The project "Controverse" aimed at improving the competences of adult educators as the direct target group of the project, i.e. lecturers, teachers, social pedagogues as professionals in different measures of adult education. They were to be encouraged to take up and deal with situations in which black-and-white thinking and entrenched pigeonhole thinking can be observed among so-called low-skilled or educationally disadvantaged learners in a way that is appropriate to the situation and effective for learning, and to be equipped with correspondingly innovative theoretical-conceptual and - above all - practically applicable methods and instruments.
Professionals in adult education, whether in general or vocational further education practice, increasingly come into situations where polarised positions on political, social or personal events trigger massive disturbances and negatively influence the group dynamics in such a way that a simple return to the actual learning topic is not possible. The aim is to develop a concept with practical approaches that make it possible to experience linguistic or non-verbal exchange with opinions and positions other than one's own, with the aim of changing consciousness towards more acceptance of being different, accepting and, if necessary, letting go of other opinions or even of other positions. The project aims to contribute to an integrated basic political education that is based on the life worlds of the participants, follows the concept of situated learning (learning on authentic occasions and situations in everyday course life) and uses experience-oriented methods to realise linguistic and non-verbal forms of dealing with different opinions.