This project aims at an exchange of best practices between the two partner schools, Martino Martini in Mezzolombardo and IGS in Gottingen, on the basis of the didactic planning of meaningful and inclusive learning environments in the two school realities. AdA ("Innovative Learning Environments") is an integrated project in Martini's PTOF, inspired by a visit to exchange ideas and projects between teachers at the partner school in Germany five years ago. It aims at inclusion, thanks to the focus on active methodologies. Starting from a school project on technologies and their use among young people, the students were stimulated to spontaneous and unstructured reflections, through brainstorming and focus groups, on the use of technology from peers: smartphones and tablets above all. It successively gradually evolved into the creation of a questionnaire to be administered to all classes of first and second grade at the end of the year, passing through a focus on the topic, conducted by the students themselves as peer educators for the classmates and teachers who had enrolled to this specific laboratory during a school assembly in March 2017. In the years 2018/2019 and 2019/2020, Ada's focus, having taken on board the premises of the previous years, shifted to the creation of a CoP among teachers, led and coordinated by Iprase, Trentino educational research body. The community shared the need to integrate the non-cognitive skills emerging from the project with the skills assessed in curricular teaching. So the basis of this project are also technologies and the integration between formal, non-formal and informal activities in the school syllabus/curriculum. “Reality tasks” as concrete, real and challenging cultural products, play a relevant role in the present exchange project proposal. The theme to be developed was identified in environmental sustainability, at the center of the previous projects and research in both schools. At Martini, some students participated in COY, the «Conference of Youth» in 2017 and 2018 - in Bonn and Katowice; lastly, Martini participated in January 2020 in the "Agenda 2030" promoted by the Province of Trento to identify a territorial strategy to assess the state of the art of sustainability in Trentino and implement it through "anticipatory" exercises of the future. Mutatis mutandis, similar activities will be carried out in the partner school as the exchange will focus on the presentation of the respective in-depth and reflection works. The teachers will discuss the methodological aspects, mainly collaborative and inclusive, as already mentioned. Teachers and students will be able to use eTwinning and the GSuite for Education platforms to develop and share ideas and best practices. The teachers involved will be invited to register, if they have not done so already (the community language teachers already have), to the eTwinning platform so that they can make the most out of the countless online update opportunities offered through webinars, virtual teacher rooms, blogs and forums dedicated to the world of school in a European perspective for their professional development, as well as keep in touch with each other and with colleagues from different countries. In addition to the websites of the two partner institutions, the works produced and the final conclusions /report will be published on these platforms. ClassRoom will be used for the creation of a virtual classroom for students and teachers. The participants will be students and teachers of the first grade class (2020) and the next first grade class (2021) of our four year-high course with a focus on applied sciences, which is the front line of our institute in terms of innovation. As far as Germany is concerned, the participants will be from different groups of students with Italian as an optional school subject. Great attention, in addition to sustainability, learning spaces and the exchange between teachers on methodologies, will be given to inclusion, since in a cooperative-learning context everybody feels more entitled to express his/her own opinions and ideas and support one another without the constraints of a standard to conform to.
The project was part of a multi-year exchange experience between two partner schools, the "Martino Martini" of Mezzolombardo and the IGS of Göttingen. Sixty-eight students took part to the project (thirty-eight Italians from the first and second classes of the 4-year high school with a focus on Applied Sciences, where German is a compulsory subject, and thirty Germans from the 11th and 12th classes, who have chosen Italian as an optional subject), seven teachers (five italian teachers and two german ones) and two external experts (Welcome Project and Environmental Sustainability Project). Sharing the project with the class teachers has been fundamental as some teachers were actively involved in welcoming students and guest teachers during their classes. Unfortunately, the project was strongly affected by the Coronavirus pandemic; therefore both schools asked for an extension to be able to carry out the activities thought out in the planning phase. The main objectives of the project were the exchange of best practices, the development of significant and inclusive learning spaces and of task-based reality activities together with the in-depth study of environmental sustainability. In the school year 2020-2021, we were not able to carry out our physical mobility due to Covid 19; virtual activities were proposed on platforms like eTwinning and Zoom instead so that students could get to know one another. The Martino Martini also involved students in the Welcome Project in collaboration with the social cooperative Kaleidoscopio; the students learned new working strategies (focus groups, metaplan, group work by cluster, word café) which they used to organize meaningful and inclusive activities during the school exchange. The four exchanges took place in October 2021 in Mezzolombardo, in June 2022 in Göttingen, in April 2023 in Mezzolombardo and again in June 2023 in Göttingen. Students were involved both in the preparatory phase and in the implementation of the activities and products as well as in the re-elaboration, evaluation and dissemination phases of the project. The students stayed with host families -except in October 2021 due to constraints related to the Covid related- green pass policy. The program included educational and cultural activities and outdoor trips with a focus on environmental sustainability and on social and communication activities. Students had the opportunity to follow lessons with their peers, experimenting with different teaching methodologies and school routines and to reinforce their language skills (language course). The students were given real-life tasks related to the project and to environmental sustainability. In September 2021 various activities were carried out: an event was organized on the Vaia Storm with the intervention of a forestry technician, the planting of some trees in Val di Fiemme, the participation of the class to the Loacker Project with the creation of a board game on sustainability, which ended with a visit to an eco-sustainable dairy farm in Val di Sole. The topic was explored during school hours as well as on excursions. All materials have been shared on Drive. Throughout the mobility program, teachers and students got to know people from other countries, came across different teaching and working methods, different school routines and school spaces, discussed and shared thoughts about the strengths and weaknesses of each school system and on their adaptability to different contexts; they deepened their linguistic, communication and technological skills and their environmental knowledge. Students have created numerous activities and materials, such as the activities for the welcome day and other moments of the school exchange, an article for an environmental blog, posters, videos, narratives, multimedia presentations for the dissemination event, a game board for the Loacker competition and a website, thus providing the school with tools and resources that could be used for school assemblies, Open Days, community events, future Erasmus+ projects so as to raise awareness about the importance of international-wide experiences and environmental sustainability. The two schools involved in the partnership intend to continue the exchange project by involving in an even more active way the school commision in charge of sustainability projects (Environment Commission at Martini - AG Umwelt in Göttingen) by incorporating the school exchanges into the ECC planning and by exploring the theme of school participation in the two institutions.