*Επισκεφτείτε τη συγκεκριμένη σελίδα από υπολογιστή ή laptop για να δείτε αναλυτικά τα Ευρωπαϊκά Προγράμματα του σχολείου
Projects list
SiLab (2019-2021)
Schools Innovation Labs
 |  | |  |  |  |  | |
Synopsis
Outcomes
-
SiLab project aims at developing some of the most valued skills in the labour market such as innovation, creative thinking and digital skills. This will be achieved though the implementation of the concept of i-lab to school environment; the creation of i-labs at schools and the development of teachers’ capacity to integrate innovation in daily school practice.
An i-lab (innovation laboratory), a concept pretty popular in big companies, is an inspirational innovative facility designed to transport users from their everyday environments into an extraordinary space encouraging creative and innovative thinking as well as collaborative work towards problem solving through a mix of on-purpose environment, technology and facilitation techniques. The strength of the i-Lab is its proven and unique approach to innovative and creative thinking, which lends itself to a wide variety of applications.
During the project our students will have the opportunity to visit the partner schools in Portugal and Croatia, where they will discuss with their peers about their ideas and their progress on the project. The i-Lab will be designed and created by the students, who must think innovatively and out of the box in order to develop such a place. It is estimated that the i-Lab will be ready by the end of 2020.
-
Apart from the i-Lab that will be created in the school, this project will create an on-line software application to be used in the i-Lab and when ready, in the i-Lab will take place some pilot sessions in order to evaluate the project products and introduce the rest of the students the idea of i-Lab.
Eurovoters (2019-2021)
Empowering critical young voters for a Europe of sustainable development and equality
 | | |  |  |  |  | |
Synopsis
Outcomes
-
The objective of this project is to empower youth to act as agents of change for building a Europe of sustainable development and equality by enhancing their critical-voting literacy that includes: (a) media and news literacy; (b) socio-emotional literacy, and (c) social-justice literacy. To do so, this project draws upon the strategies of critical literacy and experiential learning, by using new technologies, and innovative methodologies, such as collaborative role play and simulations, problem-based learning, critical-incidents analysis, and virtual communities of learning and practice.
The project reinforces the development and implementation of successful initiatives in critical-voting education. It will contribute in counteracting the detrimental consequences of populism to the values that define us as Europeans, and mainly sustainable equality, respect for human rights and freedoms, tolerance, pluralism and non-discrimination. Finally, it will raise youth’s voices and active involvement in decision-making through innovative methodologies.
-
The main result of this project will be a methodological Toolkit of ‘Resources and Activities’ for enhancing education for critical-voting literacy, which will be developed according to a comparative analysis of both teachers’ and youth’s needs in the participating countries. This Toolkit will be tested through workshops carried out with teachers and youth aged 14-18. As the project also envisages the development of teachers’ and youth’s competences to work accordingly, a Teacher’s Handbook and a Youth’s Handbook will be produced. In the end of the project a transnational joint-staff training event will be carried out in Greece to train teachers to use the project outcomes.
Political Game Changers (2019-2021)
Young students as political game changers developing an easy-to-use model for secondary schools.
| |  |  | | |  | |
Synopsis
Outcomes
-
The European Commission calls for systematic initiatives to re-engage youth in politics – based on their own understanding and voices. This project addresses the urgent challenge of young students increasing disengagement in politics.
“Political Game Changers” invite students to co-create attractive and practically useful guidance to secondary schools on how to prevent disinterest and foster engagement in politics, democracy and values. The guidance will be developed through real-life/time open schooling and will be based on practical experience.
-
To achieve its goals this project takes into account three different methodologies, the didactic, the co-creation and the subjective engagement. A school guide to engagement of young students in politics and democracy, including virtual scenarios along with a study of the reasons for the lack of interest in politics and democracy among the young generations will be created. Also, the student teams will create a video movie explaining their engagement in the politics detective missions and how they along the project developed an alternative understanding of and language for politics, democracy and EU values.
Take Action (2020-2022)
Citizenship education for an inclusive and sustainable future
| | | | | | | |
Synopsis
Outcomes
-
“Leaving no one behind” is the central aspiration that underlines the 2030 Sustainable Development Agenda. To achieve an inclusive society it is necessary to take into account the need of a sustainable approach to our development. In this scenario, not only youth are recognized by the 2030 agenda as “critical agents of change”, but they possess the energy, creativity and motivation to challenge current unsustainable models and envision new approaches and new sustainable solutions.
The “TAKE ACTION” project aims to increase social and civic competences of European youth by transferring and adapting an effective teaching methodology, the “Action Civics” curriculum, and improving the capabilities of teaching institutions in providing their students with tools and knowledge to foster their active participation in the society.
-
Our school together with the other two involved high school will test the curriculum and assess the impact both on teachers and students. An e-learning course targeted to teachers will be developed to allow the transferability of the curriculum and will be freely available to be implemented, updated and share. The pilot implementation and the evaluation activities planned in the project will be aimed at producing a report which will include detailed data on the impact of the curriculum on the involved students and recommendations for policy-makers, public institutions and authorities.
ACTIvE (2019-2022)
Job Coach, Supporting school students with Autism Spectrum Disorder to acquire independency
| | |  | | | | |
Synopsis
Outcomes
-
Our school is actively involved in many projects from all the spectrum of education. Such a project is the “ACTIvE”, which aims to promote social inclusion starting with school education through a holistic approach.
Through this project, Platon is cooperating with educational institutions from Europe in order to support special education. More specifically, ACTIvE aims to provide educators working in school contexts with innovative Continuous Professional Development opportunities to deal with ASD students. It is a project that promotes social inclusion through talent development and creates synergies at local and European level to develop innovative practices for inclusive Europe with a bottom-up approach.
ACTIvE, directly and indirectly, affects many people. Apart from educators working in school context that have an opportunity to enhance their competences in relation to autism this project benefits the students, their families and the local communities in general.
-
By the end of the project, a “curriculum to become JOB COACH” will have been developed, tailor made on the training needs of educators and psychologists working in a school context with ASD students (age 15-18). The other main result of the project will be the development of a new online learning environment, enriched with training materials for educators, a collaborative space for the users (namely, the community of practice) and an Info Desk, which will serve as a contact point among platform users and project partners.
Euriversity (2019-2022)
European action against discrimination: educational inclusion from the perspective of equality and emotional-sexual diversity
| | | |  | | | |
Synopsis
Outcomes
-
Discrimination against group of people because of their gender or their sexual orientation is a major problem that still exists in Europe according to research conducted in 2018.
There is clearly much room for improvement regarding gender and affective-sexual diversity and this project aims to offer an integral response. The main objective is to raise the levels of awareness of this subject and reducing those of discrimination and conflict due to gender or affective-sexual orientation.
There is a comprehensive action plan divided in phases throughout the 3 years of the project where all the research and results will be collected and analyzed. The next stage is the dissemination of the results that will provide the local educational communities and authorities with a solid plan on dealing with these issues. The ultimate goal of the project is to establish a “European Network of Discrimination-Free Schools” starting from inside the partnership of schools and organizations that work on this project.
-
It is to be hoped that the ultimate benefit will be an improvement in the levels of discrimination, conflict and bullying within schools as well as a greater awareness of gender diversity and affective sexual orientation. Similarly, we hope to spread inclusive values and improve the way in which those schools committed to the promotion of democratic values and an active and efficient citizenship approach diversity management
Play2Learn (2019-2021)
Reviving hands on educational play for learning skills of tomorrow
 | | | |  | | | |
Synopsis
Outcomes
-
Play2Learn has as primary objective to produce approaches and tools to help teachers encourage kids to engage with programming and develop STEM related skills. It aims to achieve this not by increasing screen time but by encouraging hands on play through the creation of use of a do-it-yourself computer kit which bridges the online and offline worlds through Minecraft Pi games and Scratch/Python programmes which interact with electronics circuits.
