Healthy Life is a project made by teachers from the Netherlands, Turkey, Spain and Italy and is based on these four main aims: increasing awareness about healthy living, promoting healthy eating, promoting exercise for physical and mental health and increasing awareness on aspects of mental health and ways to improve mental health. The WHO researched that in 2016, globally, over one in six adolescents aged 10–19 years was overweight. Only 1 in 5 adolescents are estimated to meet the required 60 minutes of psychical exercise per day. According to the WHO depression is one of the leading causes of illness and disability among adolescents, and suicide is the second leading cause of death in adolescents. As teachers we can see the significant changes in the health of our pupils. Eating habits are heavily influenced by today's popular fastfood culture, at the same time we see that the pupils motivation for physical activities is decreasing. Furthermore we see an increasing demand to help our pupils to prevent and/or cope with psychological stress, depression and anxiety. Promoting healthy behaviours during adolescence, and taking steps to better protect young people from health risks are critical for the development of our pupils and the prevention of health problems in adulthood. Getting youth aware of their health and getting them involved in aspects of healthy living is an important aspect in the development of our pupils. In our schools we encounter more and more problems with child obesity and mental health problems like anxiety and depression leading to early school leaving. Next to these objectives we want to promote social inclusion and the development of intercultural competences. Through an international project pupils get a chance to cooperate with peers from other European countries and different backgrounds and together explore each others culture and habits. These experiences help pupils to not only enhance linguistic skills but also acquire skills like self reflection, independence, self confidence and problemsolving skills. With the growing diversity of pupils we notice that social values and norms have to be mediated anew. To prevent early school leaving and to make sure ourpupils are prepared for our changing society it is very important to address cultural diversity and social inclusion. The project is not only relevant for our pupils but also for us as teachers. It will contribute to teachers’ professional development by acquiring various teaching methods of health education for both theoretical and practical skills but also organizational skills and establishing collaborations with companies and organizations in the region of the school. Within the project assignments and activities are planned based on promoting conscious consumption, researching the way fruits and vegetable are produced and the place of vegetables and fruits in healthy nutrition. We will be working together in international groups to cook international recipes using knowledge on healthy choices and gain a life skill for the future by making, tasting and experimenting with different recipes. Next to preparing the food they will be tasked with using food to create an aesthetic image, table preparation and, preparing and presenting information about eating manners. These activities will enhance intercultural competence and will benefit social inclusion by getting to know the cuisine and eating habits of each others country. A wide variety of psychical activities through PE lessons and taster classes for new sports and workshops to explore their interests and skills in the field of art and culture will be organised. On the topic of mental health we will organise special trainings like breathing and yoga, lectures, workshops to reflect on the social aspects of health and the role that schools can play in this. Teachers will design and use of Fit Teacher Cards to be used during coffee breaks and teacher meetings in the school, to increase awareness on healthy living for teachers. The prospected results of the project are: awareness campaigns and information material created by the pupils, designed Fit Teachers Cards to be used by teachers in the schools, developed assignments for teaching health education. The results of the project will be summarized in a Healthy living handbook that will help teachers with teaching about health. We have planned 5 LTTA's, starting with a Short-term joint staff training. We will explore the topic Healthy Life trough workshops about food, excercise and mental health. We will orientate on assignments, work on creating the Fit Teacher Cards and design a way to test pupils general knowledge and attitude before and after the project. All 4 countries host a LTTA. We have designed a basic framework for all planned exchanges with pupils. LTTA's will include social activities, cultural activities and thematic activities. Each country has chosen a specific thematic focus for their LTTA.
Healthy Life was a project made by teachers from the Netherlands, Turkey, Spain and Italy and was based on these four main aims: increasing awareness about healthy living, promoting healthy eating, promoting exercise for physical and mental health and increasing awareness on aspects of mental health and ways to improve mental health. The WHO researched that in 2016, globally, over one in six adolescents aged 10–19 years was overweight. Only 1 in 5 adolescents are estimated to meet the required 60 minutes of psychical exercise per day. According to the WHO depression is one of the leading causes of illness and disability among adolescents, and suicide is the second leading cause of death in adolescents. Since then we all heard and read the news and social media posts that the situation hasn't improved and even worsend in the last years. The Covid-19 pandemic took its toll on both the physical and mental health of our adolescents. As teachers we saw the significant changes in the health of our pupils. Eating habits are heavily influenced by today's popular fastfood culture, at the same time we still see that the pupils motivation for physical activities is decreasing. Furthermore we saw an increasing demand to help our pupils to prevent and/or cope with psychological stress, depression and anxiety. Promoting healthy behaviours during adolescence, and taking steps to better protect young people from health risks are critical for the development of our pupils and the prevention of health problems in adulthood. Getting youth aware of their health and getting them involved in aspects of healthy living is an important aspect in the development of our pupils. In our schools we encountered more and more problems with child obesity and mental health problems like anxiety and depression leading to early school leaving. Next to these objectives we wanted to promote social inclusion and the development of intercultural competences. Through an international project pupils got a chance to cooperate with peers from other European countries and different backgrounds and together explore each others culture and habits. These experiences helped pupils to not only enhance linguistic skills but also acquire skills like self reflection, independence, self confidence and problemsolving skills. With the growing diversity of pupils we noticed that social values and norms had to be mediated a new. To prevent early school leaving and to make sure our pupils are prepared for our changing society it was very important to address cultural diversity and social inclusion. The project was not only relevant for our students but also for us as teachers. It has contributed to teachers’ professional development by acquiring various teaching methods of health education for both theoretical and practical skills but also organizational skills and establishing collaborations with companies and organizations in the region of the school. The project assignments and activities were planned based on promoting all the different aspects of healthy living. All of these subjects were treated during four LTTA's. Students stayed in host families were they got to cook and eat new kinds of foods. They learned new healthy eating habits from different cultures and their taste palet grew. Also a wide variety of psychical activities through PE lessons and taster classes for new sports and workshops to explore their interests and skills in the field of art and culture were organised. On the topic of mental health we decided to include them within the phyiscal excersis, because these go well together. And students were more open to the combination. During the teacher meeting we also focused on the role the school can play in both the physical and the mental well being of students. Teachers and students designed Fit Teacher Cards to be used during coffee breaks and teacher meetings in the school, to increase awareness on healthy living for teachers. The reactions from the school staff and teachers to the Fit Cards were very positive. We had orginally planned to develop teaching methods and to combine those in a Handbook for Healthy living, with the purpose of helping other teachers educate their students about Healthy living. Unfortunately due to the Covid-19 pandemic we had to change our timeline multiple times and were unable to travel for a long period of time. We continued the project online and focused on giving the students digital international experiences. After the travel restrictions were lifted we had to prioritise because of the limited time that was left in the project. We made organizing the LTTA's for the students our top priority, therefor we didn't develop as much material as we wanted. But we did manage to create a padlet with tips and experiences from the teachers. For us, the most important thing was that we succeeded in giving the students the chance to go abroad and to grow in ways only these kinds of projects can achieve.