We live in a technocratic age, and today we are observing more and more often children staring at their computers or phones. We see less and less people talking to each other. Today, we are increasingly flooded with information from various sources, but we are becoming less aware of it and that is why we are often talking about "functional illiteracy". Today, most teachers share that children are indifferent to education, school, learning, and all kinds of general activities. There is no desire for direct communication because in many cases the child / young person / is afraid to express his / her own feelings and emotions, as well as to understand the feelings and emotions of others. We believe that building emotional intelligence in children is directly related to an attitude of empathy and compassion, as well as an understanding of human nature. This allows the children to connect with other people on an emotional level. Being compassionate allows the children to be helpful and respond truly to others' concerns. Therefore, the main goals we set ourselves in this direction are: To enable children and students to become aware of the educational process so that they can understand what they see, hear, read and feel, and most importantly, respond appropriately to all this. To motivate children and students to learn through empathy, which includes: emotional control, self-awareness, self-motivation and the ability to build and maintain relationships. To involve everyone in the community - children (including vulnerable groups and people with learning disabilities); teachers and parents and give them the opportunity for communication at emotional level, acquire knowledge, skills and competences in order to improve the overall personal development. Sharing experiences through the media to overcome language barriers for both students and teachers. Developing ICT skills through the use of modern technologies and virtual mobility. Development of a number of end products for sharing with partner schools, for developing competencies and entrepreneurship, and for engaging local communities in the process of their creation, implementation and dissemination. Enabling teachers to share their knowledge, compare their teaching and learning approaches, design new curriculum, programs, innovation, sharing good practice examples to enhance the quality of teaching and learning in the partner institutions. Children and students should learn, not just facts as quantity, but as quality – to gain knowledge that will help them to think, feel and, on that basis, to do causal links, logical connections and only then to act. Enabling children and students to express with words, actions or drawings their emotions using the methods of art in all its forms. Encouraging adults (parents and teachers) to share their emotions with children and to answer how we manage to deal with different emotions, because the full range of feelings is understandable and part of the human nature, although some actions need to be restricted by following patterns of behavior used in sport. The selection of partners was made in the light of shared values in terms of: The development of key competences for all individuals – from early childhood and lifelong; Acquiring of social skills, learning skills as well as social inclusion, "classroom diversity", including children from vulnerable groups. The project partnership was created thanks to previous experience our organization has in its work on ERASMUS + Comenius projects and established contacts with countries from all over Europe. The choice of countries and their number was not accidental. We focused on cultural, social, economic and geographical diversity. This will enable us to track how project activities will be implemented in different parts of Europe. We believe that our previous experience and potential from Comenius and Erasmus + projects will greatly contribute to the quality of the project. We intend ...... teachers,... children and .. parents to be involve in the project. Since the project will work in direction of emotional self-awareness, we will enable the child (guided by his teachers) to learn about his own emotions and to control them, he will have the opportunity to explore information, think and create, use his body and mind, find a solution and better ways of communicating with adults and friends, both: who are close to him or far in Europe. The Master will be a trainer, but also a follower, partner and friend.The project will focus on activities related to sports, environmentally friendly lifestyles and art in all its forms. Through these activities, children can play, make up stories and debate on the characters' behavior in these stories, express themselves better, follow the rules, practice healthy outdoor activities, learn to collaborate to achieve the same goal, to think and develop logical skills.
The main goal we set was to be able to involve children and students in a conscious educational process, so that they can understand what they see, hear, read and feel, and most importantly, react adequately to all this. - Children and students should learn, not just knowledge, as quantity, but as quality. Knowledge that will help them think, feel and, on this basis, make cause-and-effect, logical connections and only then act. - Encouraging adults (parents and teachers) to share their emotions with children and giving an answer to how we manage to cope with different emotions, because the full range of feelings is understandable and part of being human, although some actions must be limited by stepping on patterns of behavior in sports. - Enabling teachers to share their knowledge, compare their approaches to teaching and learning, construct new teaching material and teaching program / innovations, sharing examples of good practices in order to increase the quality of teaching and learning in partner institutions.
We developed and applied for this project because we believe that the development of children's emotional intelligence is an important factor for overall child development. In our opinion, it is important for children to understand what they see, hear, read and feel, so that they can react adequately to all this. - In the era of high technology, all of us, children, teachers and parents, were unprepared for the virtual reality we found ourselves in. On the one hand, we have gained the ability to quickly accumulate a large volume of information, on the other hand, we have lost the ability to communicate verbally and empathize with others. In education, there is talk of "Functional illiteracy", i.e. I have a lot of knowledge but I don't know how to use it practically because I don't understand it. - As a team, we were convinced that building emotional intelligence in children is directly related to an attitude of empathy and compassion, as well as an understanding of human nature. This skill allows one to connect with other people on an emotional level. - The teachers also had a great need to increase their competences in order to help the children in expressing, empathizing and above all understanding their feelings, emotions and adequately reacting to them.