Our partners are one more school, two ICT training centres, a network for the promotion of ICT-enabled E&T, a company offering bespoke software development services to governmental agencies and a company specialising in corporate training solutions and knowledge dissemination as well as several associate partners from the area of ICT-enabled E&T and schools.
-
This consortium will produce the results of the project which include the Play2Learn Kit comprising a do-it-yourself computer, peripherals and electronic circuits to be used with provided educational content, animated videos introducing the Play2Learn kit and its uses, educational content covering Minecraft Pi, Scratch, Physical computing, an educators guide including lesson plans, Learning Motivation Environment in all project languages delivering the Play2Learn content in the form of engaging online multimedia resources and the Play2Learn Academy virtual space with supporting infrastructure
These results will give teachers and trainers a complete package of elucidate findings regarding to ways of introducing children to programming and STEM through hands-on play. There will be created evidence-based policy and research recommendations for the use of educational play for teaching coding and STEM related subjects. Play2Learn is hoped to act as node of knowledge dissemination on how to engage children with programming and STEM and provide strategies for the adoption of educational hands-on play in the classroom
Capacity Building for Preschools (2019-2021)
|  | | | | | | |
Synopsis
This is a project for preschool education that aims in capacity building of administrators and teachers of pre-/schools in several topics such as the EU projects; ECEC Framework; saving and support traditions in pre-primary level of education; social inclusion of children with disabilities and disadvantage background.
The project includes Transnational Peer Learning Workshop, activities including children presenting and promoting their own country cultural heritage, educational part with internal and external experts and more. All of these activities target in increasing the capacity of preschool staff that lead to general improvement of current ECEC process, rise children involvement in saving and promotion of their own cultural heritage, strengthening intercultural understanding, deeper understanding by parents of their role in upbringing, care and education of children, reinforcement of local public rhetoric about necessity of high quality ECEC system appropriated to EU framework and recommendations, close collaboration between participating organization, improvement of partnership relations.
Young Europeans (2019-2021)
| | | | | | | |
Synopsis
Outcomes
-
This project addresses the urgent challenge of young Europeans’ increasing disengagement in politics. The project asks: how can open schooling in secondary schools contribute to engaging young people in politics, democracy and European values? Co-driven by young students themselves, the project will create innovative open schooling guidelines to secondary schools on how to organise engagement in political initiatives.
Young Europeans invites secondary students to co-create attractive and practically useful guidance to secondary schools on how to prevent disinterest, and foster engagement in politics, democracy and EU values. The guidance will be developed through a real-life project worked by our students and real-time open schooling and will therefore be based on practical experience of our students, not on theoretical assumptions. The students are asked to act as policy detectives on a problem they discover in their society and develop their ideas on how it should be faced through politics. During the project, our students will visit our partner schools in Vilafant, Spain, in Pasvalys, Lithuania and there will be a big student mobility in Poland, where the students will have the opportunity to discuss and share their thoughts on the project with theirs peers from other countries.
-
Based on students work this project will produce some results such as the guidebook, which is a radical school guide to engagement of young students in politics and democracy, including virtual scenarios. There will be also a study by the university partners of the project on the lack of interest in politics and democracy among young people. Another outcome will be the video movie in which student teams explain their engagement in the politics detective missions and how they, during the project, developed an alternative understanding of and language for politics, democracy and EU values. Finally, a policy paper of a reflection, based on project activities, on why Europe and the European Project are losing young people’s interest will be created.
Critical Science Detectives (2019-2022)
A new easy-to-integrate way to engage young students in science in secondary school based on the European Commission’s open science schooling guidelines
 | | | |  | | | |
Synopsis
Outcomes
-
This project belongs in a category of projects in which our school participates actively in the last years, the Open Schooling projects. The idea of open science schooling approaches is more practically implementable for schools and science teachers in secondary schools.
One of the major components in science learning innovation was: to be attractive to 21st century students, science and science learning should recover and rediscover the links to narrative and make efforts to communicate the learning in narrative forms. These links to narrative forms includes for example: adventure, science fiction, exploration, detective work, curiosity – and the ability to take action in such narrative worlds: narrative and epic agency.
The concept of this project is to integrate these narratives in the Commission’s learning policies such as “science with and for society” and “responsible science”, but also to integrate sharing the science engagement with the students’ families and with other citizens.
-
The results that will be produced based on the students’ work include a guidance collection for secondary schools and their science teachers on how to easily integrate the critical science detectives method in the science curricula, a joint video movie from all the students participating in the project explain how they changed their negative attitudes towards science through the critical science missions, a theoretical paper discussing state of the art of Open Science Schooling from the point of view of lessons learned in the Critical Science Detectives project and a policy paper trying to identify the key challenges to science learning innovation, based on positive and negative experience from the Critical Science Detectives project.
Family-based Open Science Schooling (2019-2022)
Capacity and guidance building in secondary schools for involving young students’ families in open science schooling activities to foster responsible science education
| | | | | | | |
Synopsis
Outcomes
-
European Commission and the OECD as well as leading research communities agree that one of the biggest challenges to 21st century education is to engage and re-engage young student along their teenage years in science learning. Family-based OSS is a project which addresses the need to boost the interest in and retention of students in STEAM subjects.
One powerful way to practice to (re)engage young students in science learning connected to society demands is to include families and community in open real-life activities, engaging students and their families in science in the local and virtual communities. Families, especially parents, have a crucial role at influencing students’ engagement towards science learning.
This project has 3 main objectives: 1) Encouraging families to become real partners in school life and activities through participatory design; 2) Co-creating ’science everywhere’ activities alongside teachers, students and families to support responsible science education; 3) Supporting the deployment of immersive Joint Science Missions involving the community as a whole so that schools become agents of community well-being.
-
All project elements are directed towards producing such practically useful and attractive guidance to secondary schools and science teachers through participatory design with schools and families. The success of such initiatives is totally depending on the quality of the capacity building and empowerment of science teachers, schools and the surrounding school communities.
The project will yield 4 product outcomes including the School Guide to Family-Based Open Science Schooling, a students’ video on how they developed new images and engagement to science, a study analysis on how family based open science schooling helps (re)engage young students in science, and policy recommendation on challenges to open science schooling innovation and re-thinking science education.
Diversamente coding (2018-2020)
Coding for improving the social inclusion
| | | | |  | | |
Synopsis
Outcomes
-
The project aims to develop a training course on “Diverse coding”, enabling people with specific disabilities: Adults (Age 18-60 years) with hearing disorders to increase their digital skills and programming, with a methodology that applies European recommendations to validate non-formal and informal learning to facilitate recognition and transfer of results.
The coding offers students with learning disabilities “real-world skills”, some industry experts said, “transforms them into digital culture producers”. It also interests them and makes them more available and “inclined to socialize”, building the important skills of group work and socialization, often lacking in the disabled student population of learning. -
The project aims to develop an innovative coding training program for learners with disabilities, particularly deaf people who naturally tend to have ease in coding as they are doing it every day with lip reading and decoding and deciphering every noise and sound with the aim of encouraging the development of their special digital skills for adults and, in turn, their transversal skills, in particular problem solving.
