The project “We -the children of Mother Earth” focuses on changing young people behavior, habits, attitudes towards drinkable water, breathable air, edible food and other resources that are necessary for life to continue. European Commission’s 7th Action Programme to 2020 published in March 2015 emphasizes clean air and water, recycle, reuse and sustainability of resource efficiency. As the young people comprise nearly 30 percent of the global population and will be the decision makers of the future, their way of thinking about the environment is already shaping the world of tomorrow. If there is one thing we all worry about, it is the future and innovative methods that will be used at schools. It is the reason, why we should provide great sources to promote environmental awareness to our children, so as to give a clean and a bright future. Consequently, the main objectives of our project are to decrease and solve these problems and have more responsible individuals, promoting environmental awareness, creating environmentally-conscious citizens. Other important points of the project are: to strengthen the international cooperation through sharing good teaching learning practices; to prepare and deploy the education and training of professionals for equity, diversity and inclusion challenges in the learning environment; to encourage active citizenship and entrepreneurship, jointly carried out by 2 or more groups of young people from different countries; to facilitate the recognition and validation of knowledge, skills and competences acquired through formal, non-formal and informal learning. The idea of this project occurred among 6 project partners (Lithuania, Poland, Turkey, Croatia, Portugal, Romania) which are different with regards geography, culture, history, but at the same time share the idea, that it is our duty, as educators, to make our pupils aware that nature around us is being threatened and that together we can make a difference. All the project partners have had experience in being involved in similar projects and this made clear the objectives. This project involves students 13 - 17 years old, of various levels of language competence and backgrounds in, which will help to experience and better understand what it means to be a valuable citizen of Europe with many competences in. The methodology used for the project implementation will be based on the use of non-formal education methods and learning through discovery. It includes learning-by-doing and cooperative learning: learning by doing and through debate with others in a context of a team work. Another innovative feature will be the development, test, adapt and implement new forms of learning and providing education and training, notably strategic use of open educational resources (OER) and better exploitation of the ICT potential. The pupils will decide on the direction and implementation of project, methods of communication with partner countries, workshops and all related activities. Every partner has its own part in project realization and at the same time all the partners are responsible for: creating ‘ECOTEAM’ in every school, that will do all the recycling activities, cooperate with an expert organization and create Green Corner Libraries at schools; School administration - to arrange regular meetings with local authorities and parents to emphasize the importance of the Project and its future, tree planting and nature observing activities; implementation of the lesson plans prepared by partner schools into curricular; parents and students at their schools by a presentation/ workshops; preparing 3 lesson plans for each topic -learning about forests -world heritages -water -pollution -climate change -global warming; disseminating the project. The outputs are: Educational material DVD 'Green Citizens' serves a good practice in IC T field, as new skills will be mastered about making a special movie; A book of stories ‘Sad and Happy Heroes of the Nature ' to inform younger generation of the issues around the society; Walking around - booklet (to discover partners towns and countries); A brochure about project and partners' schools; Water and Culture -a joint work about the important rivers/ seas in-around our countries, how they affected the ways of living, culture...; An environmental guide of the world's oceans and animals under danger; E-book about Global warming; Informative brochures about types of pollution and solutions; A booklet of FORESTS; Lexical environment dictionary in 6 languages; Ppts of the World Heritages in partner countries. Impact and benefit: colleagues will use outputs in their lessons; ecoteams will become traditional teams at school, responsible for events and duties; the participants will also work with other teams; the target groups gain a new environmental attitude.
The project "We - Children of Mother Earth" focused on changing the behaviour of young people, their habits, their attitude to drinking water, the air they breathe, the consumption of products and other resources that are necessary for further life. All project activities referred in their subject matter to the priorities of the European Commission's Seventh Environmental Action Programme to 2020: protection of natural capital, including fertile soils, fertile lands and seas, fresh water and clean air, and biodiversity. The programme also emphasised the conversion of waste into resources and more efficient use of water resources. Since young people make up almost 30 percent of the world's population and will determine the future, their way of thinking about the environment is already shaping the world of tomorrow. If there is one thing we all worry about, it is the future and the innovative methods that will be used in schools. That is why we should provide our children with interesting sources to promote environmental awareness in order to ensure a clean and bright future. Therefore, the main objective of our project was to promote environmental awareness and create environmentally conscious citizens. Other important points of the project were: strengthening international cooperation by sharing good teaching practices, preparing and implementing education and training for professionals on the challenges of equality, diversity and integration in the educational environment, encouraging active citizenship and entrepreneurship, implementing joint activities by two or more groups of young people from different countries, facilitating the recognition and validation of knowledge, skills and competences acquired through formal and non-formal education. The idea of this project appeared among 6 project partners (Lithuania, Poland, Turkey, Croatia, Portugal, Romania), who differed geographically, culturally, historically, but at the same time shared the view that it is our duty, as educators, to make students aware that the nature around us is in danger and that together we can change something. All project partners had experience in participating in similar projects, which allowed to clearly define the objectives. The project involved pupils aged between 13 and 18 with different levels of language competence and from different backgrounds, which helped to experience and better understand what it means to be a valuable European citizen with many competences in this field. The methodology used in the project was based on the use of non-formal education and learning through discovery. It included learning by doing and learning together: learning by doing and debating with others in a teamwork context. Another innovative feature was the development, testing, adaptation and implementation of new forms of learning and education and training provision, in particular the strategic use of Open Educational Resources (OER) and better exploitation of the potential of ICT. Pupils decided on the direction and implementation of the project, methods of communication with partner countries, workshops and all related activities. Each of the partners had their share of the project and at the same time all the partners were responsible for: the creation of Eco-teams", which carried out all recycling activities, cooperated with experts and created green corners in libraries. School administration organised regular meetings with local authorities and parents to highlight the importance of the project. Parents and students took part in workshops, presentations and open lessons, whose topics were related to the project activities. The tree planting and nature observation activities were implemented in the curriculum and lesson plans prepared by the partner schools. The following results were jointly developed: educational material "Green Citizens" - an example of good practice in the field of ICT, a book with stories "Sad and Happy Heroes of the Nature", which aims to inform the young generation about the problems with the nature around ; "Walking around" - a brochure promoting cities and partner countries); "Water and Culture" - joint work on important rivers / seas in our countries, how they have affected the way of life, culture; Guide to the world's endangered oceans and animals; E-book on global warming; Information brochures on types of pollution and solutions; FORESTS brochure; Nature dictionary in 7 languages; presentation "World Heritages" . Activities promoting environmental protection will be permanently included in the schedules of partner schools, the results will be used by the teaching staff, and the international cooperation will continue in subsequent projects.