Context: In the 21st century, the fastest growing careers and occupations are those related to STEAM (Science, Technology, Art and Mathematics). The students, starting from a STEAM teaching base in secondary education, will be exposed to a method that, established at very early ages, could trigger a permanent desire to pursue a career in any of the fields worked. We try to give our students the basis to know and to work with STEAM-based learning. In order to transmit this taste for STEAM learning, we must have a high number of teachers who are experts in the method and who help students to develop a set of thinking, reasoning, group-work, researching and creativity skills that will help them in all the areas of their lives. The aim of this project is that, in addition to classroom knowledge, teachers will achieve a more creative, more motivated students that can use science, mathematics, technology and art in real-life situations. One way of achieving a greater number of teachers and students motivated by STEAM education is to use the exchange of ideas and practices offered by the European Community through its Erasmus+ programmes. Objectives: The objectives in our project are varied, and include the following ones: 1) developing interdisciplinary collaboration between all the subjects involved in teaching STEAM improving the students' critical thinking, analyzing and problem solving skills 2) developing the students’ ability to solve global problems (such as alternative energy sources, pollutıon) using STEAM methodologies 3) improving the students' creativity, by adding Arts to the traditional STEM subjects 4) acquiring new digital skills of the 21st century in accordance to the European Framework for Digitally Competent Educational Organizations5) creating innovative products that will be also used in the future, as a result of the activities the students were involved in 6) offering career guidelines for our students in their future jobs, by stimulating their skills through STEAM activities and challenges 7) implementing innovative practices in education in STEAM related activities and methodologies 8) giving our students to build long term friendships and collaboration with students from our partner schools, and therefore encourage face-to-face and digital communication through the use of English 9) adding European value to STEAM teaching practices by taking part into an international team. Activities: The activities we planned are closely connected to the objectives we set, and are designed to achieve our goals. We try to create activities related to real-life problems for students to find practical solutions to global problems through the use of STEAM methods. For example, the students will try to create a cheap nuclear radiation detector - Ion chamber, they will try to determine and analyse organic compounds in food, in another activity they will identify different degrees of pollution by analyzing the lichens in different areas of a city, etc In general, all the challenges and activities planned will help students to discover their potential and will give them an idea about what path they could take in the future as employees or employers, and all the planned activities will include different practical products (such as posters, fliers, rockets, models etc) useful in the future in other subjects. Method: A cooperative and learning-by-doing methodology will be applied for the development of the activities in the project. The ability to learn from experiences of a practical nature allows students to develop their soft skills and improve their ability to report in plurality of contexts, not only purely school. Assessment: In order to evaluate the aims of the project, we will use evaluation based on self-assessment and peer-assessment. We will reach this kind of evaluation through teacher observation, rubrics, and questionaries done by teachers, student groups and single students. The study of the results of the questionaires, etc. will give us an overall sight of the grade of achivement of the aims stated in the project, and it will help us to establish the best dissemination for the product of our STEAM based actions.
As noted in the project summary when presented, the fastest growing careers and occupations are those related to STEAM (Science, Technology, Art and Mathematics). Exposing students to this method at a very early age could trigger a lifelong desire to pursue a career in any of the fields involved. In order to transmit this taste for STEAM learning, we must have a large number of teachers who are experts in the method to help students develop a set of thinking, reasoning, group work, research and creativity skills that will help them in all areas of their lives. The aim of this project has always been that, in addition to the basic knowledge, teachers should achieve a more creative and motivated student body that can use science, mathematics, technology and art in real life situations. At the time, we thought that one way to achieve a greater number of teachers and students motivated by STEAM education was to use the exchange of ideas and practices offered by the European Community through its Erasmus+ programmes; and after carrying out all the activities belonging to the project, we continue to maintain this idea, since through these activities we have verified the veracity of this statement. The objectives of our project have been varied, and have included the following ones: 1) To develop interdisciplinary collaboration between all subjects involved in STEAM education by improving students' critical thinking, analytical and problem-solving skills. 2) To develop students' ability to solve global problems using STEAM methodologies. 3) To enhance students' creativity by adding the Arts to traditional STEM subjects. 4) Acquire new 21st century digital skills in accordance with the European Framework for Digitally Competent Educational Organisations. 5) To offer professional guidelines for our students in their future jobs, stimulating their skills through STEAM activities and challenges. 6) To give our students the possibility to build long-term friendships and collaborations with students from our partner schools, and therefore foster face-to-face and digital communication through the use of English. 7) To add European value to STEAM teaching practices by participating in an international team. The activities have been planned closely related to the stated objectives, and have been designed to achieve our goals. We tried to create activities related to real-life problems so that students could find practical solutions to global problems by using STEAM methods. To evaluate the project objectives, we used an evaluation based on self- and peer-assessment. In general, all the challenges and activities carried out have aimed to make students discover their potential and give them an idea about the path they could take in the future as employees or entrepreneurs, and all the planned activities included different practical products (such as posters, flyers, rockets, models, etc.) useful in the future in other subjects Cooperative and learning-by-doing methodologies have been applied for the development of the project activities.