Our partnership consists of 4 secondary schools from Spain, Italy, the Netherlands and Germany. In all countries we have noticed that many of our students do not show a lot of interest in reading novels anymore. According to studies like the International-Elementary School-Reading-Test (Iglu) of 2017 or the JIM Study 2016 this is a common European problem among students, especially between the age of 12 and 15. We regard it a necessary aim of schools to stop this trend in order to prepare students for life and the world of work by creating new approaches to literature to strengthen their reading and writing abilities. Developing their reading skills does not only contribute to a more successful career at school but also offers them new chances on the European labour market. Therefore the main aim of our project DEAR (Drop Everything And Read) is to motivate teenage students to read again and to share their reading experience with others. In the project the students will try out innovative approaches to youth literature and will learn about the different European cultures as we will choose novels written by authors from the participating countries. One innovative, creative approach is the building of a 'Story Train' which will be the final product based on Astrid Lindgren's idea. The students will create single compartments of the 'Story Train' by e.g. depicting a particular scene or character(s) from their novel. Thus they will give a brief insight into the novel which is supposed to inspire other students to read it. Working in international teams and discussing and working on novels they will gain more social competences, independence of thought and action and will develop a critical mind. Dealing with literature by employing head, heart and hand will also deepen the students' understanding of and empathy for fictional characters. This also helps to give them guidance for their own lives. But they will also improve key competences such as their presentation skills, their range of vocabulary as well as written and oral skills in English. In every country about 20 students (13-15 years) per project year will participate and benefit from new incentives to literature. Every year different students and teachers will work on the 'Story Train' in international groups. We will use the necessary mobilities to bring students and teachers from our schools together to work collaboratively in international teams on various youth novels (plot, character, themes) to create compartments of the 'Story Train'. This way a large number of students will get the chance to stay with a host family in a foreign European country and experience its culture. As preparation of the Exchange weeks the students in all countries will choose two novels from a list of youth literature put up by the teachers. The list will contain novels by authors from all participating countries and will be sorted out by themes. In the first year the themes will be adventure, crime, teenage problems and first love. In the second year new themes will be added to the list like e.g. fantasy, friendship, vampires and violence.The students will also start using the eTwinning platform to exchange their personal files and to introduce themselves to the students from other countries via e-mail. After reading their chosen novels they do creative assignments in which they discuss the novel's topic and impact on them. In the exchange weeks the students will work in international teams which have been reading the same novel. Now they will talk about the characters in the novel, the plot and the themes in English. Then they will get the task to promote their novel by e.g. performing scenes from the novel, creating literary landscapes for a scene or dressing up like a character and giving a speech. Every international team will build one compartment of the ‘Story Train’ choosing their own creative way to promote the novel. In the end all contributions to the ‘Story Train’ will be put together in a film. In the first year the train will have about 5-10 compartments, in the second year about 10-20 compartments. The idea of the project is to present our final product, the ‘Story Train’ to other students, all the teachers in each participating country’s schools, other schools and the local libraries. We want to enable everyone who is interested in this new approach to literature to use it as means to make students interested in the novels that are promoted in the ‘Story Train’. We also would like to encourage other teachers to let their students create new compartments and add them to the train if they want to recommend a new novel. Students from our project will go into classes of Primary schools and kindergartens to read out to younger students and children to wake their pleasure of reading. The project will also serve as an important part of a more intensive collaboration with local libraries. Thus the 'Story Train' bears the chance to be continued in future years.
Our partnership consists of 4 secondary schools from Spain, Italy, the Netherlands and Germany. In all countries we have noticed that many of our students do not show a lot of interest in reading novels anymore. According to studies like the International-Elementary School-Reading-Test (Iglu) of 2017 or the JIM Study 2016 this is a common European problem among students, especially between the age of 12 and 15. We regarded it a necessary aim of schools to stop this trend in order to prepare students for life and the world of work by creating new approaches to literature to strengthen their reading and writing abilities. Developing their reading skills does not only contribute to a more successful career at school but also offers them new chances on the European labour market. Therefore the main aim of our project DEAR (Drop Everything And Read) was to motivate teenage students to read again and to share their reading experience with others. In the project the students tried out innovative approaches to youth literature and learned about the different European cultures as we chose novels written by authors from the participating countries. One innovative, creative approach was the building of a 'Story Train' which is the final product based on Astrid Lindgren's idea. The students created single compartments of the 'Story Train' by e.g. depicting a particular scene or character(s) from their novel. Thus they give a brief insight into the novel which is supposed to inspire other students to read it. Working in international teams and discussing and working on novels they gained more social competences, independence of thought and action and developed a critical mind. Dealing with literature by employing head, heart and hand also deepened the students' understanding of and empathy for fictional characters. This also contributed to give them guidance for their own lives. But they also improved key competences such as their presentation skills, their range of vocabulary as well as written and oral skills in English. In every country 20-26 students (13-15 years) per project year participated and benefited from new incentives to literature. During the two project years different students and teachers worked on the 'Story Train' in international groups. We intended to use the necessary mobilities to bring students and teachers from our schools together to work collaboratively in international teams on various youth novels (plot, character, themes) to create compartments of the 'Story Train'. This way a large number of students should get the chance to stay with a host family in a foreign European country and experience its culture. Unfortunately Corona interfered with our plans in the second project year so that travelling abroad was not possible. As preparation of the exchange weeks the students in all countries chose two novels from a list of youth literature put up by the teachers. The list contained novels by authors from all participating countries and was sorted out by themes such as fantasy and friendship. The students also started using the eTwinning platform to exchange their personal files and to introduce themselves to the students from other countries via e-mail. After reading their chosen novels they did creative assignments in which they discussed the novel's topic and impact on them. In the exchange weeks the students worked in international teams which have been reading the same novel. They talked about the characters in the novel, the plot and the themes in English. Then they got the task to promote their novel by e.g. performing scenes from the novel, creating literary landscapes for a scene or dressing up like a character and giving a speech. Every international team was asked to built one compartment of the ‘Story Train’ choosing their own creative way to promote the novel. In the end all contributions to the ‘Story Train’ were put together on a webpage. The idea of the project was to present our final product, the ‘Story Train’ to other students, teachers in each participating country’s schools, other schools and the local libraries. We wanted to enable everyone who is interested in this new approach to literature to use it as means to make students interested in the novels that are promoted in the ‘Story Train’. We also would like to encourage other teachers to let their students create new compartments and add them to the train if they want to recommend a new novel. Students from our project went into classes of Primary schools and kindergartens to read out to younger students and children to wake their pleasure of reading. The project also serves as an important part of a more intensive collaboration with local libraries. Thus the 'Story Train' bears the chance to be continued in future years.