A lexicon of educational films on the subject of STEM for primary and secondary school students – films4edu Erasmus Project

Project Title

A lexicon of educational films on the subject of STEM for primary and secondary school students – films4edu

Project Key Action

This project related with these key action: Cooperation for innovation and the exchange of good practices

Project Action Type

This project related with this action type : Partnerships for Digital Education Readiness

Project Call Year

This project’s Call Year is 2020

Project Topics

This project is related with these Project Topics: Open and distance learning; Key Competences (incl. mathematics and literacy) – basic skills; Natural sciences

Project Summary

The report for the European Council prepared by the Reflection Group Europe 2030 focuses much attention on improving youth education, introducing new teaching methods, elements of creativity and innovation. According to the document, the most important strategic instrument that provides citizens with the opportunity for social advancement is better use of talent in society. The project is aimed at developing and disseminating high-quality distance learning in STEM education, as well as strengthening basic and transversal skills defined in the European Key Competences Framework in the learning process. The key competences in the basic and transversal dimensions, the development of which will be influenced by the implementation of the project, include scientific and technical competences, the ability to learn and algorithmic thinking. As indicated in the European Commission study “Supporting the development of key competences: Learning approaches and environments in school education (November 2019)”, learning in a real-life scenario and scientific experiment methods used in science, technology, engineering and mathematics (STEM) can favor the development of a number of competences. For this reason, increasing students’ motivation to study science, technology, engineering and mathematics (STEM) and improving achievement in these areas are important challenges facing European education systems. At the same time, schools in Europe face a new and unprecedented challenge: replacing traditional, mostly frontal learning with distance learning. These are completely different organizational models of the school, different pedagogical methods, different applications of digital technologies in teaching. according to consultations with teachers carried out by consorcium partners (October 2020), teachers of STEM subjects lack easy-to-use and generally accessible educational materials. Distance learning in subjects such as history or the mother tongue is not such a challenge as teaching chemistry or physics.

The project is targeted at 2 groups: primary and secondary school STEM teachers and primary and secondary school students
The main objective is to develop and improve the quality of distance learning STEAM education and increase the teaching potential and distance learning capacity of primary and secondary schools in 4 partner countries until 28.02.2023
Specific Objectives:
1. increasing the knowledge of at least 300 teachers from at least 100 primary and secondary schools in the use of films – teaching experiments in STEM education;
2. increasing interest of 600 primary and secondary school students in experiments in physics and chemistry
3. increasing the knowledge of 1000 recipients of disseminating activities about the opportunities offered by the use of films – teaching experiments in STEM education
4. increasing innovation and internationalization of the institutions involved (6) through the exchange of good practices, joint development of universal educational and training materials and promotion of open education

The project will produce the following intellectual output
O1 – Methodology of teaching STEM subjects using the method of films4edu experiments
O2 – Online Catalog of Physics Experiments for Primary and Secondary Education
O3 – Online Catalog of Chemical Experiments for Primary and Secondary Education

Structure of the Intellectual Outputs:
Methodology will include the results of the teachers’ needs surveys carried out under the project, plan of each experiment based of experiments scenarios from O1 and O2 (100) with an overview, as well as evaluation results and guidelines for teachers on the use of videos during lessons.
Catalog O1 will contain 60 films (30 at primary school level and 30 at secondary school level). Catalog O2 will contain 40 films (20 at primary school level and 20 at secondary school level) All films will be recorded in the national language of the Leader / partners, then subtitles in English and other languages of the consorcium will be added to each film.

Beyond the intellectual outputs listed above, films4edu will deliver the following results, during and after its completion:
1. 2 multiplier events that will raise awareness on the project outputs and attracting the interest of more than 50 primary and secondary schools/100 teachers
2. development of the project’s visual identity
3. distribution of at least 1000 project online flyers: the online flyer will contain a qr code ensuring direct access to the project results page
4. building a 1 network of contacts between schools and teachers of STEAM subjects, being a combination of cooperation networks of consorcium partners
5.100 news items to be published on the website during the project
6. 1 films4edu Social Media page

EU Grant (Eur)

Funding of the project from EU: 186290 Eur

Project Coordinator

UNIWERSYTET SLASKI & Country: PL

Project Partners

• UNIVERSITAET INNSBRUCK
• UNIVERSIDAD DE MALAGA
• AKADEMIA GORNICZO-HUTNICZA IM. STANISLAWA STASZICA W KRAKOWIE
• ZILINSKA UNIVERZITA V ZILINE
• Fundacja Małopolski Uniwersytet dla Dzieci