The project “Parenting stand-up” aims to share experience and practices between partner organizations from Romania, Cyprus and Portugal, to learn how to get parents involved while promoting a better home-organization cooperation and communication for the benefit of the children. The project’s objectives are: - To grow the level of involvement of 24 parents in activities while promoting active participation inside their organization - To develop capabilities of 15 staff from the partner organizations to support parents’ involvement and commitment - To create a common parent involvement program and a booklet which to include working methodologies and learning activities in the direction of parent-child-organization cooperation. - To facilitate communication, cooperation and exchange of best practices between 24 parents and 15 staff from the partner organizations while promoting mutual learning between them. The project will approach 2 perspectives: one offered by the partner organizations and their staffs toward parental involvement and the other one offered by the parents toward their involvement, in a common effort of the partner to combine them in order to achieve their goals. The participants ( parents and staff ) will participate at common seminars and workshops which will offer learning opportunities for enhancement of the involvement of parents, reinforcement of their cooperation with the organizations and creating partnerships parents-organizations. The topics of learning, teaching and training activities refer to active participation, parental involvement, cooperation & partnerships, communication and team building activities, study visits. Through the activities of the project we want to develop in our parents their skills for life, to foster their social educational development, and to motivate them in learning with implications for their ability to parent and participate in their communities. The project will address mostly soft skills like: Communication – oral, speaking capability, written, presenting, listening; Interpersonal skills – sociability, social skills, Positive attitude, Critical thinking, Responsibility – accountable, reliable, conscientious, common sense, Teamwork – cooperative, supportive, helpful, collaborative, Work ethic –willing to work, initiative, self-motivated, good attendance. Also through some specific activities we will work on digital learning of parents – through digital story telling activity, through online cooperation with peers from the partner countries, through the use of digital tools ( pc, camera, social media) during the project. Staff will participate in specific learning and exchange activities which will give them a range of initiatives promoted by partner organizations, whose main emphasis is on empowering parents and families as well as supporting learning processes beyond organizations. Focus of discussions will be on low skilled parents from lower economic backgrounds, who are less likely to naturally engage in cooperation with organizations, so that staff develop their skills and capabilities to empower parents and families, get new approaches for parental involvement and increase their abilities to encourage positive parenting skills. During the project, the partners will develop a specific parental involvement program which to encourage the active participation of parents according to the family background and will efficiently engage parents who can offer their time and experience. The parental program will be included in a booklet as a tool to share knowledge/working methodologies for parental involvement and as a tool to disseminate the project’s outcomes. The project will give the partner organizations a wider array of environments for parental involvement, providing the necessary variability to fully understand the processes and approaches for the cooperation parent-child –organization which will result in an increased capacity to motivate and engage parents and ultimately in higher quality educational programs for the children.
The project “Parenting stand-up” aimed to share experience and practices between partner organizations from Romania, Cyprus and Portugal, to learn how to get parents involved while promoting a better home-organization cooperation and communication for the benefit of the children. The project followed to grow the level of involvement of our parents in activities while promoting active participation inside their organization, to develop capabilities of our staff to support parents’ involvement and commitment, to create a common parent involvement program and a booklet which to include working methodologies and learning activities in the direction of parent-child-organization cooperation, as well as to facilitate communication, cooperation and exchange of best practices between parents and staff from the partner organizations while promoting mutual learning between them. During the project development partners approached 2 perspectives: one offered by the partner organizations and their staffs toward parental involvement and the other one offered by the parents toward their involvement, in a common effort of the partner to combine them in order to achieve their goals. Thus, selected participants ( parents and staff ) were involved in common seminars and workshops which offered learning opportunities for enhancement of the involvement of parents, reinforcement of their cooperation with the organizations and creating partnerships parents-organizations. The topics of learning, teaching and training activities refered to active participation, parental involvement, cooperation & partnerships, communication and team building activities, as well as study visits. Through the activities of the project we wanted to develop in our parents their skills for life, to foster their social educational development, and to motivate them in learning with implications for their ability to parent and participate in their communities. The project addressed mostly soft skills like: Communication – oral, speaking capability, written, presenting, listening; Interpersonal skills – sociability, social skills, Positive attitude, Critical thinking, Responsibility – accountable, reliable, conscientious, common sense, Teamwork – cooperative, supportive, helpful, collaborative, Work ethic –willing to work, initiative, self-motivated, good attendance. Also through some specific activities we worked on digital learning of parents – through digital story telling activity, through online cooperation with peers from the partner countries, through the use of digital tools ( pc, camera, social media) during the project. On the other side our staff had the chance to participate in specific learning and exchange activities which offered them a range of initiatives promoted by partner organizations, whose main emphasis is on empowering parents and families as well as supporting learning processes beyond organizations. Focus of discussions were on low skilled parents from lower economic backgrounds, who are less likely to naturally engage in cooperation with organizations, so that staff developed their skills and capabilities to empower parents and families, get new approaches for parental involvement and increase their abilities to encourage positive parenting skills. The project also built on a learning by doing experience for parents and staff to work together - a parental involvement program which was developed under support of staff and partner organizations within all the partner countries. The parental program was included in a booklet as a tool to share knowledge/working methodologies for parental involvement and as a tool to disseminate the project’s outcomes. The project gave us a wider array of environments for parental involvement, providing the necessary variability to fully understand the processes and approaches for the cooperation parent-child –organization which resulted in an increased capacity to motivate and engage parents and ultimately in higher quality educational programs for the children. Following the project the partners have streamlined the activities of PARENTING STAND UP which resulted in replication through its trained specialists: psychologists, cultural promoters / activities and adult trainers, a Yes to educational volunteering Parents Network in Romania and Active Parenting day in Cyprus.