“Diversamente coding” also aims at transparency and recognition of skills and qualifications; application of the European recommendations to validate non-formal and informal learning for experts in diversily coding with the improvement of their digital skills and programming in an informal and formal learning environment. Another goal is to increase skills in vocational training and adults, helping to improve support for adults with disabilities across the full spectrum of their digital skills, by intervening in improving social inclusion, as stated in the Europe 2020 objectives and implement the European recommendations methodology to validate non-formal and informal learning for adult education in the fields of social assistance.
Eurochange (2018-2020)
Children inspiring children to become agents of change for a child-friendly multicultural Europe
| | | | | | | |
Synopsis
Outcomes
-
The main objective of this project is to empower children to act as agents of change for building a child-friendly Europe in the sense that is socially-inclusive by celebrating and cherishing the diversity of our cultural heritage. To do so, it encompasses the children-inspiring-children approach, while using new technologies, and innovative and creative methodologies, such as collaborative art-making, intercultural online pedagogy, and collaborative story-telling and poetry. Another important objective of this project is to promote children’s and teachers’ training to enhance their competences in becoming the facilitators of the children-inspiring-children approach so as to meet the first objective of the project.
The project aims to promote social inclusion by taking advantage of the potential that cultural heritage gives us to celebrate and cherish our diversity. Raise children’s voices and active involvement in education through an innovative methodology drawing upon the children-inspiring-children approach.
-
The EUROCHANGE project will produce a methodological tool for the Children-inspiring-children approach according to a comparative analysis that will result from both teachers’ and children’s needs analyses in the participating countries, but also on the basis of the state-of-the art analysis in each participating country.
According to this methodological tool, the consortium will produce a Toolkit of Resources and Activities that will promote the objective of the project. This Toolkit will be tested through workshops carried out with teachers and children 9-12 and then finalized, localized and translated in the national languages. As the project also envisages the development of teachers’ and children’s competences to work accordingly, a Teacher’s Handbook and a Children’s Handbook will be also produce.
EGGS (2018-2021)
Empowering critical young voters for a Europe of sustainable development and equality
| | | | | | | |
Synopsis
Outcomes
-
EGGS project will develop a new game facilitated by a didactical approach designed specifically for children (11/15 years old) to be delivered by Serious game technology. The project is aimed at promoting entrepreneurial education and digital learning in lower secondary school in order to increase school engagement and prevent ESL (Early School Leaving).
This project addresses the EU2020 target of reducing the rates of early schools leavers below 10 %, which is currently challenged by the increasing migratory flows throughout Europe. In particular, the project will be focused on “Education and training 2020” (ET2020) challenges of: 1) Improving the quality and efficiency of education and training; 2) to promote equity, social cohesion and active citizenship; and 3) enhancing creativity and innovation, including entrepreneurship, at all levels of education and training.
The idea behind the project is to develop an entrepreneurial mind-set in lower secondary education school students to foster their capability to take action in the society as the future citizens of tomorrow society. The challenge is to move from entrepreneurship with a focus on business and new venues creation to a newer trend of entrepreneurship which focuses on enterprising mindset and behavior. Entrepreneurial education is an empowering method that enables students to take the future in their hands, by promoting learning by doing, self-efficacy, resilience and motivation. -
The main result of the project is the creation of the EGGS game, for which our school is in charge of, that will incorporate 3 innovative elements: The SROI, Social Return On Investment, MODEL, the game based learning contents, that includes food and packaging waste reduction learning materials and the game its self, that allows the students to learning by playing to make the planet a more sustainable system where waste is transformed again into a resource generating value. The calculation of the SROI will enable students to be aware about their social impact of their actions towards a circular economic system.
School of Tomorrow (2018-2021)
| | | | | | | |
Synopsis
Outcomes
-
The aim of the project is to create an inclusive school through integrated strategies for preventing early school leaving. A school where all kind of students, regardless of background, physical and/or psychological difficulties, social groups or similar, will be able to reach their educational goals. We need to equip our learners with skills and competences such as creative thinking, inquiry based learning, critical thinking and independent learning. In this project, different experts in the field of education have come together to create a toolbox of various approaches aimed at making learning more efficient and effective in today’s globalized environment.
Strategies for tackling early school leaving could be divided into three main categories; Prevention, Intervention and Compensation. In this project, the main focus will be on strategies and good practices connected to “Intervention” and especially School-wide strategies that address all pupils, but are beneficial to those at risk of dropping-out.
The project examines and exchanges good practices/methodologies that could support schools and other educational actors to tackle early school leaving and integrate this in different strategies. -
Different experts in the field of inclusive education form part of this project. There are academics and teachers coming from different areas and levels in the educational spectrum, working together with the sole aim of creating a toolbox consisting of good practices to share with the various stakeholders. The good practices shared involve topics such as philosophy for children, inclusive practices, digital storytelling and other collaborative and holistic approaches to teaching and learning. Such practices and methods were disseminated during partner meetings so far held in Sweden (November 2018), Hungary (April 2019) and Sicily (October 2019) and will continue to be disseminated in between meetings and during our final meeting to be held in Greece in May 2020.
Games for basic skills teaching (2018-2021)
| | | | |  | | |
Synopsis
Outcomes
-
In all partner countries, there are many workers with insufficient basic skills, which gives them less opportunities in their current job place and it also limits their career on the labor market. Also among adults already attending school the lack of basic skills limits their outcome of training and education. The project addresses two major challenges in this field:
Low skilled persons have difficulties to use traditional adult education and training where students work independently with texts and assignments. These people have reservations towards education, they have very little personal motivation and they tend to believe that attending education will lead to failure. Therefore, the project seeks to develop new ways of teaching basic skills that will be accessible and adequate for low skilled persons. New learning designs will be developed with the use of analogue and digital serious games, also called serious games.
-
The project consists of two intellectual outputs:
- A guidebook for teaching with serious games. With learning designs, study cases produced in the project and structured recommendations on how to implement new learning designs with serious games.
- An open online training course on teaching: “Changing the game”. As the project runs the course will be presented first as a real-time online course with synchronous participation, and then as an open e-learning resource for asynchronous participation.
Student Talent Bank (2017-2019)
 | | | |  | |  | |
Synopsis
Outcomes
-
School Talent Bank was a project aimed at promoting entrepreneurial education in secondary schools in order to prevent early school leaving, facilitate the transition from school to work and increase students’ engagement especially in those schools which register a high percentage of ethnic minority and foreign born students.
The project’s goal was to enrich school teachers with entrepreneurial competences and mind-set in order to foster school engagement and to inspire them to apply entrepreneurial methods across a variety of subjects.
A consortium of different types of organizations around Europe, including our school, gathering teachers, students, teachers’ networks, and other relevant shareholders, worked together for two years creating some very interesting results.
-
The two main results of this project were:
- The development of a training course to increase the entrepreneurial competences and mind-set of school teachers with a particular focus on Diversity and Talent management and Emotional Intelligences delivered through “learning snacks”.
- The Creation of a Student Talent Bank Platform which will host the “learning snacks”, a community of practice and a Student (Time) Talent Bank. Our school was in charge of developing this platform.
For more results and resources visit the Student Talent Bank website.
ANEMELO (2017-2019)
Augmented reality and NEw MEdia against onLine prOmotion of unhealthy foods
| | | | | | | |
Synopsis
Outcomes
-
The ANEMELO project objective was to initiate an attractive and innovative Augmented Reality-based didactic approach for children 11 – 16 years old in five (5) countries (UK, Cyprus, Greece, Italy, Poland) to be administered by teachers or social workers working with them. ANEMELO has produced an approach with the necessary tools to help those working with children reach out to them with a view to help them adopt a healthier lifestyle by identifying, understanding and repelling the messages behind online advertising disguised under games, social networks, cartoons, competitions, etc.
