The topic “freedom and boundaries” offers a high enough complexity and is of current public interest, which makes it ideal for this projects peer group (students between the age of 13 and 19). By looking into this topic the students shall discover that especially today it is of utmost importance to fight for your freedom and to actually make use of it. At the same time they shall experience the boundaries that go hand in hand with freedom. Selecting a more general topic allows a multifaceted use in various subjects from different point of views. This also supports the integration of the asylum seeking students, which are part of both participating schools, through subject and class covering projects. As a final conclusion a joint theater performance is planned adhering to the “freedom and boundary” topic, which will be published as a video project created by the students themselves using tablet applications on the learning platform in the world wide web. By performing in the theater the students shall experience a conquering of personal boundaries and thereby experience new freedoms themselves. This allows a non theoretical approach to the topic and allows the student to learn new practical experiences and acquire new knowledge. Further the project focuses on the freedoms and boundaries which are part of the digital media. Those are developed at a steady pace and in permanent use. Digital media is used by the students in private on a daily basis but they also start being used in the classroom. The two participating schools both already use IPads in some classes on a regular basis but smartphones also increasingly start to enter the classrooms. To ensure the beneficial usage of digital media in the classroom different scenarios have to be tested and evaluated. The project can be divided into different segments: 1. PEERTEACHING - Creation and exchange of digital material with the partner school This is the sequel to the currently running project “PEERTEACHING blablabla” Students create their own learning material (mainly videos) about the “freedom and boundaries” topic which then can be used by other students of both partner schools. Furthermore, they use and generate learning material in the area of media competency. Especially the beneficiary use of certain Apps/learning programs and also the critical reflection in regards of media usage and the regulatory framework. 2. LEARNING AND TEACHING ACTIVITIES IN ACCORDANCE WITH THE PARTNER SCHOOL AND CULTURAL EXCAHNGE During the meetings with the partner schools the creation and performance of a theater with the topic “freedom and boundaries” is of main interest. The task of the students is to create a theater performance based on the learnings from the former lessons in the classroom. Thereby a focus is to include students with different cultural backgrounds (especially refugees) in the undertaking. Thus the students do learn to cross cultural boundaries in an active way and dont just approach the topic “freedom and boundaries” in a purely theoretical way. 3. Exchange of teachers In two transnational project meetings (one in every school) with four teacher each, workshops about the usage of digital media are planned. Furthermore, additional workshops in the area of acting will be offered to the teachers. The teachers will also gain insight in other school lessons through sitting in on lectures of other teachers, This offers also a chance to give feedback in this context.
The topic “freedom and boundaries” offered a high enough complexity and is of public interest, which made it ideal for this projects peer group (students between the age of 13 and 19). By looking into this topic the students discovered that especially today it is of utmost importance to fight for your freedom and to actually make use of it. At the same time they experienced the boundaries that go hand in hand with freedom. Selecting a more general topic allowed a multifaceted use in various subjects from different point of views. 1. PEERTEACHING - Creation and exchange of digital material with the partner school This is the sequel to the preceding project “PEERTEACHING Digital media as a chance to develop foundation competences”. Students created their own learning material (mainly videos) about the topic “freedom and boundaries” which can be used by other students of both partner schools. Furthermore, they used and generated learning material in the area of media competency. The focus was especially on the beneficiary use of certain Apps/learning programs but also on the critical reflection in regards of media usage and the regulatory framework. 2. LEARNING AND TEACHING ACTIVITIES IN ACCORDANCE WITH THE PARTNER SCHOOL AND CULTURAL EXCAHNGE During the meetings with the partner schools the creation and performance of a theater with the topic “freedom and boundaries” was of main interest. In mixed groups the students were tasked to create theater performances based on the learnings from the former lessons in the classroom. The plays were created and rehearsed during workshops held in Germany with the support of students of the university of Augsburg. The final results were performed during the second meeting in the classrooms by the students in Austria. Younger students of other classes were able to visit the classrooms, watch the plays and discuss with the actors about the content. The five plays could in short be titled: “Mobbing”, “Language barriers Austria – Germany”, “Donald Trump traveling in Mexico”, “Role models” and “Bar room slogans”. “Bar room slogans” was about being a responsible citizen in a democracy and our society. A student film crew documented the creation process of these plays with the help of digital media. 3. EXCHANGE OF THEACHERS The basics for the project were planned during a meeting of all the teachers partaking in this project in Fürstenfeld. Recreational group activities were used as open platforms to discuss and plan the topics of the plays as well as the time schedule of the project. To better exchange teaching techniques a lot of work shadowing was performed and the different ideas were discussed in the group. Also it is worth mentioning that there were a lot of new faces in the team and the group activities offered an easy way of getting to know each other. Unfortunately, the planned follow up meeting to reflect and possibly plan new projects had to be rescheduled as a Facetime conference call due to Covid-19. The goal of this project was to break cultural borders and expand the freedom of all partaking individuals. Nowadays this goes hand in hand with a sensible and responsible use of digital media. The project aims to enable students and teachers from both schools and all over Europe to use digital media in their lessons but also for their private leisure. Moreover, the created material and videos gives insight into “freedom and borders” from different views and gives reason for contemplation.