The ENDING consortium brought together five organisations from three European Member States to jointly develop, test and implement a peer-to-peer learning methodology to prevent ICT abuse and reduce early school leaving. ENDING started from the idea that the use of digital devices by teenagers is a factor that aggravates the likelihood of early school leaving among the most exposed teenagers. In this sense, the first challenge was to design a methodology in which young people would be the protagonists, but without forgetting the other two parties involved: teachers, i.e. schools, and families. The partners were involved in the development of an innovative educational tool that would serve the school community as an instrument to promote the good use of ICTs by identifying relevant information sources appropriate to the age of the children and, at the same time, promote positive peer-to-peer relationships. Furthermore, the results of the documentation should encourage critical thinking, raise awareness of risks and promote respect for others. Thus, the design of the methodology was oriented towards the active participation of adolescents. One of the objectives was to target the population with fewer resources and at risk of social exclusion, since in these areas the role that activities in schools can play takes on greater importance. Activities The activities developed during the project were: - Exchange of good practices and experiences between partners. - Adaptation of materials - Development of the Guide - Internal training of trainers - Workshops (teachers, families and students) - Evaluation and validation (ex-ante and ex-post questionnaires) - Adaptation of contents - Translation, revision and production of the guides The methodology developed was tested in four schools (two Portuguese and two Spanish) that joined the consortium as associated partners. The project produced the following intellectual outputs: o IO1: Design and development of a methodological E-Guide for educators (ENG - ESP - POR - GER). o IO2: Design and development of E-Guide for parents, (ENG - ESP - POR) o IO3: Design and development of E-Guide for students (with contents elaborated by the students themselves) (ENG - ESP - POR). Results o 81 teachers (Portuguese and Spanish) participated in the project. o 25 parents participated in the workshops for families held in the four schools. o More than 182 pupils aged between 11 and 14 years old participated in ENDING activities. o 33 pupils between the four schools participated as student trainers or "rolending". Five multiplier events were also organised, involving 159 participants in person and 174 in digital format. The results of the project are available as Open Educational Resources and are freely accessible through the website www.endingproject.eu.
The main objective of this project is to contribute to the decrease and prevention of early school leaving. For this purpose, we considered it necessary to develop an innovative and up-to-date methodology that could be easily implemented by schools in an autonomous way. Further more, the objetives we wanted to achieve have been: • Prevent children exposure to disturbing or potentially harmful content • Reduce ESL improving the school environment • Design and implement a peer-to-peer methods that promote network security and digital well-being • Develop attractive and interactive, yet simple and practical, educational contents • Train the educational community on network security and digital well-being and encourage critical thinking • Improve professional skills in teaching, reducing conflict in classrooms • Promote positive interpersonal relations & cooperative learning.
Whilst the Internet offers abundant opportunities for education, networking and communication as an information superhighway, it can also manifest risks, particularly regarding vulnerable populations such as children and adolescents. The Internet and ICTs have heightened the potential impact of existing forms of threats and risks. These include, among others:• Children’s exposure to potentially harmful content on websites and online forums and blogs;• Proliferation of child sexual abuse images and materials, increased levels of harm for the victims and increased levels of profits for criminal enterprises;• Inappropriate contact with children and ‘grooming’ by unknown adults;• Cyberbullying, by means of email, online chat services, personal web pages, text messages and other forms of electronic content. The project addresses early school leaving, which it is still a major concern for countries like Spain (17,9%) or Portugal (11,8%) that are far from the 10% target set by the EU. The needs addressed were: - To contribute to the training of teachers - To give students the opportunity to contribute their experience. - Contextualise the risks and dangers of connected digital technologies in a multi-thematic and positive environment.