The game-based learning approach was used to help children develop an interest in and a deeper understanding of; (1) online advertising by enabling them to identify relevant techniques promoting junk food or participating in online activities of food manufacturing companies; (2) the origins of obesity; and (3) the healthier lifestyle options available to counteract against obesity.
-
The results of the project included an online repository (Reference List) populated with material to be considered (studies, papers, conferences, workshops, case studies, etc.) that can be used by teachers or parents who want to do some further research in this topic. Also, a comparative that acts as an initial version of the Anemelo Handbook which includes the literature quotes, summaries, sources – per chapter was created.
The main outcomes, however, were the teachers’ handbook, with main subject the obesity among youngsters and the game StoryBoard for students in age group 11 – 16 years old.
You can find these results here: https://anemelo.eu/index.php/results
SpaceGuardians (2017-2020)
Interactive eBook for Improving Astronomy Literacy of Kids
| | | | | | | |
Synopsis
Outcomes
-
The study of Astronomy is an important experience which has far-reaching implications for many curricular areas. “Astronomy literacy” implies not only knowledge and understanding of the Earth and its interaction with other celestial objects, but also an understanding of the scientific processes used to produce those concepts.
But Astronomy, as part of science education, can no longer be viewed as only elite training for future scientists or engineers. As recently stated in a EC Report, knowledge of and about science are essential to prepare people to be actively engaged and responsible citizens, creative and innovative, able to work collaboratively and fully aware of and conversant with the complex challenges facing society (Science Education for Responsible Citizenship, EC, 2015).
The project SpaceGuardians aimed to develop an innovative pedagogy for improving Astronomy Literacy of children (3 to 6 yo) and for raising their interest over STEM (science, technology, engineering and mathematics), based on an interactive learning eBook.
-
The project produced some very interesting outcomes such as the eBook that included:
- A framework for Astronomy education specifically developed for pre-school level.
- Good practices of storytelling and interactive stories, specifically for this age group.
And is appealing for both boys and girls. As an interactive eBook, it integrated interactive features, namely a dynamic storyboard that may enable for different endings depending on the children’s response to questions, mini-games, puzzles and other elements embedded in the story. Also, a Facilitator’s Guide – SpaceGuardians Facilitator’s Guide – for teachers and parents was developed, to help them make the most out of the learning opportunity provided by the interactive learning book.
To see all the project’s results click here: https://spaceguardians.eu/results
iCap (2017-2019)
Early Innovation Capacity
| | | | | | | |
Synopsis
Outcomes
-
iCAP was one of the first practice-oriented projects in the EU responding to the Commission’s invitation to establish experimentation with the creation of innovation interest, skills and capacity in primary and secondary school, and it also contributed to a new generation of Erasmus responding to the increasing EU interest in entrepreneurship and innovation based schooling.
In this project, our students of the first class of gymnasium, as well as the students from the other schools participating in the project, had to work as a team and develop a project with the aim of creating change in their own communities by finding a problem or something missing from their local society and develop solutions and proposal on how to change that.
The project provided students the opportunity to engage in missions, from research to small local NGO initiatives both internally at their schools and within their own communities, to contribute and co-create innovative solutions to societal problems. This represented a powerful open schooling approach, establishing local partnerships with the community and offering real-life/time challenges to the students.
-
All of the activities worked through real-life local societal challenges and worked in close collaboration with small eco-systems of community resources. The activities and processes were worked, shared and discussed with the students as they were the centre, the co-drivers and co-creators of the planning, activities and results of the project. In the end of the project, the main outcomes were:
- The Virtual Resource Centre where the experiences of the participating schools are shared and where the other outputs can be accessed.
- Guidelines document for implementing innovation capacity projects providing an account of the project experience, a ‘how to’ guide, a discussion of the impact of the project on the students and a bank of useful resources linked to the theme of innovation and capacity building
- Video documenting student experience offering a full account of the project approach
- Policy Paper based on inputs from participants throughout the project.
- Research and experimentation on the impact of carrying out these projects on young people and on teachers
Find our students’ work on this project, as well as the works of students from the other schools on the project’s website.
Open Science Schooling (2017-2020)
Fostering re-engagement in science learning through open science schooling
| | | | | | | |  |
Synopsis
Outcomes
-
State of the art research and key global stakeholders, such as the OECD and the EU Commission, jointly agree that the disengagement in science takes place in secondary school and typically when the students are from 12 to 15 years old, indicating that science resistance is strongly linked to the development of the students’ identify and personality.
This project aimed to address this problem using the “Open Science Schooling” approach by engaging students in real-life science challenges in the society. During this project both students and schools were engaged in practical science collaboration with resources in the community, including research, science, innovation and social resources and stakeholders. The students were offered direct participation in epic, immersive and exciting missions as well as different learning styles and cross-subject and cross-class approaches. During the project, the students had the opportunity and resources to develop a different image of what science is and what science could be for them, linking in much more narrative ways to the identity and personality of the young students.
-
The mission of the project was to develop and produce OSS guidelines through practical experimentation and through the co-creation of secondary school students. We aimed to answer what is OSS, how can OSS be integrated in secondary schools, how can OSS be practiced in real-life and in collaboration with the community, how can the students’ engagement and achievements be evaluated and documented and how can the students’ OSS engagement lead to the creation of local open science schooling eco-systems?
Based on these the key outcomes of the project were a guide for secondary schools, a video movie of the student teams’ real-life science engagement and how this experience affected them, a students’ personal documentation of their involvement in the project and recommendations for policy-makers on how to support the full integration of open science schooling.
Digit (2017-2019)
Boost competences for a responsible use of online identity
| | | | | | | |
Synopsis
Outcomes
-
Digit’s goals was to boost adult educators competences in relation to the concept of “digital footprint” through the development of a training model and contents that will provide the necessary tools to assist people in the management of their online data in a protect and safe manner.
Project rationale was based on the definition of online identity of the individuals, i.e. the digital footprint. Online identity is represented by all the online data produced by, for and about an individual and the consequent interpretation of these data. Therefore the project addressed the topic from multiple points of view and reflected about the implications of online identity for the individual, as adult and active member of the society.
This project aimed to educate and shape up aware families by making them “responsible consumers” of the web and help parents and older adults to raise responsible future digital citizens. Another objective was to help citizens understand the “value” of what they publish online and provide them the right instruments in order to promote conscious use of the broader concept of “online identity”.
-
The main results from this project were:
- The MANIFESTO for a competent and intelligent management of online identity which represents the guidelines for adult educators to structure courses on DIGITAL FOOTPRINT.
- Training contents and tools to support adults in the learning process on “how to stay safe online” and raise responsible children
The Young European (2017-2019)
A Conscious and Safe Citizen of the World
| | | | | | | |
Synopsis
Outcomes
-
This project aimed to increase the cultural awareness with regard to uniqueness of other European nations, understanding of the problems connected with immigration, tolerance towards cultural, social and religious dissimilarity of immigrants, comprehension of the dangers of the contemporary world and enhance knowledge and skills related to personal safety and safe behaviors in various situations. Another important goal was to enrich teachers’ knowledge and skills and a joint creation of didactic materials and tools related to the project subject.
After the initial assessment of knowledge on security/safety issues we analyzed the data gathered and created some didactic games about multiculturalism and issues related to security/safety. Other activities included international contests and thematic workshops, first-aid courses and simple e-learning applications raising awareness in the field of security and personal safety.
-
The results produced during this project included the methodological publications and didactic games connected with the project’s main topic. This publication consists of lessons scripts about multiculturalism and safety and the games are quizzes, memory game and some board games which were made during the two years of the Project with the collaboration of students from all the partner schools.
