Project topic: Sing and move! Children’s songs and activities that make children move for nursery schools in Prague and Aachen. Project goal: With the project the culture of songs and short stories for preschoolers which make children move of both cities Aachen and Prague should be reflected and brought together. Students become familiar with children’s songs/ “movement songs” and “movement stories” which their nursery schools prefer to work with and exchange them with their partner. In a next step students are asked to work on methods to bring their songs and “movement stories” forward to preschool children. All this material should be put together in a handbook for nursery schools. Project partners: Students from ACKKS/Aachen and the VOS, SOS/ Prague who visit classes focusing on child care and education doing placements/internships during their school education, aged from 16-18+. The projects will be supported by teachers who teach the subjects German, Czech, English, Social Education, Physical Education, Children’s literature, Arts and Music. Number of participants at short-term exchanges: 12 students, 2 teachers of each school Project leading teachers: Ruth Fiand, Käthe-Kollwitz-Schule Aachen Olga Sedlarova, Vyssi odborna skola pedagogicka a socialni, Stredni odborna skola pedagogicka a Gymnazium in Prag Project description: First Project year: First students gather their experience with children’s songs/movement songs and movement stories and choose favourites of their city’s nursery schools. Then they build „intercultural teams or twins“ and inform their partners about their collection of songs/stories. Therefore songs and stories should be translated into English, vocabulary glossaries should be worked out, students should exchange song texts, melodies and stories so that the partner can read and listen to them. Next students work on methods and didactical material to bring their songs/ movement stories forward to preschool children. They work out teaching methods, creative activities which can help preschool children to understand their song. Again students exchange their didactical material. After this theoretical project phase, students should be given the chance to do some „practical work“ with their songs and didactical material in nursery school thus broadening their vocational skills. For this reason short-term exchanges are planned in Prague and Aachen which should give students a chance to visit their partner’s nursery school to present their songs/stories, work with their didactical material with the help of their twin partner. And finally evaluate their material, decide which materials they want to take into a handbook for nursery schools, work out this handbook. Or students create and offer a workshop for preschool children at school, if nursery schools prefer this. During this phase of exchange students should also take part at “module lessons” focusing and comparing the different schools systems/job trainings and nursey school concepts. They should also sit in on classes and present their project results to junior students. Second project year: Students work on a choir and/or dramatic performance of their songs/ stories for preschool children in which they sing/present their songs and stories/ “move”/“dance” their stories on stage. For this reasons children’s songs and stories which make children move or that tell a story which can be performed should be focused on during both project years. Students should choose an overriding topic for their performance so that the contributions of each student group can be combined to one performance. During short-term exchange, students take part at theatre/dance workshop and work on their own performance. They do rehearsals and finally nursery school children are invited to see the students’ performance. During this exchange students also take part at “module lessons” focusing on the difference in their job trainings and nursery school concepts (see first project year). Project results/products: • Collection of songs and movement stories with didactical material (handbook) • Project homepage • Project diaries • Song audios • Song and “movement story” performance/ dance and choir, film of performance • Project homepage
Project topic: Sing and move! Children’s songs and activities that make children move for nursery schools in Prague and Aachen. Project goal: With the project the culture of songs for preschoolers which make children move of both cities Aachen and Prague should be reflected and brought together. Students become familiar with children’s songs/ “movement songs” which their nursery schools prefer to work with and exchange them with their partner. In a next step students are asked to work on methods to bring their songs forward to preschool children. Students write short stories on the basis of their song and design short scenic plays for children. Restructuring of project The project was prolonged to catch up on project goals and project meetings. Originally students should work on a public choir and dramatic performance of their songs for preschool children. Because of the Covid pandemic public performances could not take place. Therefore students designed different scenic plays of their songs and recorded videos. At project meetings in June 2022 in Prague and Aachen videos of choir performances were also recorded and published on the project homepage. Project partners: Students from ACKKS/Aachen and the VOS, SOS/ Prague who visit classes focusing on child care and education doing placements/internships during their school education, aged from 16-18+. The project was supported by teachers who teach the subjects German, Czech, English, Social Education, Physical Education, Children’s literature, Arts and Music. Number of participants at short-term exchanges: 12 students, 2 teachers of each school Project leading teachers: Ruth Fiand, Käthe-Kollwitz-Schule Aachen Olga Sedlarova, Vyssi odborna skola pedagogicka a socialni, Stredni odborna skola pedagogicka a Gymnazium in Prag Project description: First Project year: First students gathered their experience with children’s songs and chose favourite songs of their city’s nursery schools. Then they built „intercultural teams“, who came into contact to exchange their songs. Therefore songs were adapted and translated into English, German and Czech. Not only song texts were exchanged. Students also produced audios of their songs so that their partners could listen to them and to publish audios on the project homepage. Song texts were exchanged and discussed in class to give partners a feedback. Next students joined in “song teams”, chose “their song” and worked on methods and didactical material to bring their song forward to preschool children. They worked out teaching methods, creative activities which can help preschool children to understand their song, also focusing on children who are not native speakers. Again students exchanged their didactical material. After this theoretical project phase, students should be given the chance to do some “practical work” with their songs and didactical material in nursery school thus broadening their vocational skills. For this reason short-term exchanges were planned in Prague and Aachen which should give students a chance to visit their partner’s nursery school to present their songs, work with their didactical material with the help of their partner. These visits at nursery school were planned in “intercultural teams” but project meetings had to be cancelled because of the Covid pandemic. Second and third project year: First all project results were handed over to the next “project generation” and “were put to the test”, thus compensating the nursery school visits and work with children at partners’ nursery school. Again “song teams” were built which chose one song to work with. Students wrote short stories on the basis of their song. Again schools were sent into lockdowns. Therefore students were given method trainings on scenic play in distance lessons to prepare them for their next “practical project phase” which took place in the third project year. “Song teams” chose different forms of scenic play like e.g. shadow- and puppet-theater, Kamishibai, puppets on the string, stop-motion film and transformed their short story into a short scenic play. This work was accompanied by art teachers. Finally students recorded their performance as a video for the project homepage. First results and methods were exchanged during a digital meeting in March 2022. In June 2022 short term exchanges could take place in Aachen and Prague. Here the films were presented and discussed. Song rehearsals took place and students also worked on a choreography for their song presentation. As a replacement for a public presentation choir performances were filmed for the project homepage. At last a handbook with all project songs and material was distributed to nursery schools in Aachen and Prague for evaluation. Project results/products: • Collection of songs and short stories with didactical material (handbook) • Project homepage simo-praach.de • Song Audios • short films of scenic play based on song short stories • film of choir performance