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Learning Through Art

2020-1-DE04-KA105-0194052020Youth mobilityfinalized
Countries: DE|HU|LU|TR|CZ|EE · Grant: €19,721
New innovative curricula/educational methods/development of training coursesYouth (Participation, Youth Work, Youth Policy)Creativity and culture

Objectives

The “Learning Through Art” (LTA) project took place in Antalya, Turkey, from February 17th to 25th 2022. It was a unique type of the training course (TC) that gave an opportunity for people who worked with youth, learning settings to explore the power of art as an educational tool or artistic learning settings in order to bring innovation to their youth work (YW) and be more effective in empowering young people. With this unique experimental seminar, we intended to exchange and explore fresh ideas and innovative practices and tools for YW. Consciousness of LTA usually opened new "channels" and “connections” in learners, generating new feelings, thoughts and helping people to become more open, self-aware, spiritual, creative and to realize their full potential. We projected and received through art a lot of information that can be useful for learning. Besides, activities that involved constituents of art could attract young people that were not appealed by “traditional” learning methods. So, for our organizations to be able to provide better learning opportunities for our youngsters and include young people that were “left out” we needed to add dimensions of LTA. This TC responded to our partners’ need for revising our YW methodologies and looked for innovations. With this project, we discovered experiences and good practices from another field – the arts – and exploring how to apply it to work with young people. From our experience with cooperating with experts from the artistic field, we discovered that we shared similar values and approaches. During the last decades, LTA was focusing on the connection between body, mind, spirit and emotions (holistic approach). It was an approach to teaching and learning — not a technique or set of methods. It was therefore shaped by each individual teacher in light of his or her own interests as well as in response to the needs and interests of one's students. AIM The general aim of this project was to contribute to the improvement of the quality of YW by developing competencies of people that worked with youth (teachers, youth workers, youth leaders, trainers, educators that worked with young people outside formal education settings) to apply LTA as a tool and approach in the formal as well as in non-formal settings. Based on a experimental learning approach, this training had the following five objectives that were closely related to each other: 1. Practical part: Experiencing a series of exercises with different constituents of the arts, discovering own approach to teaching and learning, becoming more self-aware and developing a creative way of expression and developing the personal motivation to use LTA approach. 2. Analyzing the experience: Becoming more aware of the power of LTA for promoting holistic development – learning from one's own emotions and also discovering it from a theoretical point of view. 3. Conceptualizing: Exploring opportunities for including art as an approach and/or a tool in youth work and discovering what competencies it could develop in young people. 4. Developing skills in designing, music, filming and implementing learning activities for/with youth that would be based on consciously chosen learning elements of art that develop concrete competences. 5. Sharing experience from the training course and developing ideas on follow-up activities on using learning elements of art in youth work in local and international projects.

Project partners (6)