Creative minds Students of partner schools will be asked to develop an app for education. In the process they learn about target groups, visual and functional design. In order to eventually fill it with good content they have to both observe their town, learn more about it and be able to communicate what they learned. Activities and Teacher training events are chosen to step by step prepare teachers and students for the final task. The project is about enhancing critical thinking, entrepreneurial thinking, problem solving, language skills a developing and a sense of Citizenship in the local community and on an European level. Associated partner GetCOO is giving us the opportunity to use their technology and app to design educational activities for pupils. It can be used as a game to discover and describe the place where they are living taking phots and adding facts. The target groups are teachers who will learn end experience methods of working entrepreneurial and students who are carrying out the work and other schools, citizens and visitors of the town who can use the app. Xxxx teachers and xxxx students are directly involved and 5000 people is expected to be reached during the project During the project all participating countries will enhance teaching and learning in all the areas described earlier but the different partners will also focus especially on the needs that has been identified when evaluating schools results The project needs to be carried out transnationally because we all bring useful experiences and competences. Sweden will bring know how and ideas on how to use ICT to gather information such as Google forms. Turkey has know how on design and important experience from international projects and etwinning. Greece brings ideas and know how of digital maps. Spain brings ideas of how to empower students and work on developing their sense of citizenship through the activity “Visual dictionary” which will build citizenship locally and on a European level and it may eventually be a part of the app. Italy brings experience of the technology we are going to try. They also bring the cooperation with the associated partner GETCoo. The partners in the project represents different parts of Europe, north, west, east south, cost inland, different cultural backgrounds, languages, types of communities, religions, This diversity is excellent for the promotion of learning and using a foreign language for all involved. The big diversity and our work together will also help promoting prejudice thinking All partners have previous experience of international projects which will help the project to be successful. Publishing film and updates on the web will be ongoing activities throughout the project to create interest and provide information of the progress and the results. Other activities are four project meeting to manage, plan and evaluate the process and the project and three teaching training events where teachers gain the knowledge needed to proceed. One about using gamefication for education and how to work with ICT to gather information from target groups, one about the app making process and successful projects and one about digital maps. In schools we will have an activity that is ongoing with different topics every term a “Visiual dictionary”. We will have activities to present project, Skype meeting with app company and students. A common Webpage will be launched. W There will be an internal competition called Where is it? To get the experience of planning, executing and evaluating a very small entrepreneurial project Students will work on ideas for the app and with the content they would like to upload into it. They will share this with other students in partner schools by Skype. Towards the end we will have dissemination activities such as promotion to local media, in social media and students will also contact city council to present the possibilities with the app. In the process teachers are developing knowledge and experience on how to on how to incorporate entrepreneurial tasks and ICT in school in order to enhance their teaching when it comes to entrepreneurial thinking, problem solving, critical thinking , language skills and citizenship on a local and European level. Students´ will develop entrepreneurial skills, Critical thinking, language, geography and they will get more motivated to make a difference and see more possibilities. Students will gain lifelong friendships around Europe and develop language and interaction skills. Students will be less prejudice. If the work with the app is successful the app will be useful for schools and citizens for years to come since it is possible to adjust the content to fit the identified educational needs.
Background The four partners (Sweden, Italy, Spain, Turkey) had never worked in a project together, but we all knew Italy. First we were five partners but Greece left the project just after it had been approved. We wanted a project where teachers could share best practises and where students could feel engaged, enriched and more motivated. Students at partner schools were invited as creators of content to be uploaded into the database that provides information to an app called “GetCoo travel”. They learned about target groups, design, digital tools, information seeking, source criticism and copyright. To discover what content to create, the students observed their local area, the buildings, statues and art. Most of the activities were chosen to step by step prepare teachers and students for this task. Objectives enhancing critical thinking, entrepreneurial thinking, problem solving, improving language skills and developing a sense of Citizenship in the local community and on a European level. Participants 4 partners Sweden coordinated the project and brought know how and ideas on gamification, programming, how to use ICT. Turkey brought know how on how to organize student activities and competitions. Spain brought ideas of how to empower students and work on developing their sense of citizenship. Italy brought experience of using GetCOO app and other technology. They created and administrated the websites and blogs of the project. When Greece left we shared their tasks and responsibilities between us. The partners represent different parts of Europe with different cultural backgrounds, languages, types of communities and religions. This has been excellent for the project. All partners had previous experience of international projects which helped the project to be successful. Silent partner GetCOO has given us the opportunity to use their technology and app to display our work. They also trained the teachers on how to use the technology and provided support. Activities TPM: Five transnational project meeting to manage, plan and evaluate the process and the project. LTT: Three LTT where teachers learned skills that was useful in the project. 1:st in Sweden feb 2018, about programming and using gamification for education. 2.nd in Ravenna oct. 2018. Silent partner GetCOO had a workshop about their Technology and the app. We also learned green screen. 3:rd in Brussels. How to use digital maps in education. School to school activities: The “Visual alphabet” The “Logo competition”, The “Where is it “competition, The “GetCOO POI” competition and “Flat pigeon”. The Visual Alphabet (called visual dictionary in application): The Igualada teachers introduced a new theme every semester. The tasks were about observing different architectural details, materials and patterns. At the end of the semester we all uploaded photos connected to the topic. The Spanish teachers used the photos to prepare an exhibition that was supposed to be on display during March 2020. The Logo competition: It was held in 2018. Turkey was in charge. Students drew or created an image. The partner schools choose a limited number of images for the European finale. Turkey provided an overview. All partners schools ranked their favourites. Turkey arranged a live broadcast finale where all partner schools gave their votes and a winner could be declared. Where is it?: This competition was carried out locally and internationally. It was about students and parents guessing where different photos were taken. The international version was online (put together by Italy). The local versions was carried out by each partner school. GetCOO poi competition : We took pictures of interesting places - POIs (Point Of Interest) . We wrote descriptions and uploaded pictures and facts to the database. Anyone can use the app. The user takes a picture of something interesting and if this item is found in the database the user automatically will get the information. After the LTT in Sweden we decided to add gamification elements to this activity. We decided that the first country to reach 50 POIs would win. We could follow the scores on a web page. Turkey won. Flat Pigeon: To involve the younger students we added the Flat Pigeon activity. It was a picture of a Pigeon that we sent on a tour to all the schools. The Pigeon explored a topic in every country. The students wrote blog posts about it. Photos of the pigeon in different situations was also uploaded. Students could follow Flat Pigeons journey on the blog and make comments. Results & impact new methods in teaching such as gamification, google earth, treasure hunt, GetCoo app entrepreneurial tasks and ICT in school, knowledge of copyright, and source criticism how ICT can be used to teach, learn, communicate and share motivation to learn English knowledge of the local area and Europe understanding of school systems in partner countries. respect and less prejudice thinking