their home countries they want to take as working material. The third stage production in the third school deals with the third aspect (“European Identity“) on the basis of texts the students have written by themselves. Working more independently and with their own ideas, the students have to try and cooperate for a joint performance. The fourth presentation is a planned as a festival with different contributions about the future of Europe for all. The best contribution will be awarded a prize.
Although the EU has developed into the world´s largest economic power and one of the safest regions worldwide during the sixty years of her existence, she is nonetheless confronted with challenges from the outside and from within. Perhaps the most important of these is the danger of Europe losing the acceptance and the trust of her citizens who feel less and less as Europeans. A European identity, however, is based on the awareness of a person´s own national identity. How can the EU react to these challenges? The main issue of the planned project was to raise the students´ awareness of their own national identities as well as the achievements and the challenges of the Europe of today. Discovering their own and other European nations´ cultural heritage by dealing with (dramatic) texts from different time periods and nations led to an appreciation of our common European heritage. The focus was on four different aspects: 1. National Identity – What does it mean to be German/Dutch/Italian/French? 2. Looking over Borders – Other nations´ cultural heritages and our reception 3. Proud to be European! – Finding a (joint?) definition of the term “European Identity“ 4. Eurotopia – Developing ideas for Europe´s future Students worked on these aspects in drama workshops and created, wrote and performed their own texts, photos and films on the basis of texts from their own cultural background and from the ones of the other participating students. Different dramatic forms have been explored, experimented with and employed to voice the students´ ideas. There were a lot of advantages in this experimental approach such as fostering the freedom of ideas and creativity and attracting students, parents and local community as audience, thus increasing the impact of this project on the schools and their communities. Over all, this project involved three different levels. The topics (contents) were the four aspects presented above. The teaching methods and the didactics dealed with the questions: What can we learn from each other? Which mode of presentation is best for a given audience? What is the main message of our presentation? Do contents and form correspond with each other? In addition, there was still the point of communicating successfully with each other and dealing with misunderstandings when they happen. The aim was to have the students stage four different productions after a week-long workshop in each of the participating schools. For the first stage production each school focussed on already well-established performance practice from their own school, thus benefiting from what the other schools showed as good practice. This first meeting took place in the Netherlands. In the second stage production all of the participating students worked together to set up a performance about the second issue, “Looking over Borders“. In preparation the students discussed and decided upon the texts from their home countries what they wanted to take as working material. The third stage production in the third school dealed with the third aspect (“European Identity“) on the basis of texts the students had written by themselves. Working more independently and with their own ideas, the students practiced and cooperated for a joint performance. The fourth presentation was a Europe-festival with different drama and political contributions about the future of Europe for all.