The human mind evolved with stories, and it is shaped by them. Good storytelling can motivate people to do incredible things and it is a tremendous advantage in developing various skills. Education and learning are no exception. Creating and sharing stories is an innate gift for all of us. Storytelling can open new perspectives and influence attitude and behaviours. At the same time, creating stories can be a healing process as creators observe and reflect on themselves, emotions, processes around and other people. The NGOs part of this project encounter issues in their work with vulnerable adults in terms of art, culture, and creativity. An internal needs assessment revealed that the partners' adult educators need new skills and methods to be used to promote the social inclusion of the vulnerable groups they work with and in developing their key competences. Under this vision, the consortium organisation has worked to give a new methodology for adults educator to improve values/skills using stories. The project aimed at improving the competences of adult educators and experts in the field. The pandemic situation we have experienced in the last few years made us realise that adult education providers must be equipped with innovative methods to apply arts as a tool to support the social change and creating resilient communities. One of the still unseen aspects of the pandemic and uncertain times we have lived in are the psychological barriers and social crisis affecting people's development and their normal behaviours, affecting communities and societies. Art and culture have the power to change behaviours and promote social inclusion. Within this project we wanted to specifically use the power of the stories – narration in the arts as a tool to reach the objectives we set. The main objective achieved was to bring together organisations working with adults with fewer opportunities and social inclusion processes to develop their capacity to create transformative and sustainable learning environments through the use of Storytelling. The other main objectives that have been achieved are the following: -The promotion of social inclusion and empowerment of the vulnerable groups of adults and the development of key life management skills, competences and values such as goals setting, problem solving, reframing and creativity, creative thinking, and self-esteem. -The ignition of adults' creativity and innovation, which allowed them to find innovative solutions to deal with uncertainty and challenging situations. -Partner organisations were allowed to use the storytelling method to promote the social inclusion of adults from vulnerable groups. -A number of solutions and approaches have been identified to address the development of adults' creative skills and build their resilience using storytelling as an educational method. -There was an awareness of the importance of cultural education activities in times of pandemic and the development of adults' capacity for innovation as a response to difficult situations. -Educational activities were developed and tested to promote creativity, innovation, and the development of personal and social skills and to engage adults in developing innovative solutions to the challenges they face. In addition to these objectives, some important results were also realised during the project. They are divided into two intellectual outputs. In the first one, we have designed the e-toolkit with methodology to work with stories. Second step, there was a compilation of 57 stories, which has been collected in an e-book, these stories were proposed by the partners, after that, all stories were analyzed to link the stories to a the five skills/competences values choosen usin a template designed by all partners. Out of these 57 stories, we have selected 16 stories and we have created an e-book, with the methodology to be used by Adult educators. The e-book , the final result of the project was created: a handbook (translated into all consortium languages), which contains all the stories selected and then analysed by each partner member of the project. For each value and competence there is a part of theoretical analysis and a part of practical analysis.
We wanted to demonstrate exactly the power of Stories through Creativity Art and culture have the power to change behaviour and promote social inclusion. Within this project, we specifically wanted to use the power of stories - field of arts storytelling as a tool to: - Promoting social inclusion and empowerment of vulnerable groups of adults, while developing key life management skills such as goal setting, problem solving, reframing and creativity, creative thinking, self-esteem and self-confidence - Ignite adult creativity and innovation and thus empower adults to come up with innovative solutions to deal with uncertainty and difficult situations. The situation created by Covid19 requires, in our view, that adult education institutions consider innovative ways of applying culture as a tool to support social change and build resilient communities. The main objective of the project was to create transformative and sustainable learning environments using the transformative power of stories in all of us.
The objective of applying for this project came from the need to find an easy and attractive methodology to work on values with vulnerable adults. Creating and sharing stories is an innate gift in all of us. At the same time, storytelling can be a healing process. We believed that one of the yet unseen aspects of the pandemic and the uncertain times we are living in are the psychological barriers and the social crisis affecting people's development and normal behaviours and that need is for the entire EU as a whole. The needs addressed have been: - Allow partner organisations to use the storytelling method to promote the social inclusion of adults - Identify a set of solutions to address the development of adults' creative capacity and increase their resilience - Raise awareness of the importance of cultural educational activities. - Develop and test educational activities that can promote creativity, innovation and the development of personal and social skills and involve adults in developing innovative solutions to the challenges they face.