After years of experience in foreign language teaching we have realised that acknowledging, being aware and understanding the relation between both the world of origin and the world of the target language helps students of a foreign language to learn it better. Moreover, the more intercultural awareness students are enriched by, the easier it is for them to acquire the target language. These reasons have motivated us to design the project CHEFS (Cultural Heritage English, French and Spanish) in which the cultural heritage plays a key role in foreign language teaching and learning. This project is aimed at mainly adult learners but also youngsters, paying special attention to those with special needs, seniors, immigrants and refugees for whom it is important to promote autonomous learning, understanding sociocultural diversity, and improving their communicative competence. The previously mentioned needs are meant to be met by helping students to acquire the strategies to perform in a variety of communicative contexts; to create intercultural bonds and to improve oral comprehension, expression and interaction. As per specific objectives, students are expected to expand cultural heritage vocabulary, exchange cultural heritage knowledge, discover local and classic artists in the countries involved, improve oral communication, participate in virtual environments to exchange opinions, and know the background of selected works of art. The participants in the project are countries with a relevant cultural heritage: Italy, Greece, Belgium and Spain, representing different types of organisations such as Third Age University, NGO and public and private school of languages. This partnership combines both expertise and inexperience in European projects so that there will be a continuous exchange of ways of working and learning from each other. Concerning the activities, there are three different types involving both teachers and students: partners’ meetings, teacher training and students’ mobilities. The topics of interest are traditional cuisine; music and traditional dance; museums and monuments, and festival, traditions and legends. The methodology follows an action-based and collaborative approach where all the partners create, develop and share tasks, and students work cooperatively. Thus, communication among the partners is essential and will be the key point to obtain the desired results. The results will be assessed by quantitative, qualitative and dissemination key performance indicators (KPIs). Some qualitative indicators include milestones reached within the foreseen time frame, partners’ satisfaction with the project management and budget accomplishment. As regards the quantitative ones, some examples are assessment questionnaires, checking that planned meetings have been carried out, reports positively evaluated by the National Agency and feedback from at least 30 students. The indicators for dissemination are project website visits, distribution of the project Manifesto, social networks visits and partners’ publications. The expected impact is on adult learners, teachers and trainers and organisations. As far as learners is concerned, their motivation in foreign language learning is expected to be strengthened by raising awareness of multicultural identities, sharing traditions so as to create a sense of community and fostering a life-long learning attitude. Concerning teachers and trainers, they will be highly motivated by working in intercultural and multilinguistic contexts, which will impact on improving their collaboration and team work approaches, boosting their abilities to transfer the new acquired knowledge and sharing experiences and methodologies from other peers. As regards the impact on organisations, a professional growth of each member, role models to be implemented in other contexts, rise in education standards and training methods as well as a broader interconnected system to exchange best practices are expected. Last but not least, it is necessary to mention that the project impact will be felt at all levels (locally, regionally, nationally and internationally) by being included in the national education syllabi, exchanging conclusions in social networks and websites or organizing workshops for those showing interest in it, among others. All in all, schools of adults and organisations may derive substantial benefits from the teaching of a foreign language through cultural heritage in the long term. A whole set of activities and good practices will be created to enhance students’ motivation and interest in learning a second or third language, being students themselves and their performance the focus of attention within a cultural-based environment, and, anybody in the teaching and learning community will be able to benefit from it.
The project CHEFS (Cultural Heritage through the learning of English, French and Spanish as a foreign language) has been successfully completed and after three years, we are satisfied to have been involved in this project. During this time, we have succeeded in engaging many students and teachers from different schools in different activities, and we are proud to present the results. Our students have improved the target language through the cultural heritage not only of their country, but also of the other partner countries of the project. Furthermore, we (both students and teachers) have exchanged experiences, knowledge, and ways of working, which have enriched our teaching and learning practice and broadened horizons. Being able to work with people from other countries has been a paramount motivation while carrying out the activities as students could interact in real everyday life situations. The objectives of the project have been achieved by improving the cultural awareness and European citizenship of adult learners and teaching staff through the discovery and promotion of European cultural heritage whilst using a variety of activities and learning techniques. From a linguistic point of view, foreign language acquisition has been optimized; language skills of students of English, French and Spanish both in and outside the classroom have been enhanced; social skills promoted; individual self-confidence boosted and autonomous and peer learning engaged. Sixty-seven students and accompanying persons took part in the mobilities. This figure would have been even higher had we been able to perform C4 in Brussels, a mobility we had to cancel due to covid. The profile of the vast majority of students who participated in the mobilities was that of people who had never had the opportunity to participate in a European project before. Apart from the possibility of putting the language studied into practice, all these people were able to meet people from other countries and therefore get to know other cultures and establish links that go beyond the CHEFS project. Moreover, our project has not only benefited the sixty-seven participants mentioned before, but also those who, in a direct or indirect way, have participated in the proposed activities, a total of about 3000 people. Apart from the activities carried out during the mobilities, we have undertaken other tasks, in order to achieve the objectives that we had initially set. Most of these activities have been collected in a downloadable handbook available in the project blog https://erasmuschefs.com, which includes the record of all the transnational meetings, activities, mobilities, impressions of students, dissemination, etcetera. Last but not least, the CHEFS project has been a motivational approach to second language teaching and learning for all the individuals somehow involved in the project. We strongly believe that we have succeeded in conveying the importance of cultural heritage when learning a foreign language. Going to class is important, but second language learning goes beyond the classroom, and this is what we have promoted with the CHEFS project. Nowadays, students who have experienced the CHEFS project are eager to undertake activities outside the class by exploring the surrounding cultural heritage and establishing contacts with students from other countries they share the same interests with, such as the learning of a foreign language through its monuments, legends, food, traditions, folk and music. After this three-year experience, we are convinced of the merits of our methodology and are happy to observe how our activities are not limited to the classroom and the language only. We are sending confident, multi-lingual and skilled ambassadors of the European project into the world and will continue to work with the learning outcomes and methodology of the CHEFS project, in order to also maintain and further expand our international network of participants.