EDRKINDER (2017-2019)
Montessori for Adolescent
| |  | | | | | |
Synopsis
The aim of the project was to strengthen the potential of the participants by exchanging experience in the area of Erdkinder Montessori, cooperation of schools and dissemination of model elements of the Montessori method for young people aged 12+.
Teachers from our school and the other participating schools have become familiar with the Montessori educational system and participated in trainings for 5 days in each partner country (6 trainings). Furthermore, our students got involved in some projects assigned to them by the teachers. In order to complete the assignments they collaborated with students from the other partner schools using the eTwinning platform to present their tasks. There was also short term exchange of pupils during the project.
It was a project that achieved to strengthen the professional competence of teachers by participating in international mobility and collaborating in the practical dimension of a new teaching method. It was also very profitable for the students in what regards their international collaboration skills since they got to work with peers from other countries.
Learn to Play, Play to Learn (2016-2018)
A European Focus on Structured Play in Early Childhood
| | | | |  | | |
Synopsis
Outcomes
-
The project focused on resources and methodologies to help children develop pre-literacy skills, problem solving skills and concentration, and also generate social learning experiences in greater diversity than in a single country setting. Several types of play can be considered relevant with respect to children’s holistic development during the early childhood years: exploratory play, constructive play, creative play, pretend, fantasy and socio-dramatic play, physical / movement play, and language and word play.
The project aimed to develop common resources which can be utilized in the Early Childhood setting. This took the form of thematic kits developed collaboratively by class teachers across the partner schools. Our educators had a first-hand experience of Early Childhood settings and practices in other countries, explored different models of Early Childhood education with particular emphasis on structured play and developed literacy rich environments which blend specific Early Childhood literacy goals. The students got more familiar with the use of Web 2.0 technology to engage directly with students in other countries and the use of ICT in the creation of resources for junior classes.
-
The project created a bank of resources for use in the Early Childhood classroom. This was organised thematically with physical and on-line resources.
These results were first available for the teachers currently working with Early Childhood classes across the partner schools. However, the project activities have been disseminated to peers and colleagues through local professional networks.
Furthermore, the work allowed participating students to have greater engagement in structured play in the classroom. This was observed through quality interactions with other children, objects, and places. Resources shared allowed for a broader language-rich environment to encourage play, exploration, conversations, and collaboration.
Entrepreneurship (2016-2018)
A step to the future
| | | | | | | |
Synopsis
Outcomes
-
Fast changing technological, economic, political environment encourages educating young people in the spirit of free market, seeking a better life under market conditions, teaching them to understand what is business, encourages developing initiative, entrepreneurship and leadership qualities.
To address this challenge, our school and our partners on the “ESF” conducted some activities and produced some results through our students’ work on this direction. This one more project that our school is part of that was characterized as “GOOD PRACTICE EXAMPLE” by the European Commission. The aim of the project was to improve our learners’ sense of initiative and entrepreneurship as one of the key competences that is on the agenda of Europe and to make the formal and non- formal learning environment life more relevant for their personal and professional lives which are a missing point for our side.
The most important aim of the project “ENTREPRENEURSHIP: A STEP TO THE FUTURE ” apart from fostering the economic and entrepreneurial skills of school communities was to develop the ability to work in international teams in different economic and entrepreneurial projects, to create business plans, to foster national heritage and to adapt them to the modern competitive environment.
-
To reach the aim and objectives there were 4 teaching/learning activities where students visited the partner schools and worked together with their peers in multinational and multidisciplinary groups. Some of the outcomes that were produced through this project were:
- Students Training Companies set up in each partner school;
- Documentary about the economic situation in each country;
- Economical e vocabulary in English-Lithuanian-Romanian-Turkish-Portuguese-Italian-Greek languages.
All the materials are free and open to everyone through the website and social media of the project.
MOTIVA (2016-2018)
Developing digital entrepreneurship contents for secondary schools
| | | | | | | |
Synopsis
Outcomes
-
The European Union stresses the importance of promoting and assessing transversal skills, such as entrepreneurship and digital competences. Secondary schools are critical to success in this strategy in which an efficient use of ICT is critical.
MOTIVA was a project that aimed to boost business skills through the use of a platform in the cloud defined in collaboration with the users themselves. More specifically the project sought to improve students’ creativity, collaborative skills, awareness and effectiveness, motivation and perseverance, and their ability to mobilize others, work with others, plan and manage tasks, and learn from experience.
It was a very successful project since students improved their engagement and their entrepreneurial skills and digital competences. Teachers improved their abilities to implement innovative ICT- based methodologies in the classroom and they had the chance of implementing best practices and innovative approaches to develop and assess transversal skills. Also, some very useful tools for educators have been created through this project.
-
The results of this project include:
- Teaching materials to support teachers of any discipline, with students between 12 and 18 years, to achieve these entrepreneurial skills.
- Study on teachers’ needs in the fields of entrepreneurial skills and use of ICT to improve students’ learning experience.
- Development of an electronic learning platform for secondary schools.
- Development of learning activities to promote the selected skills that fit e-platform’s technical features.
- E-platform user’s guide for teachers.
- Report for policymakers and their influencers to foster entrepreneurial skills and digital competence in their agendas.
During the project there have also been some training seminars for teachers in charge of implementing the pilot program to test, assess and refine the learning platform and its contents.
GameOn (2016-2018)
Game-based learning in School Education
 | | | | | | | |
Synopsis
Outcomes
-
The world of media is changing and school has to adapt new methods of teaching and learning. Learners are getting more and more used to mobile devices like tablets and smartphones. They play on these devices and the number of apps concerning education is increasing. In learning theory the field of game-based learning is becoming more and more important. Little games have always been used in schools to foster motivation of the students, but improvements in technology have leaded us to new experiences and new potentials.
Schools and teachers nowadays can’t ignore these new approaches and they have to know how to integrate modern game-based learning approaches in their teaching. The aim of GameON was to get an overview on game-based learning in schools, the needs of teachers in this field and develop a guide for the teachers on how to implement these methods in class.
-
The outcome of this project was this book that introduces teachers to the concept of game-based learning and gives them an overview.
The book also takes teachers through several useful serious games in a hands-on approach that helps them understand how the game can be integrated into their classes. It contains a section on future development of game-based learning, providing a detailed overview of which opportunities technology will provide in the coming years (for instance, individualized learning through learning analytics), and what should be developed in the field of game-based learning in order to take advantage of these opportunities.
The book can freely be downloaded as a PDF from the website but it is also available as a free e-book on e-book stores.
CHRIS (2016-2018)
Countering Human Radicalization in School
| | | | | | | | |
Synopsis
Outcomes
-
The aim of the project was to develop didactical initiatives to prevent different types of radicalization amongst children and young people in schools. The CHRIS project involved young students in basic schooling from different European countries in the development of sustainable ways of countering radicalization in schools. This involvement was based on in-depths engagement in what produces radicalization potential in relation to teenage identity formation and through real-life and real-time community collaboration – and with the aim to build capacity to co-create the project outcomes.
The CHRIS project aimed at taking radicalization prevention in schools to a didactic level and mobilizing young students’ hidden and unfolded knowledge to do so. Therefore, the project aimed at taking the participating young student teams through 3 phases of capacity building and co-creation: Feeling Me Feeling School (identity), Open Schooling (reality and community) and Co-creation (design of radicalization prevention in schools).
CHRIS project was highly successful and was awarded the “Good Practice Example” label by the European Commission.
