This project "THE CULTURAL HERITAGE OF OUR LAND: FROM ART TO FORK" will last two years, from september 2019 to august 2021. Respecting the priorities of the European Commission the general objectives are the following: - social and educational value of European cultural heritage, its contribution to job creation, economic growth and social cohesion - social inclusion - drop out and disadvantage. In order to meet the needs detected by the partners involved in the project, it aims to focus the attention on the social and cultural characteristics of the environment where our students live, through the study of the cultural heritage of a land characterized by unique flavours in its cuisine, different cultures in its history and a not yet completely unveiled art in its territory. A typical dish contains not only single ingredients but the natural, artistic and cultural heritage as well. So, “ the cultural heritage of our land” starts from an artistic or historic remains, passes through the typical herbs or produce, and finally arrives in our dish and on our fork. A dish always tells something about our origins. The participants of the project involve secondary school students aged 15 - 17 in the partner schools and their teachers managing and facilitating the project activities. The project was born from the desire of guiding the students towards the discovery of their own local community as a place of work opportunities, creating new businesses thanks to the cultural heritage enshrined in it and then compare it with the cultural heritage of other European countries in order to look for differences and similarities. The basic goal of the project is less about single identity and more about exchanging and sharing common elements of single country’s heritage in order to enliven in students the idea of European citizenship, to let them widen their horizons. Another objective of the project is to enable students to learn basic digital skills, use modern technology by doing practical tasks in an international environment of European countries. The project will be carried out internationally by six secondary schools based in Italy, Poland, Bulgaria, Cyprus, Portugal and Greece, so it will provide an opportunity of teamwork both at national and international level, will enable to share good practices in the area of the way of using the cultural heritage in creating work opportunities and school curricula dealing with this topic. Thanks to transnational collaboration the participants will get to know partners from other countries of the European Union and will learn to work together, taking into consideration cultural differences, need of tolerance, art of listening to others, expressing oneself in a foreign language and gaining confidence in international communication. The project is based on three Labs: 1. HERE ARE MY ROOTS : art discovery, folktales, natural landscapes 2. THERE ARE SOME "ROOTS" IN MY DISH!: food discovery, family recipes, typical -local ingredients 3. PRESERVE YOUR ROOTS FOR THE FUTURE: eat locally and be healthy, no food waste and keep an eye to labelling All the labs aim at gaining new knowledge and improving language skills, especially English, (ESP for tourism, cooking, sciences) as it is the language in which the project will be carried out. During the two years of the project students will create different products (questionnaires, presentations, quizzes, digital dictionaries, videos, a magazine, project newsletters) and take part in online and onsite activities (lessons based on online resources taught by teachers from all partner countries, workshops with experts, lecturers, meetings with people specialising in the field connected with the topic of the project, field trips) in order to learn how to use new digital skills, acquire some knowledge local and partners’ cultural heritage and how to preserve our roots, i.e. eat fresh, healthy local produce or prevent or avoid food waste. Teachers will create learning meterials, assessment rubrics and digital badges recognizing completed tasks, the main product will be magazines summarising the first and second year of the project, multilanguage dictionary and project newsletter presenting the outcomes of the training events. Six training events are planned during the project life cycle and online activities will be carried out continuously and their outcomes will be uploaded on ETwinning Twinspace.
The project THE CULTURAL HERITAGE OF OUR LAND: FROM ART TO FORK began in September 2019 and ended in August 2022, a year later due to the Covid pandemic.The project aimed to accompany students to discover the land in which they live, the cultural roots that represent its heritage and guide them to an examination of the differences and similarities with a view to preserving their roots (language, art, music, dance, food). The whole project revolved around the word ROOTS (cultural origins, ingredients of a poor cuisine, sustainable food approach with no food waste). The participants were secondary high schools from Italy, Bulgaria, Cyprus, Greece, Portugal and Poland and they never disregarded the overall goals set in the application phase (the value of the common European heritage, social inclusion, economic disadvantage and fighting school dropout) . The pandemic only strengthened the basic purpose of the project as students and teachers who had begun working together on the meaning of HERITAGE, on common and different elements, on getting to know the different territories with their art, culture, food, found themselves together going through an experience that united them even more, definitely improving the digital and language skills of all participants, the ability to continue to confront each other despite the psychological state affected by the pandemic , the knowledge of topics inevitably related to Health and Wellness, food waste and the recovery of eating habits to which the lockdown has forced everyone. The project was divided into 3 workshops to be conducted in the 6 planned mobilities. 1. THESE ARE MY ROOTS: art discovery, folktales, natural landscapes. 2. THERE ARE SOME ROOTS IN MY DISH: food discovery, family recipes, typical local ingredients 3. PRESERVE YOUR ROOTS FOR THE FUTURE: eat locally and be healthy, no food waste and keep an eye to labelling. The results of students' and teachers' research and work (videos, presentations, questionnaires, games, performances/posters/ multi language dictionaries) concerning all the labs were presented during training events and then analyzed in depth by participating in the lectures conducted by experts, workshops, while visiting places connected with the particular topic of the lab. The first workshop was successfully carried out between Italy and Greece. The outcomes concerning the second lab were presented in virtual mode in Bulgaria and blended in Cyprus, as Bulgaria and Poland were unable to participate due to high infection rates in their countries. The third workshop marked a return to normalcy with the two mobilities held first in Portugal and finally in Poland. The project results have been disseminated inside the partnership in the form of seminars/workshops or presentations created by direct participants - teachers and students, for other teachers and students of parents schools, parents at parental meetings and potential students on Open Days. In the schools there have been created an Erasmus corner displaying activities and pictures of the project; school websites contain information and reports from training events together with the link to public project website and blog; the project has a Facebook profile used by all the partners to promote the activities. The local community has been informed through local media and a great number of online presentations and videos are available with the name and a short description of the project. As most of the schools involved in this project have been involved in international projects for many years, there is a big amount of expertise concerning dissemination they have shared with the others.The teaching and learning materials produced during these three years (newsletters, videos, dictionaries) can be used by colleagues and students as the website is still accessible ( this cannot be said for Twinspace since there have been occurred some changes to ESEEP). Due to the pandemic, even the original project of immersing students in the family realities of the host countries was no longer possible after the Greece mobility, and for safety reasons students were no longer housed in families but in hotel facilities. Thanks to the transnational collaboration, the participants not only learned about the realities of other European countries, but also learned how to work together, how to embrace differences as cultural enrichment, how to listen, how to express themselves in another language, how to gain more self-confidence, and, in the second part of the project, how to overcome the psychological anxiety caused by the lockdown. Each mobility had a moment of preparation with activities carried out on the eTwinning platform, and a moment of realization on site through presentations, video making, competitions, and lectures with experts (notable ones were those on the meaning of heritage in Cyprus, the circular economy in Portugal, and food recovery in Poland).