The project 'Historical Places Build Relations' seeks to mediate between European students from different European cultures and background. Watching discrimination and racism throughout Europe even within the younger generation we think bringing different cultures together at a young age, focusing on our common history and possible common roots might bring about a change in their attitude. We do hope to raise the students awareness of this ‘sameness’ while researching for the different projects and at the same time to trigger their awareness of the ‘otherness’ being a great value that they should appreciate. We would like to start with an introduction video (first presentation of school/ town/ region) so all the partners get to know the other partners and the region they are from. This should ideally already include typical cultural and regional events. Furthermore we would like to establish e-twinning as a common tool to set up constant contact and exchange of ideas. As Jorge Cidade from Agrupamento de Escolas de Celeirós, Portugal, has already gained experience with etwinning, he has already set up our etwinning group and will be responsible for its update. There should also be a project included called 'News of the month' in which students should pick a political topic and explain its background and relevance within their own country and its consequence for the European Union. On a more entertaining level the same exchange will be conducted via “Kahoot”-quizzes which will be supervised by Agrupamento de Escolas de Carregal do Sal, Portugal. Her school has already experience in using this tool to keep up regular exchange on the results of our projects. During these exchanges the students will get to know each other and their region better. In the long run our project results planned as of today are: a logo competition (students plan and carry out a school- wide competition to find a common logo and to bring the Erasmus project into the school life and the local community. ( invitation of the press) Moreover, we plan to set up a shared homepage. Students will have external support by experts introducing them to the setting up and maintaining the shared homepage. It will be the shared task of all participating student groups to keep it updated. During the regular partner visits we will work on the following projects together: Other project results planned will be a 'European' board game (eg memory with pictures of local historical places of all participating schools). On top of that there will be a project T-shirt and surveys/ polls (public and intern) on a regular basis to see how far the project idea has spread within the school community and the local community. In addition the students will, after having gained insight into the other partners' culture, create a recipe book (eg. 'Our common table'.) These recipes will have been intensively tested at our regular 'European Table Festival at the partner visits. We will also focus on the European languages and their roots, their role within the EU, common roots etc. Here we are planning a quiz ( e.g. historical semantics) planned and conducted by the students in the schools and the home towns. This will be especially interesting as our partner school Mutriku BHI, Spain, is in Basque country with people trying to keep the Basque language alive in events like “Korrikas”. The different aspects we are trying to focus on: The political and historical roots of Europe from the very beginning which can be seen in the prehistoric monuments in the area of Agrupamento de Escolas de Carregal do Sal via ancient Roman and Greek history to be found in all of our partners’ countries but especially in the area of I.I.S. "G. MINZONI", Italy. We will go all the way to modern history where we will focus on the different “Policies of Remembrance and Cultural Commemoration”. Here we have, for example, the story of the Portuguese ambassador in Bordeaux who saved the lives of many Jews during his time in Bordeaux, which Agrupamento de Escolas de Carregal do Sal has already worked on or the German “Stolpersteine”. Furthermore, we will include a social aspect considering that the ERASMUS+ Programme also focuses on the problem of early school leavers and wants to open a door to other European countries as possible future working countries. One of our partners I.I.S. "G. MINZONI", covers both these aspects, being a technical and vocational institute as well as having a large number of pupils from disadvantaged families. The role of art and music and how they connect European countries will be another focus in many of our project results. We are glad to have IES Padre Isla, Spain, an institution with special focus on music and art, amongst our partners to support us here. The Goethe-Gymnasium Gaggenau also has a “Musik-Plus” profile. In the long run we hope to plant into our students’ heads the European ideas of tolerance, acceptance, open-mindedness and understanding.
The goal of the project "Historical Places Create Relationships" was to mediate between European students from different European cultures and backgrounds. In the face of discrimination and racism throughout Europe, even among the younger generation, we believe that bringing different cultures together at a young age and focusing on our shared history and possible common roots could bring about a change in their attitude. We have been successful in doing this. We were able to overcome the challenges that the corona pandemic posed to all partners together, with continued mutual support. In the virtual meetings, it quickly became clear that Corona knew no boundaries, yet could not slow down our project. We learned how to use digital tools and got to know the partners and their culture first through introductory videos, gallery walks, digital books, exhibitions and kahoots. These digital tools will accompany the students in their further educational journey. Each partner organized an online meeting, and after Corona, an on-site exchange. Through the Corona-related one-year extension, we not only learned about our original activities and goals such as highlighting historical (Romans), architectural (memorial), culinary (feast days, food habits) and linguistic/cultural (proverbs, gestures) similarities or differences, but also expanded the focus on "commemoration" to include the theme "Giving lost places a memory". In each case, a place that had been forgotten but was memorable to us was researched and presented. The aim was to create a jointly designed memorial for each of these places and to hand it over to the public in a ceremonial act. These were, for example, a children's and women's prison in Mutriku, the labor camp in Gaggenau, Martyrs' Square in Naples. One of the emotional highlights was the joint creation of commemorative tiles in the museum Aristides de Sousa Mendes, a Portuguese diplomat who saved hundreds of Jews from Nazi persecution, after a presentation by his granddaughter. This example illustrated to the students how important civil courage and democratic values are and are becoming, especially in today's world. All project results promoted creativity, organizational skills and willingness to work together, such as the logo contest, the building memory, the electronic board game, the recipe book, the creation of the showcase, the school homepage, the implementation and evaluation of the surveys, etc. The students found the joint activities such as the international evening, the sports and dance activities, and the excursions to be community-building and 'bonding'. Many personal contacts have arisen from this, which have also led to private vacation visits and led to lasting friendships. Through English as the project language, the students improved their expressiveness, grammar and vocabulary. It was great to observe how even language-shy students communicated in English as a matter of course in the course of the meetings. Overall, we could all observe that it was a great opportunity for the students to discover and show their strengths and talents in this project, which are often not called upon in everyday school life. Our courage, despite our extreme insecurity, whether to carry out the project during Corona was rewarded by so many shared and still bonding experiences and great products.