Fairy Tale Bridges of Europe is an Erasmus + KA2 project for exchange of good practices. The project will last for 24 months, bringing together six partner organizations from Slovenia, Spain, Croatia, the Czech Republic and Italy, who want to exchange knowledge and examples of good practices in the fields of social inclusion and early learning of a foreign language. The project coordinator is Kindergarten Galjevica, which is experienced in managing and participating in international projects, as are all other partner organizations, with the exception of kindergartens from Czech Republic and Vrtec Črnuče, who are novices in this field. The project is designed to follow the objectives of the Europe 2020 strategy - strengthening the profile of teacher professions and improving the quality of pre-school education. The partnership brings together experts in the field of inclusion and early learning of a foreign language, who will exchange examples of good practices as part of 5 learning / teaching / training activities. They will prepare a record of methods and programs with recommendations for the work of professional staff, which will help with the professional development of employees in kindergartens and schools. These activities will also serve as an upgrade to the precisely prepared project management plan, as an oportunity to monitor the quality of project work and project results as well as the evaluation of events. The events will be attendet by teachers from six partner organizations who will spread the acquired knowledge among their colleagues and parents. The project results will reflect both the work of teachers as well as the key involvement of children. Children will be the authors of the project logo and the book of fairy tales, they will be involved in the preparation of the project mascots, teaching materials and games and the preparation of a handbook for early learning of a foreign language. Wide spread dissemination is of great importance, that is why we prepared the plan very carefully. We included the publication of professional and informative articles, an extensive list of recipients of electronic news, lectures and workshops, the sharing of materials and project results in Ersamus + corners, as well as publications on the websites of various European networks. By widespread dissemination of project results, we would like to reach the widest possible professional public, and thus provide the source of inspiration and assistance to all who, on a daily basis, face the challenges of inclusion in the early stages of education. Our aim is to build a solid bridge, which would overcome the obstacles that appear when the society does not listen to social inclusion and friendly cultural dialogue. The project will start on 1.10.2018 and conclude at the end of September 2020 with an international conference in Ljubljana.
The Fairy tale Bridges of Europe is our first approved Erasmus+ KA210 project, that we coordinated. The idea for the project dates back to the time of the Comenius projects, when we experienced how great impact international activities can have on kindergarten work. To make it easier to connect with children, we once again chose a world of fairy tales that is close to children. A project was created the way that touched on social inclusion and early language teaching, two priorities of our organization. We chose the areas because we wanted to deepen our knowledge in the field of social inclusion, learn about the challenges they face in other, related organizations across Europe, learn new ways to solve these challenges, learn examples of good practice and share experiences with employees in partner organizations. We chose the field of early language teaching, both mother tongue and foreign language, as we have many years of experience in this field. We wanted to pass on our knowledge to preschool teachers across Europe, but we also wanted to get acquainted with the methods of early literacy in other preschools and schools, methods of working with children in multilingual families and good practices in learning a foreign language for preschool and first grade children. We invited 5 partners to the partnership, including two newcomers in the field of Erasmus + projects, and the amazing journey began. Each partner organization is a specialist in one of the areas we wanted to strengthen; we all come from different cultural and / or geographical areas and face different social groups and different challenges. We hoped for a diverse range of activities, methods and examples of good practice, and we got it. We planned 5 learning / teaching / training activities, one in each of the partner organizations. Each meeting had a specificdifferent - topic related to the objectives of the project. The host organization, which is also an expert in the field covered by each meeting, prepared lectures, presentations and other activities to disseminate knowledge and gain international experience, and each partner had to prepare an analysis of the situation in each field in their own organization and country and present specifics. Thus, we ensured knowledge of the situation in the project areas in all partner organizations and countries. We successfully carried out 3 physical mobilities, and then the Covid-19 pandemic crossed our plans. Despite the extension of the project for a period of one year and a great desire to carry out physical mobility, due to unstable conditions, safety of participants and limited time, we finally decided to hold the last two meetings virtually. Our final conference was also held in virtual form. It was attended by 74 teachers and preschool teachers from all over Europe. During the individual meetings of the partners, we were in constant contact and Vrtec Galjevica, as a coordinating organization, coordinated the work and supervised the current performance of certain tasks. In this way, we ensured that the project was “alive” all the time and that the participants had a sense of information and active involvement. When we applied, we anticipated that we would achieve a lot in the project. We can proudly say that we have achieved all the results. Mascots have come to life in all partner organizations, some will continue their project path in new projects, the fairy tale book includes more than 10 fairy tales from 5 countries, an electronic manual for English teachers will soon enrich many foreign language lessons in all partner organizations, and the voice about our project spread among the general and professional public with the help of many publications in print and electronic media, proceedings of professional conferences and professional journals. The long-term effects cannot yet to be seen, but we anticipate that they will be noticeable especially in the field of international involvement of all partner organizations, more frequent use of fairy tales in working with children with special needs and greater motivation and self-confidence of preschool and school teachers in foreign language teaching. All partners have already joined new Erasmus + projects in 2020, and we also plan further cooperation in a joint project and eTwining projects.