A Lonely Planet or digital connected? Erasmus Project

Project Title

A Lonely Planet or digital connected?

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: ICT – new technologies – digital competences; Health and wellbeing; Inclusion – equity

Project Summary

Teachers want to make sure their lessons online are interactive, more challenging, high-quality. Pupils want that too, but at the same time, as consumers, they also want to be able to deliver high-quality work for online assignments, which is not always possible. Therefore, during our four exchange weeks over the next two school years, we want to offer 210 students (105 per grade / 35 per country), participating teachers and parents ICT courses to all involved, not only to improve online classes for teachers and students, but also to provide serious valuable and worthwhile alternatives to physical exchanges and extracurricular activities. That is why our exchange weeks will be completely online and we will experiment with online outdoor activities, online introduction to and acquaintance with culture, family, city and country, online group challenges and games and online international research. To ensure that everything runs smoothly and to ensure real interaction and good quality, we offer eight courses during two exchange weeks: working with Office for advanced students, making (YouTube) videos, editing, cutting, etc., the creation of your own website, create your own online outdoor activity (treasure hunts, quizes, viewing tour, escapes, challenges etc.), how do we recognize a good source, what is fake news? How do I prevent social isolation and how do I deal with it? and the do’s and don’ts of the internet and ICT use (young people and their ICT world in 2021). During the remainder of the exchange week, pupils in groups of six from the three countries will deal with the issue of “Global Health” (nothing is more appropriate than that topic nowadays and this crisis must also be one of reflection, conclusions and a look at the future). This theme will be divided into 17 sub-themes for the 17 sub-groups: politics and health, economy and health, young and old, travel and health, numbers and statistics, health policy in the Netherlands in comparison, health policy in Hungary in comparison, health policy in Macedonia in comparison, insurance policy in the EU, epidemics and childhood diseases, UNHCR, health policy and Corona in BRIC, contradictions in Europe (the extremes), health developments in the US, conclusions after the first and second wave and finally private family life during the lockdowns . Not only will the research into these themes teach the students to reflect on what happened, but at the same time it is the way for us as teachers to see whether the above-mentioned ICT courses are paying off, as they have to incorporate the digital learning into their research and presentation thereof after the second exchange week. Teachers and parents also participate in the various courses. We do this consciously to ensure that a snowball effect arises and that what we have learned is not limited to the group of those directly involved. The teachers can transfer what they have learned to other classes and pupils and give input to the school board about usefulness and necessity. Parents can use what they have learned in their own home situation (after all, they have also become part-time teachers during this crisis) and at the same time convince their environment and school boards that more should be invested in the digital online possibilities of education. In addition to these courses and the research into the sub-themes mentioned, there is of course still enough time for the “fun” things, as students would say. Pupils show their own school, family and city to their exchange partners, they challenge their partners with an online challenge, they set out a treasure hunt in Amsterdam and give an online workshop in the Rijksmuseum, they drop their partners somewhere … and just see that you come “home” again. Not only do we do this to really introduce students to each other, but of course also to ease the above research, but also to use our digital tests again and to check whether the ICT courses have actually descended. At the end of each activity week, we spend a day during which students can evaluate their digital exchange, digital assignments and challenges, ICT courses and compare their experiences with each other. We ask the same of the participating teacher, the accompanying teachers (from all three countries) and the parent forum of the three nationalities. We collect all these experiences and tips to achieve better online lessons and fun, educational, interactive online alternatives for international exchanges and extracurricular activities and with the help of communication experts, this becomes a paper and online handbook after the fourth exchange week in the second project year. with all useful tips and tricks, which will be offered to all relevant regional, national and European authorities in order to achieve more attention and, above all, more investment in digital possibilities.

EU Grant (Eur)

Funding of the project from EU: 84870 Eur

Project Coordinator

Stichting Veluwse Onderwijsgroep & Country: NL

Project Partners

• Bilingual Nonprofit Ltd.
• “Sv.Kliment Ohridski” High School