This project will unite five schools from France, Greece, Germany, Poland and the Czech Republic in a joint effort to look back on our historical heritage, to discover its impact on our culture and to confront our views with foreign partners while at the same time making the use of the English language necessary to co-operate within the framework of a transnational project. The theme of World War two is part and parcel of every country’s curriculum, as the study of English as a foreign language is. The project aims at enabling pupils to get an insight into other countries’ history so as to broaden their perspectives and enrich their knowledge of European history ; it will raise the students’ cultural awareness and develop respect for heritage on a national and European scale ; it will promote an understanding of the diversity of cultures and tolerance ; help the students become aware of the necessity to master foreign languages in order to work on transnational projects and improve their linguistic skills ; encourage collaborative work and promote interdisciplinary project-based learning . It will also help students acquire and improve skills in terms of teamwork, social relations and it will allow teachers to develop different teaching methods and approaches. In order to achieve our goals, project teams will be set up in each of the partner schools, consisting of teachers and students. The target groups will be composed of 14 and 15 year-old students. We intend to carry out diffferent activities (writing of articles, creation of slides, production of videos and radio broadcasts, creation of webquests and quizzes, guided visits of historical landmarks and thematic workshops in museums, etc.) tackling different specific aspects of World War II: - Youth during the Second World War - Being a Jewish at the time of WW2 - Resistance during WW2 - The D-day - The economic and psychological consequences of the war - Learning from the past. During the five mobilities, students will also work on the cultural impact of World War II, through the study of movies, songs and famous literary works dealing with the 5 main themes mentioned above. At each step of the project, the participants will contribute to the writing of an e-magazine that will be published on each school's website and thereby be seen by learners, parents and locals within and beyond the school community. This production of a multi-perspective e-magazine in English will gather the work done by all the partners and deal with the different aspects of WWII and its impact on each country’s culture. Several exhibitions of the work achieved by students will also be carried out in the different schools At the end of the project, we will have strengthened our students’ self-esteem, increased their active participation and their social skills ; they will have an increased interest in and knowledge of European history; they will have improved ICT and foreign language skills. This transnational project will also have contributed to the development tolerance and motivation among all the participants (teachers and students), they will all have become more politically involved and will have a raising awareness on the need for continued European integration. Finally, this project will have allowed the creation of learning material for pupils, as well as the implementing of new teaching / learning techniques and the publication of open educational resources that everyone (future pupils, teachers, parents etc.) will be able to use over time.
This project has brought together five schools from France, Germany, Greece, Poland and the Czech Republic. It has presented all of them with unique opportunities to learn, in very many different aspects. The first one to be mentioned in this context is the use of English as a “lingua franca”. Not only have all participants deepened their language skills considerably, but the project has also made them aware of the importance of foreign languages in general. These broadened communicative skills have definitely contributed to a more general mutual understanding of each other’s culture, each other’s history and the shared responsibility for a common European future to be one of peace and tolerance. This has been achieved by taking a closer look at the grave mistakes of the past with its millions of young European lives being lost in bloody battles, air raids, death camps, etc. Visiting places like the former GESTAPO prison in Cologne (Germany), the D-day beaches of Normandy (France) or the memorial in Lidice (Czech Republic), to name but a few, enabled the participants to come to a much more profound and deep emotional understanding of the terrible events that took place there than this would ever have been possible in a normal school-lesson context. Unfortunately, the Corona pandemic, which struck shortly before the 5th mobility to Poland with a scheduled visit to the Auschwitz death camp, affected the project in a very severe manner. Due to schools, regions and whole countries in various lockdowns, due to students and teachers being confronted with the necessity to adapt to new and unfamiliar forms of digital learning, due to a shift of priorities in life generally and school life in particular, and finally due to the general impact of all of this on all of us, work on our project was virtually forced to come to a standstill. When we realised that even the extension of the project would not allow us to do the remaining mobilities to Poland and Greece as planned, we transferred whatever possible to online activities. This resulted in virtual mobilities, were timelines, Kahoot-quizzes and other materials were created. All in all, it is well justified to say that many objectives of this project have still been achieved. This is particularly owed to the excellent organisation and planning of the mobilities. The choice of places visited, as well as the balance between study visits, multinational workshops and social activities, not only enabled a deep insight into different European cultures but also contributed to and promoted active European citizenship. This is clearly visible in the results created by the participants, such as articles written, videos produced and web quests created, as well as their comments during workshops and guided tours. To give others the opportunity to benefit from this project, various teaching materials were created, which have been published on a project website.