-
The key outcomes of the project were:
- Resources pack to use as cases
- Guide pack on radicalization prevention in school for primary and secondary schools across Europe
- Recommendations for further and focused research based on the project experience and
- Knowledge creation
- Policy recommendations for radicalization prevention for schools based on the project
- Experience and knowledge creation
All the results are accessible through the webpage of the project.
iYouth (2016-2018)
Empowering Europe’s Young Innovators – the desire to innovate
| | | | | | | | |
Synopsis
Outcomes
-
The mission of iYouth project was to contribute by practical experimentation to our understanding of the way didactics and methods can help secondary schools to create and foster innovation interest, skills and capacity among the young students.
Our students along with the students from the other schools that participated in the project, formed a team and worked on an innovation mission based on an innovation that they wished to implement in their society. The students had the opportunity to discuss and develop their projects in collaboration with their peers from the other countries in the meeting that took place during the 2 years of the project.The project team analyzed and considered the consistent research that has been carried out on the nature of learning methodologies expected to have the potential to foster entrepreneurial and innovation interest and engagement among young people. The main underlying assumption of the project was that innovation might be rather a new dimension in learning and school, offering young students immersive, continuous and community based experience aimed to foster interest in changing things, detecting new opportunities, engaging in interesting collaboration, playing detectives and explorers in a playful and serious way, at the same time.
-
The main outcomes of the project are:
- The iYouth Resource Center which offers well-structured material, selected for practical experimentation.
- The Policy Paper – What does it take to foster innovation interest and capacity among young learners?
- The “iYouth Special – Research and practical experimentation challenges towards open schooling innovation”.
All the results are accessible in the project’s website.
ScienceGirls(2016-2018)
Teenage girls as co-creators of science learning engagement
| | | | | | | | |
Synopsis
Outcomes
-
Young people are increasingly disengaged from science learning in schools and this is causing great concern in the EU Commission and among other global players. Therefore the commission developed a “Science Learning Innovation Agenda”, described and documented across numerous Commission documents, research papers and guidelines.
The “ScienceGirls” project’s goal was to contribute to the Science Learning Innovation Agenda through practical experimentation in secondary school. The project aimed impact on science learning in schools re-defining its appeal to the young generations. Synthesizing leading research, it is clear that most girls do not feel comfortable with science education and the values and personal identities linked to science and science jobs.
During the 2 years of the project our female students participated in several activities that were designed according to the project’s goals and objectives. The project focused on and worked through 5 overall innovative thematics, based on comprehensive preparatory reviews of recent science learning research: Co-creation identity, Real-life experience, Open schooling, Mixed reality collaboration, Authentic visions for attractive gender sensitive science engagement.
-
Our pupils visited the schools of our partners (we hosted one of these mobilities as well) and in these meetings they took part in common activities with their peers. A strong and most dynamic climax in the project was the 5 days “Science girls vision encounter” mobility, along which the participating girls created visions for what science learning in school could be – with a strong focus on female identity.
Some main outcomes of this project include:
- The ScienceGirls guidance to gender-sensitive science learning innovation in secondary school
- The 30 minute video scenarios of innovative science learning in secondary school – produced by the students
- The policy paper for Innovation in science learning in schools
Flipped Classroom (2016-2018)
Reversed Roles at School: Flipped Classroom and Learning Through Teaching
| | | | | | |
Synopsis
Outcomes
-
The objective of this project was working out a methodology based on innovative techniques and ICT tools. The core of the project was the exploration of an innovative approach in education called “Flipped Classroom” which inverts traditional teaching methods delivering instruction online outside of class and moving homework into the classroom.
The shift of the teaching components results in greater student engagement in the classroom activities and better academic performance. What is more, students are more aware of their needs and skills, which makes them more responsible for their education. The method is deeply imbedded in the digital era because it involves creating instructional films by students themselves. They learn through lecturing their peers thanks to creative and emotional engagement in designing videos and other electronic tools. Flipped classroom can be used with every subject but in this project we concentrated on Science especially Mathematics.
-
In this project our teachers and the teachers from the other participating schools were acquainted with the applications used to create advanced videos, screencasts, slideshows and other audio-visual materials. The teachers used the method in practice and fliped a chosen school course to see how the method works. Then they evaluated the exploratory process and its impact on the teaching process.
The project included many activities, some of which were completed during 3 blended mobilities.
Students tested different applications and designed didactic materials in different classes (Maths, Chemistry, Biology, Foreign Languages, vocational subjects). During the blended mobilities they simulated flipped classrooms and learnt cultural background of the partners’ countries using ICT tools.
The main results of the project are reports on the method research and use as well as the didactic base which can be used and enriched in the future.
In A Far Away Land: Refugee Children (2016-2018)
| | | | | | | |
Synopsis
Outcomes
-
This project addressed some of the new priority areas for ET 2020 which are: inclusive education, equality, non-discrimination, civic competences, open and innovative education and training, including by fully embracing the digital era. One the ET 2020 headline targets is also the reduction of early school leaving rates.
Through the “Refugees” project we aimed to raise awareness of refugee crisis in Europe and develop understanding of cultural differences, increase intercultural understanding, to grow respect for the different, to develop practices of accepting dissimilarity and to understand the meaning of showing solidarity in a local, national and global level.
-
During this project our students conducted a series of activities related to the thematic of the project along with their peers from our partner schools. By the series of training activities, the project achieved to develop pupils’ intercultural dialogue; ICT, language and communicational skills both in mother and foreign languages; social& civic competences; intercultural, reading, maths, digital and science competences; presentation and expression skills; cultural awareness and expression which are the key competences of ET 2020, to promote participation in democratic life of Europe and active citizenship.
The international dimension of youth activities helped enhance the foreign language competence of young students, increased their working experiences, learnt about the European Union, got to know new cultures and peer to peer exchanges.
SOS Planet A Robotics Project (2015-2017)
| |  | | | | | |
Synopsis
Outcomes
-
This project’s main goal was to familiarize students and teachers with the world of robots and programming and enhance students’ key competences as they are described by the European Commission. Our students worked in 2 groups, designed missions for their robots and performed it. After completing their mission they evaluated and reported on it and exchanged their knowledge with the other students’ teams from the other schools. After that they had to work on a different mission designed by another student team and perform it based on the reports from the other team.
During the two years of the project there were five student mobilities where the students worked in transnational teams to overcome a challenge prepared by the teachers in the host country. Students were evaluated both quantitatively and qualitatively.
This project was awarded the “EUROPEAN LANGUAGE LABEL” by the commission, an award given to projects that have found creative ways to improve the quality of language teaching, motivate students, make the best use of available resources to diversify the languages on offer, and other innovative initiatives.
-
The result of the project included:
- e-book containing information about robotics, the explanation of missions and challenges, tutorials, recommendations, troubleshooting, glossary of technical terms, diagrams, and photos. It can be used by students who want to be self-taught or guided by a teacher. It contains the basics to programming Lego EV3 robots.
- A handbook showing all the basics about programming robots in an attractive format, including video tutorials made by the students.
Also, an open robotics day was organized at the end of the project along with workshop organized and tutored by students with expertise in robotics at the end of the project. All the results and extra resources can be found in the project’s website.
CLIL 2 (2015-2017)
Youth, multilingualism and work perspectives in Europe
| | | | | | | |
Synopsis
Outcomes
-
This is the sequel of the CLIL project in which our school was also part. The project’s goal was to provide our students with a comprehensive understanding of the European labor market and skills they will need for their future careers. It seems, this future will be challenging, because these skills change quickly, so teachers must adapt to new technologies and knowledge of foreign languages.
