The purpose of our project “High5” is to motivate students for a lifelong learning and thus tackling early school leaving and disadvantages. We will work with environment and climate goals and promote a comprehensive approach to language teaching and learning. We will do this by systematically using CL learning and various ICT-tools combined with crafts. We prevent exclusion through CL, which is based on cooperation. CL-learning make it easier for students with disadvantages. The choice of topic rests on the students' interest in sustainability issues. Participating countries have different experience of working with CL structure. Finland has good results in PISA surveys and uses CT in its daily teaching. Finland will be responsible for assisting other participants. Sweden has a teacher who is also an environmental and health protection inspector who will be extra help with environmental / climate & health goals. We have done a planning that is nearly followed by monthly activities. In addition, our mobilities, which all have links to the environment and health. Participating countries in the project are Sweden, Italy, Spain and Finland. The age of the students is 11-16 years. We have geographical distribution, cultural differences and social differences both within our own school and partly among participating schools. This gives us good conditions for exchange. We will use many different ICT tools as an effect of gifts, but as crafts of a more traditional nature. All participants are public bodies. In mobility, each country will send 10 students and 2 staff, ie venue country will welcome at least 36 people. In total there will be 144 mobilities. The schools will participate in activities related to the project, such as Erasmus Day. The project will be disseminated through parents, several different social media, local actors such as newspapers, authorities among others. We expect that we will get school-motivated students who become eager and socially secure and thus want to continue their studies. Students will feel involved in the EU and the societies in our different countries. They will see that we have more things common, than differences. Students will feel safe using another language in addition to their mother tongue, familiar with several ICT tools and gained a broader view of sustainability.
The purpose of the "High5" project is to motivate students for lifelong learning, address the issue of early school dropouts and disadvantages while promoting a holistic approach to language education and learning with a focus on environmental and climate goals. The project's goals have been achieved through carefully planned activities and collaboration among the participating countries, Sweden, Italy, Spain, and Finland. The project has engaged a large number of students, 334 in total, aged 11-16, as well as numerous teachers with various subject expertise and other school staff. To achieve the project's goals, we have worked based on cooperative learning (CL), a specific model of collaborative learning, where students from different countries have worked together in groups. This has promoted increased interaction, a heightened interest in each other's cultures, and improved language learning. In the project, students and teachers have also developed their ICT skills as various tools were used throughout the project. Working with crafts and creativity has also been one of the project's methods to reach the project goals. Through cooperative learning, crafts, and various ICT tools, we have overcome challenges, and students with different backgrounds and conditions have been successfully included and developed in the project. The project has included activities and lectures focusing on ecological, economic, and social sustainability. Students have gained practical knowledge on how to live more sustainably by reducing resource consumption and recycling materials. We visited various recycling stations, nature reserves, environmental projects, and created art and objects from recycled materials. During the final lesson in Sweden, the entire project's work on sustainability was summarized. The students demonstrated their broad knowledge, their ability to draw conclusions, see connections, present facts, and show how sustainability interacts from an economic, social, and environmental perspective. A success factor in the project has been the group's good communication and clear project structure. Monthly meetings were held to ensure that the project adhered to the schedule, and decisions were made collectively. Challenges that arose, such as Covid-19 and geopolitical conflicts, were effectively managed to ensure the project's safety and continuity. During Covid-19, teachers were forced to teach digitally and create materials adapted for digital teaching. This increased the teachers' professional knowledge in digitization and communication further. The project was open to students from various social backgrounds, and the opportunity to participate was irrespective of economic or social background, making it compensatory. The project engaged a large number of students and activities were adapted to meet the participants' various conditions. We ensured the students' safety through practical arrangements, parental consent, and risk assessments. Regular meetings and established communication channels offered support and security for the students. We have actively shared the project's results through various channels, such as school meetings, class councils, parent meetings, social media, local newspapers, TV stations, Erasmus corners in schools, Erasmus days, eTwinning, and the project's website. The website contains the project's final products, such as videos, lesson plans, images, and evaluations. The goal was to reach a broad and diverse audience, including individuals involved in education in various ways. Our goal has been to spread the project as widely as possible so that as many people as possible can benefit from the project and to inspire others to pursue future Erasmus projects and applications. The experiences and results of the project have provided our schools with the opportunity to use the project's results for long-term impact. This is done by integrating environmentally friendly methods into everyday work routines, working based on cooperative learning in regular teaching, and expanding collaboration with local organizations and businesses for the benefit of students' understanding of sustainability locally and in European countries. During the project, we received positive feedback from teachers, students, parents, and other stakeholders. They emphasized the positive changes in attitudes, behaviors, and learning outcomes that they noticed. In the evaluations, students stated that they improved their English skills, learned more about other cultures, made new friends, increased their knowledge of sustainability, and gained increased self-confidence in social situations, enabling them to connect with students from other countries. The students who completed their basic education during the project all continued to higher education. This project has encouraged us all to continue with more Erasmus projects.