Sustainability will be the primary challenge of this generation. Throughout most of history, the tasks of achieving sustainability were local or regional. In the 21st century, however, they are global. Only through international cooperation can nations overcome the challenges of answering the questions of the future which is why our project is going to be carried out transnationally. Preparing our students for those challenges of the future and equipping them with the skills they need are our main educational goals. However, we teachers can hardly follow the pace of current developments in the field of modern technology, digitalization in all areas of life, global and climate change in connection with questions of sustainability and the growing demand of highly skilled youths (e.g. language skills combined with cultural competence). This project of our 5 schools in Estonia, Finland, France, Germany and Spain has thus been developed to enable the teachers to support the students to become aware of common challenges in Europe and enhance their problem solving skills. Sustainability as the key challenge will be the common thread knitting together the 22 months of project work. Surveys among our students, teachers and parents have shown that this key concept can be subdivided further to tackle the specific needs of each school leaving us with topics that cover various areas of learning and will be addressed at the five meetings. All the 5 partner schools offer general education at a secondary level. The partners differ in their fields of expertise and complement each other in their best-practise experience. The main target group of our project are the students (4 student meetings: 5 students + 2 accompanying teachers per country in each meeting, 125 students in total) who will be 14-17 years old. In order to benefit from the project and also produce meaningful output, a certain level of English and intellectual capacity is required that younger students do not have. Letters of motivation are part of the selection process of students. The first meeting will be a teacher mobility (3 per country) in which we will focus on “Sustainable Teaching“ and thus aiming at the teachers’ perspective and specific skills that will be transfered to the students in the coming mobilities. 1. Sustainable Teaching in Helsinki (teacher meeting) Major topics/objectives: input and best-practise exchange on sustainable learning methods (e.g. ICT, sustainability, languages), examining and testing of technical equipment needed for the planned student activities (e.g. video making software), fine-tuning of project planning between coordinators 2. Communication: Sustainable Language Learning in Marburg Major topics/objectives: CLIL, language learning apps/games, autonomous language learning techniques, flipped classroom/blended learning, making a language learning video, recommend language learning apps 3. Environmental Sustainability in Tallinn / Helsinki Major topics/objectives: holistic approaches to raise environmental awareness, making a video about a visit to e.g. a power plant Tallinn/ waste incinerator in Helsinki, creating a school/city agenda for sustainability, learning about electronic waste 4. ICT: Sustainable Infotainment in Granada Major topics/objectives: ICT, strategies how to recognize real news/fake news, cooperative learning strategies, social media, creating guidelines on sustainable use of social media 5. Creativity: Artistic Expression of Sustainability in Paris Major topics/objectives: developing ideas for a sustainable school in Europe/living in a city in the future, creating and displaying pieces of art (story/song/ 3D-models, paintings etc.) The methodology in carrying out the project regarding meetings, preparation, follow-up activities and management is based on the following principles: cooperative, international, competence-based, project-oriented, blended learning, learning by doing, ICT, creative. We aim at sharing information with our own students, parents and fellow staff but also interested people in our cities, countries and beyond. The schools will involve the whole community in all stages and the results will be incorporated into the school curricula to guarantee a long lasting effect on the schools’ development. Thus they will enrich daily teaching and school life. Best practice case studies and any kind of product will be shared online through our school websites and other platforms (Erasmus+ Project Results Platform etc.) We will include the local media by sharing information and issuing press releases. Promotion of events such as the international meetings as well as the last milestone (International Sustainability Event) will generate attention as a helpful means to inspire others to set up a similar European project. With the help of this project the students will enhance their key competences that are necessary to understand and tackle environmental and learning sustainability.
Sustainability will be the primary challenge of this generation. Only through international cooperation can nations overcome the challenges of the future, which is why our project was carried out transnationally. Preparing our students for those challenges and equipping them with the skills they need were our main educational goals. This project of our 5 schools in Estonia, Finland, France, Germany and Spain had thus been developed to enable the teachers to support the students to become aware of common challenges in Europe and enhance their problem-solving skills. Sustainability as the key challenge was the common thread knitting together the 22 months of project work. All the five partner schools offer general education at a secondary level. The partners differed in their fields of expertise and complemented each other in their best-practise experience. The main target group of our project were the students (4 student meetings: 5 students + 2 accompanying teachers per country in each meeting, 125 students in total) who were 14-17 years old. In order to benefit from the project and also to produce meaningful output, a certain level of English and intellectual capacity were required, explaining the chosen age group. Letters of motivation were part of the selection process of students. The key concept of sustainability was further subdivided to tackle the specific needs of each school, leaving us with topics that covered various areas of learning addressed at the five meetings as planned in the application. 1. Sustainable Teaching in Helsinki (teacher meeting) Major objectives: best-practise exchange on sustainable learning methods, updating project design, testing of technical equipment/acquiring skills later transferred to students (e.g. video making software), product: promotional video for our project 2. Communication: Sustainable Language Learning in Marburg Major objectives: CLIL, language learning apps/games, autonomous language learning techniques, blended learning, products: language learning videos, recommendations for language learning apps 3. Environmental Sustainability in Tallinn / Helsinki Major objectives: holistic approaches to raise environmental awareness, visiting a power plant in Tallinn, products: a news video on environmental sustainability, a newspaper with information and guidelines for schools and individuals 4. ICT: Sustainable Infotainment in Granada Major objectives: ICT, real news/fake news, dangers of social media, product: a blog with information on fake/real news, guidelines on sustainable use of social media, dangers e.g. cyberbullying 5. Creativity: Artistic Expression of Sustainability in Paris Major objectives: developing ideas for a “City of the Future” (Paris, district “Le Marais”), product: a piece of art + opening event The methodology in carrying out the project regarding meetings, preparation, follow-up activities and management was based on the following principles: cooperative, international, competence-based, project-oriented, blended learning, learning by doing, ICT, creative. The schools involved the whole community in all stages and results (e.g. recommended language learning apps, sustainability news video) were incorporated into the school curricula to guarantee a long-lasting effect on the schools’ development. Thus they will enrich and have already been part of daily teaching and school life. Results were shared with our own students, parents and fellow staff but also with interested people in our cities online through our school websites, Twinspace, Facebook and other platforms (Erasmus+ Project Results Platform etc.). We also included the local media by issuing press releases. However, due to the Covid-19 pandemic, the last milestone (International Sustainability Event) could not take place, which is why we lost this opportunity for dissemination purposes. In addition, the implementation of results into school curricula and daily school life has not yet been completed due to the more pressing Covid-19 pandemic. We could not have known before but the Covid-19 pandemic made it necessary for distant teaching to draw on e.g. technology and ICT-skills the students had previously acquired. Students at home had to rely on their own competences and thereby experience self-efficacy. As they had mastered cultural, language-related, social, ICT and subject-specific challenges, they were well prepared for distant teaching. In distant learning the students also had to cooperate with other students who themselves in turn benefitted from their experience. Even if one day the pandemic should be overcome, the character of teaching will have changed and the skills acquired in the project will have a long-term impact on the student body and the teachers. In conclusion, evaluation has shown that with the help of this project the students enhanced their key competences that are necessary to understand and tackle environmental and learning sustainability.