Learn and Play project is targeting a common problem within the educational systems in all European countries: the reding literacy barrier in early childhood education. The lack of reading skills for primary schools students is directly linked with the dropout rates among children with special needs and minorities but is also vital for the overall attainment in school in next educational levels. The project is transnational initiative that will be implemented in Bulgaria, Ireland, Spain and Turkey by organisations with significant experience in teachers training, family trainings, methodology development and educational research. Their joint efforts will develop innovative methodology for extensive language learning, based on gamification of learning content with variety of interactive resources and visualized on a platform, where all project target groups are actively involved - students, teachers and parents. The project aims to equip teachers with innovative methodology and interactive resources for language teaching and learning, to provide them with wide range of teaching ideas and pedagogical instruments and to straighten their professional development. The project will also equip parents of primary students with mother language different than the official language of the educational system in each country with practical tools to support their kids at the very beginning of the educational journey. Furthermore, the project will encourage primary students’ more active role into the learning process and will ensure good start in education for all. The expected project impact is beyond national borders of the applicant countries. The elaboration of free interactive resource with practical guides for its usage on personal demands and available in four European languages is an innovative contribution on national, regional and European level. The created methodology and extensive reading program will serve as an example to other education systems in EU (outside the partnership) that face similar challenges and have no web-based resources for teaching the official language as second language. All intellectual outputs will be applied and tested in several piloting schools in Bulgaria, Ireland, Spain and Turkey. The schools are selected to have good digital provision but limited digital-supported teaching. The piloting stage will provide significant and contextual feedback from the direct target group in each country. The platform and the audiovisual guides will be fine-tuned and improved afterwards and will became more easily accessible and user-friendly. Participants in piloting stage are primary school teachers and parents of children whose mother language is different that the official language of the educational system. A series of dissemination events are planned in each country in order to popularise the outcomes among the target group and the relevant stakeholders. Three of them will be conducted on regional level and two on national level. This will not only enlarge the scope of the project but will make the number of the potential platform users unlimited. Life streaming will be provided to support participants that face economical or geographical obstacles and cannot participate into the workshops. In long term perspective, the project goal is to support the ongoing educational reforms in EU countries by providing teachers and students with the skills required by the labour market and the economy, and by mobilizing all stakeholders to change the role of digital technologies at education institutions, to decrease the early school leaving rates caused by language barriers and reading disadvantages; to integrate interactive and open educational resources into the teaching curriculum and to increase the quality of learning; to increase the access to affordable and high-quality early childhood education.
The project consortium defined several objectives at different levels: On individual level: - to equip teachers with innovative methodology and interactive resources for language teaching and learning; to provide them with wide range of teaching ideas and pedagogical instruments and to train them how to apply the new methods in their daily work; to create teachers network and to straighten their professional development; - to equip parents of primary students with mother language different than the official language of the educational system in each country with practical tools to support their kids at the very beginning of the educational journey; - to encourage primary students’ more active role into the learning process and to ensure good start in education for all; On school and system level: - to decrease the early school leaving rates caused by language barriers and reading disadvantages; - to integrate interactive and open educational resources into the teaching curriculum and to increase the quality of learning; - to increase the access to affordable and high-quality early childhood education
Learn and Play project is targeting a common problem within the educational systems in the participating countries: the reading literacy barrier in early childhood education. The lack of reading skills for primary schools students is directly linked with the dropout rates among children with special needs and minorities but is also vital for the overall attainment in school in next educational levels. The target groups within the project countries are different – ethnic minorities in Bulgaria and Turkey, Migrants and refugees in Ireland and Spain, children with special needs in all project countries. During the preparatory period, we identified common problems and decided to look for common solutions that can be easily adjusted toward the local context. The low school performance and significant drop-out rates among minority students who speak different mother tongue than the official language of the respective educational systems (Spain and Bulgaria were leading this negative EU statistics when the proposal was developed). The language barrier was identified as an key obstruction for effective inclusion of primary school students who speak Bulgarian, English, Spanish and Turkish as a second language. Two other needs were identified and addressed: - Lack of good quality innovative educational content and gamification of the language learning process in all project countries, while excellent resources are available only in English; - Lack of integrated approach and methodology that actively involves students, teachers and parents into the language learning process;