In this context the project was structured in three main areas: Research of the European labor market, using free online resources and new technologies (ICT), and implementation of CLIL methodology. The project promoted collaborative work through platforms like TwinSpace and Google drive, where students and teachers carried out work together and organized meetings online. In the mobilities to the different countries, students presented their tasks and teachers provided the CLIL lessons.
In general, it was a very successful project that benefited both our students and teachers that took part and it was awarded the “GOOD PRACTICE EXAMPLE” label by the European Commission.
-
The results of the project included:
- Six e-books with CLIL lessons (Science, New Technologies, Natural Resources, Industry, Natural and Cultural Heritage and Robotics).
- European labor market researches in different fields.
- Development curriculums (Europass format), video resumes, letters of application and portfolio.
- Business: Visits and practices.
- Visits to representatives of public employment agencies.
- Work fair, educational coaching workshop, visits to universities, etc.
- Video conferences with people working abroad.
More details of the project are available on the website.
ECHO (2015-2017)
European Choir and Orchestra
| | | | | | | |
Synopsis
Outcomes
-
“ECHO” was a project focused in culture and especially music among the participant countries. In this project students had the chance to discover the other countries and to move closer to their cultures. The musical practice was an educational tool that gave the opportunity to experience alternative teaching methods.
Playing together in an orchestra implies effort, discipline, listening skills to achieve the desired harmony, ECHO was a tool to develop social and learning skills. The students gained great experience by participating in concerts collaborating with their peers from other countries.
It was a project that helped develop a multicultural learning, increase the interest in other European languages, strengthen the knowledge of the English language, create bonds between students, develop creativity, think over social issues, improve computer skills, develop the habit of cooperating and making decisions.
-
During each mobility in the partner countries there was organized a common concert with the participation of students of each partner school. The main theme of the project was children’s rights and each partner chose a song on that perspective. The songs were shared with the partners in the original language and in English, were arranged for the orchestra, performed and sung during these concerts.
Furthermore, a new song was created and performed during the three concerts.
Local and national organizations involved in the defense of children’s rights were directly involved by the individual partners and participated in events, particularly the concerts. There were also artistic productions on the theme, workshops during the meetings and a graffiti which was completed by students from the four countries during the last meeting in Italy.
CLIL (2014-2016)
Bilingual education: a step ahead
| | | | | | | |
Synopsis
Outcomes
-
CLIL was a project aimed to implement bilingual education and CLIL methodology into the project and school’s everyday work in order to help teachers and students improve their key competences, language skills and motivate them for further development of international relations.
Content and Language Integrated Learning (CLIL), in which pupils learn a subject through the medium of a foreign language, has a major contribution to make to the Union’s language learning goals. It can provide effective opportunities for pupils to use their new language skills now, rather than learn them now for use later. It opens doors on languages for a broader range of learners, nurturing self-confidence in young learners and those who have not responded well to formal language instruction in general education. It provides exposure to the language without requiring extra time in the curriculum.
The most significant innovation in the project was that it did not intend to offer short-cuts to CLIL methodology in schools. We did not want to simply implement CLIL into our curricula but to go a step ahead, sharing good practices with other educators. -
The project involved 60 teachers from 14 institutions from 4 European countries. 250 parents participating actively in the project activities and 500 pupils/children engaged into bilingual education.
Lesson plans, hand-outs, worksheets, educational resources on 5 theme sets (PE, Arts and Crafts, Science, Music, Maths) were created. Also, 2 DVDs with films and instructions to illustrate the content included into lesson plans were developed.There were workshops for teachers and parents – in a form of open classes and/or training sessions – and systematic bilingual classes for children – educational classes including the contents of the theme sets previously mentioned.
Water, a European Task in a Global Context (2014-2017)
| | | | | | | |
Synopsis
Outcomes
-
Schools from 8 different countries dealt with the manifold aspects of water and its importance for our daily lives in the context of an international exchange. The participating partners have a different view on the availability of water, providing the students with the experience and the awareness of access to drinking water and a thoughtful reflection of their own water consumption. Due to geographical, Social and cultural aspects, each country contributed individually and particularly to the project.
-
Topics covered within the three-year project activities were water conditioning, chemical and physical properties of water, water treatment and drinking water abstraction, distribution of water in the geological, geographical and political context, water and agriculture, water as a threat: flood and flood control, infrastructure: economical an ecological issues, water power, geothermic, water as economic factor, tourism, wellness, the intercultural dimension of water: water in Art, music, literature.
The students acquired and extended their presentation and research skills. They learnt how to plan, carry out and analyze surveys and other data collection methods. They gained an insight in social science and academic research and through their visits in the other partner countries’ schools they gained precious experiences and exchanged their views on the project with their peers.
We are the world, we are the children (2014-2016)
A European Focus on Structured Play in Early Childhood
| | | | | | | |
Synopsis
Outcomes
-
The 21st century brought a lot of disagreement among generations. Diverse generations see the same things differently as a result of generation gap. It is a considered opinion that the youth will not be strong enough for challenges and struggle for human values. The concept of the project was to search for the stories of success how children changed the world in the history of nation; saved people, weren’t lost in extreme situations, protected and struggled for human values.
The project intended to inspire the students – our rising generation – to act presently and change the world today; despite of, a young age, nation, race, social status, beliefs, and influence of other circumstances.
The substance of the project was to prove a self-realization in acquiring and improving social, linguistic, communicative, cognitive, initiative and creative, cultural, individual competences and skills. Acquiring these competences, students will develop their attitudes towards values, will become more tolerant to history, other generation, will be open to other cultures and views, will develop self-confidence and trust to others.
-
Participating members from each school while working on this project searched for historical facts in their region about the young people’s accomplished achievements that changed their life or someone else’s life as well. The collected stories were conveyed using various modern expressions of art, forms appealing to young people such as street dances, theatre, music, art, IT and were portrayed in each school in the stand “Living history”.
They students also produced the educational-methodical e-book “Children also can change the world” and the teachers of History, Native language, Ethics, Art published lesson plans, lesson handouts and methodological recommendations in the e-book.
The project partners also produced a collective DVD with captions in English which includes presentations of stories collected during the project.
The students had a very active role on the project since most of the results were produced by them and gained very useful experience while collaborating with their peers.
Successful Scientists (2014-2016)
A European Focus on Structured Play in Early Childhood
| | | | | | | |
Synopsis
Outcomes
-
The objective of this project was to develop innovative and exciting ways of teaching and learning of science concepts and to foster a thirst for knowledge, a sense of excitement, increased engagement and a love of learning about the world in which we live.
During this project the partners worked to together to develop innovative teaching methods and resources for the following areas of science: Sound, Earth & Space, Properties of materials, Light and Electricity, Humans, Animals & habitats, Forces & Magnets. Each school tried different methods of teaching a concept. The ideas, where possible, were linked to sustainability and how we may need to sustain our planet in the future. -
The most innovative ideas/lessons/resources were collated to form a bank of resources that teacher, schools in the locality and the wider community can use to teach that area of science.
This developed a complete package of resources that is a useful tool for teachers in the science sectors.
The students also were benefited greatly by this project thanks to their participation and common work with their peers in the joint mobilities in other countries.
Sinbad (2014-2016)
A journey to promote key competences in early childhood education through storytelling
| | | | | | | |
Synopsis
Outcomes
-
The Sinbad project aimed at promoting storytelling and the use of storytelling techniques in pre-school and primary school education in order to enhance the key competences acquisition of children.
Telling stories offers a powerful methodology to support the development of children. It supports the listening and reading comprehension and is a natural opportunity for children to grow as language users. It besides provides a possibility for children to interact with the cultural context of fairytales, folktales and other stories, it strengthens the children’s ability to concentrate and fosters creativity as well as critical thinking by stimulating discussion and debate.
