This project planned between two high schools (one in France and one in Italy) aims at raising awareness about what it means to be a European citizen for young teenagers (aged 16-17) in France and in Italy. More specifically, the aim of this project is to compare the similarities and the differences between our two countries in several areas that the students will choose to study in groups of 4 to 5. Given recent political events in France and Italy, this project will make our students, who are future citizens and voters, think about the vocation of Europe as a vector of unity and development around themes which are common to all young Europeans. This project was born from the desire to collaborate between a French establishment located in Romorantin-Lanthenay in the region Centre-Val de Loire and an Italian establishment in the city of Ferrara in Emilia-Romagna. The students of the French high school involved in the project are students in ES (Economics and Social sciences) and the students involved in the Italian high school are students in technological subjects. The total number of students involved in the project will be around 70. Our students will work on a specific theme along with students from the partner school, and will be supervised by teachers of various subjects (English, history and geography, economic and social sciences, law and religion), which will allow our young high school students to get in touch with another form of culture. This research work, carried out throughout the two years of the project, will enable our young people to acquire a greater awareness of their European citizenship. Throughout the project, the students will have to conduct research and communicate with their pen pals in English. They will develop their skills in English with a "communic'active" goal as students will have a specific task to perform and the English language will serve as a tool to carry it out. In addition, the students will have to use the working methods taught in both schools in an interdisciplinary European project. They will need to collect, select and analyze information, organize, structure and synthesize them in order to convey a clear message. The project also aims at making our students more self-sufficient as they will have a certain degree of freedom. This freedom can be seen in the choice offered to students of their work group and the theme studied within it. All students will also have to develop skills to carry out group work involving people of different nationalities. The various mobilities planned during the two years of the project will aim at giving a concrete aspect to the project for our students by working hand in hand with the students from the partner school. The teachers involved in the project will also develop their skills in English as well as their awareness about European citizenship. They will also be able to observe the differences in teaching practices between our two countries, which might improve their teaching practices in return. A first final production will be made by gathering the work of all the different groups of Franco-Italian students. Their productions will take various forms such as written supports (research, statistical studies, essays), iconographic documents or videos for a final exhibition whose creation will begin at the end of the first year of the project. The students will have to meet during the mobilities to discuss the content of their production. This exhibition will be completed during the second year of the project and it will then be available physically in both schools and virtually on the internet. Finally, we want a small group of students to make an oral presentation of the project in both schools during the second year of the project, which will be an opportunity for us to disseminate the results of our project by inviting the local and regional press as well as other people interested in this theme to attend the presentation. Lastly, the experience gained by all the actors who participated in this project will allow us to take into account the positive and negative points highlighted during the two years of the project in order to continue making other projects later on.
The project mobilised high school students aged 16 to 17 as part of a project between France and Italy around the theme of European citizenship. The goal of the project was to develop our students' European consciousness. A class of 29 students in Première ES (Economics and Social sciences) in France took part in this Erasmus + project along with 29 Italian students from the high school N. Copernico A. Carpeggiani in Ferrara. This project allowed students to study the national singularities of each country (France and Italy) to compare the similarities and differences within several areas chosen by the students themselves. We started the project by working virtually via the Etwinning TwinSpace so that the pupils could discover themselves and present their respective schools. The students prepared a written presentation of themselves in English and produced a video montage presenting their school. These activities were carried out at the beginning of the projectand one hour was dedicated to this every week in the students' schedule. The project was then organized around 4 mobilities (two incoming and two outgoing): C1: mobility from Italy to France: a group of 15 Italian pupils came to France, accompanied by two Italian teachers in order to allow the pupils to meet each other physically and start thinking about the themes they wanted to deal with during the project. The students were hosted by families throughout the week. C2: mobility from France to Italy: a group of 14 French pupils went to Italy, accompanied by three French teachers in order to allow the pupils to continue their work on the project. C3: mobility from Italy to France: a group of 14 Italian pupils came to France, accompanied by two Italian teachers to deepen the work. C4: mobility from France to Italy: a group of 15 French pupils went to Italy, accompanied by two French teachers in order to allow the pupils to continue their work on the project. All the details relating to these 4 mobilities are available in part 7. Learning, teaching and training activities. For both C5 and C6 mobilities initially planned when the project was drafted, the exceptional situation linked to COVID-19 made any travel impossible and the closure of French and Italian establishments made any virtual event between our establishments too difficult. Although the project was extended by 6 months, the situation in our countries did not improve and thus no implementation could be carried out to continue the work started by the students last year, especially since the French students involved in the project have all obtained their Baccalaureate diploma, thus moving on to college. The purpose of this project was to allow our young high school students to open up to another form of culture. This work carried out throughout the two years of the project has enabled the students to acquire a greater awareness of their European citizenship. The pupils had to communicate in English throughout the duration of the project to be understood by their peers, which made it possible to practice English in a real exchange situation, especially during the weeks spent abroad. The work carried out by teams of Franco-Italian pupils allowed them to develop teamwork even though it could not be finalized during the last two mobilities. The goal of these last mobilities was the preparation of a mobile exhibition made by the pupils. This exhibition was meant to be presented in the two establishments and in the local libraries and cityhalls of both cities. Unfortunately, this exhibition could not be produced due to the pandemic. However, the students made some concrete productions: - the project logo - a comic strip on cultural stereotypes between our countries - slideshows on their visits to Chambord and Amboise (castle and Clos-Lucé) and on the life of Leonardo da Vinci - a photo exhibition produced for Erasmus Days 2019 and displayed at the library of the French high school - a recipe book featuring traditional dishes from our respective gastronomies - a slide show on human rights - a slide show on global warming - several presentations on Venice (its architecture and its history) following a guided tour of the city - a video montage featuring interviews with students on their experience of the project - The students also independently managed an Instagram account to talk about the project with each other. Students have developed their ability to speak in a foreign language, not only linguistically speaking but also in terms of confidence in themselves. We hope that this project has also given them the possibility to think about their future studies by showing them other horizons which is something our rural students sometimes lack.