The project followed a bottom-up approach. It aimed at raising awareness for the potential of storytelling in education and supporting educators and teachers in applying storytelling in education. This was reached by developing educational resources and materials for teachers or other people working with primary aged children and implementing it in form of blended learning. All contents were based on a pedagogical framework, developed at the beginning of the project. -
The main results of the project are:
- Pedagogical framework: Competence development through storytelling including the Sinbad model
- Education pack
- E-learning course containing information about the concept of competence and the EU key competences, appropriate story selection, story structure, finding a suitable place, presenting a story, involving children and supporting the competence acquisition including storytelling competences. The course is free of charge and can be attended in all six project languages. At the end of the course participants can receive a certificate after answering some test questions. A forum allows the exchange with teachers from all over Europe.
Story collection including suitable competence development activities - Workshop concept and storytelling workshops including framework for assessment and certification
Guidelines for storytelling practice: recommendation for teachers and other people active in pre- and primary school education to organize practice workshops
NON-FOR-LESL (2014-2016)
Non-Formal Learning Can Prevent Early School Leaving
| | | | | | | |
Synopsis
Outcomes
-
Non-For-Lesl addressed the challenge of Early School Leaving (ESL) at the stage of school level-intervention. The cooperational basis together with EU countries was to meet the headline target set in the EU 2020 Strategy to reduce ESL to less than 10%.
ESL is a process rather than a one-off event. It often starts in primary school when students can experience time school failure and growing alienation from school for the first time. School failure often affects students’ perception of themselves, which leads them to adopt restraining characteristics: Growing sense of alienation from school, disruptive behaviour, high level of absenteeism and a lack of confidence and self-esteem.
The consortium developed and pilot-tested MyKey (www.my-key.online). It is an innovative, multi-dimensional OER validation tool and can be used by students additionally to school assessment procedures. MyKey is based on a holistic view of student’s learning while it draws away from boundaries caused by subjects. It presents and validates skills, knowledge and competences acquired through non-formal and informal learning related to the key competences and transversal skills. With MyKey students get the opportunity to showcase their progress and achievement. -
The main outcomes of the project were:
- a Comparative Study Analysis in which the issues under investigation were analyzed and the opinions of the target group (students and teachers) were collected with the use of questionnaires
- a framework and a system for the validation of non-formal/informal learning within school based on the key competences
- the OER MyKey
- step-by-step guides for students, teachers and administrators with background information on the project and on how to use and implement MyKey successfully
- an implementation phase of 5 month with an implementation report in the form of case-studies
- an overall comparative implementation strategy and evaluation: a “ready made – ready to implement” pack for operation
A healthy mind in a healthy body (2014-2016)
| | | | | | | |
Synopsis
Outcomes
-
The project aimed at promoting a healthy lifestyle among students, in particular through healthy diet and physical education. The rationale behind the project was linked to the strong conviction that it is necessary to start shaping proper eating habits of the Young Europeans and to raise awareness of a healthy lifestyle, by introducing a healthy diet, regular physical activity and active leisure.
Through the project we attempted to help young people to take the right decisions concerning their diet and ways of spending their free time, inspiring them to take up active and creative activities that could come in place of the long hours spent in front of the computer.
The project proved extremely necessary as it had considerably enhanced the knowledge and skills of its participants and had increased the awareness of the young people as to the needs of their own body and the necessity to eliminate risky behaviors (such as use of nicotine, drugs, alcohol and other psychoactive or harmful substances).
-
The project tasks included: art competitions (5 international contests, approx. 200 submitted student works), thematic Online newsletters (3 issues), lesson plans and syllabuses, Students’ Dream PE Lesson Outline (60 lesson plans from all partner schools); 5 quizzes, 6 interactive crosswords, 6 online questionnaires on sports and healthy lifestyle, dedicated meetings with specialists from health, sports and diet sectors.
We also developed healthy menus (approx. 100 menus from all partner schools); folders/maps that show places in the close area of each partner school where one can do some sports or actively spend their free time.
Five photobooks were published, each documenting current project activities, including local cuisines of each of the partners.
Early Learn to Learn Environment (2014-2016)
| | | | | | | |
Synopsis
Outcomes
-
Early childhood years are important because it is the period when children should receive education to improve their cognitive, social, emotional and physical skills. Precisely, it is the time when children form habits to shape their lives in future and that is why a well-planned and implemented education and care is necessary.
The specific focus on the project was developing “learn to learn” competence in preschool children, involving it in the preschool education through natural activities and training the teachers about using“L2L” activities. We used “nature as means for children to use and develop creative thinking and problem solving skills, learn to manage their own learning, create new objects from natural materials and in general to “L2L”.
-
During the project, the teachers of the partner schools worked on developing trainings and activity plans for the “EL2LE Guide for Teachers”. Totally, 60 activities were developed.
Also, a research paper on “opportunities and obstacles in 21st century “learn to learn” competence: what works, what doesn’t and what needs to be done” was prepared.
We also created the Road Map, which are recommendations to the policy-makers and European Commission aimed to change the curriculum and adapt “learn to learn” competence in ECEC programmes.
Finally, we organized workshops for teachers and parents to be aware of the “L2L”implementationsand learn activities to do with children at home. Kids continued developing “L2L”at home.
Karel (2013-2015)
Autonomous Robot for Enhancing Learning
The purpose of the project was to develop curricular materials for science and technology learning with robots. There was designed and built an autonomous, mobile, low-cost robotic platform for secondary schools. The robotic platform was named KAREL in tribute to Karel Čapek, the Czech writer who introduced the word robot. There was also developed a curriculum which included lesson plans from different fields (physics, biology, electronics, mechanics, programming, and robotics).
The participants used and develop their competences in mathematics, ICT, technology, sciences, curriculum design and languages.
This project involved both pupils (14 to 19 years old) and teachers. The pupils (girls and boys) participated in all stages of the project. They researched, designed, built and tested the robotic platform. Teachers (women and men) guided pupils and developed the curriculum.
Karel was a huge success and the good work done by the students and teachers was awarded with the “SUCCESS STORY” and ““GOOD PRACTICE EXAMPLE” label by the European Commission.
SECONDARY EDUCATION
CAREM (2012-2014)
Collaborative Art-Making for Reducing Marginalisation
CAREM aimed to develop educational activities, material and related pedagogical strategies of collaborative art-making that strengthen intercultural education and inclusion practices, reduce social and academic marginalization and increase the participation of marginalized children, like culturally diverse students or children who face learning or language difficulties, in the curricula, cultures and societies of schools.
Each partner developed activities and materials of collaborative art-making for each of the 3 pools: promotion of diversity, marginalization reduction and the development of a democratic European citizenship.
This material was published on-line and provided teachers (ages 9-12) with educational strategies and material that enabled them to deploy collaborative art-making to promote amongst their students an awareness of the importance of cultural and linguistic diversity within Europe and of the need to combat racism, prejudice and xenophobia.
SECONDARY EDUCATION
FIESTA
Facilitating Inclusive Education and Supporting the Transition Agenda (2011-2014)
The main aim of this project was to develop a multi-disciplinary learning approach for professionals in education, health and social services in order to facilitate the additional learning and support requirements of children with special needs during periods of transition.
In collaboration with higher level institutions such as the University of Edinburg and the University of Nicosia there were developed a sustainable network for the inclusive education and collaborative working, a platform for all professionals involved in educating children with special needs, online e-learning modules for inclusion, transition, collaborative working.
PRIMARY EDUCATION
Projects list
- (+30) 23510 31111
- info@platon.edu.gr
- Ganochora - Katerini, Greece