Drop Everything And Read Erasmus Project

Project Title

Drop Everything And Read

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 : School Exchange Partnerships

Project Call Year

This project’s Call Year is 2018

Project Topics

This project is related with these Project Topics: Early School Leaving / combating failure in education; Creativity and culture; Key Competences (incl. mathematics and literacy) – basic skills

Project Summary

Our partnership consists of 4 secondary schools from Spain, Italy, the Netherlands and Germany. In all countries we have noticed that many of our students do not show a lot of interest in reading novels anymore. According to studies like the International-Elementary School-Reading-Test (Iglu) of 2017 or the JIM Study 2016 this is a common European problem among students, especially between the age of 12 and 15.
We regarded it a necessary aim of schools to stop this trend in order to prepare students for life and the world of work by creating new approaches to literature to strengthen their reading and writing abilities. Developing their reading skills does not only contribute to a more successful career at school but also offers them new chances on the European labour market.
Therefore the main aim of our project DEAR (Drop Everything And Read) was to motivate teenage students to read again and to share their reading experience with others. In the project the students tried out innovative approaches to youth literature and learned about the different European cultures as we chose novels written by authors from the participating countries. One innovative, creative approach was the building of a ‘Story Train’ which is the final product based on Astrid Lindgren’s idea. The students created single compartments of the ‘Story Train’ by e.g. depicting a particular scene or character(s) from their novel. Thus they give a brief insight into the novel which is supposed to inspire other students to read it. Working in international teams and discussing and working on novels they gained more social competences, independence of thought and action and developed a critical mind. Dealing with literature by employing head, heart and hand also deepened the students’ understanding of and empathy for fictional characters. This also contributed to give them guidance for their own lives. But they also improved key competences such as their presentation skills, their range of vocabulary as well as written and oral skills in English.
In every country 20-26 students (13-15 years) per project year participated and benefited from new incentives to literature. During the two project years different students and teachers worked on the ‘Story Train’ in international groups. We intended to use the necessary mobilities to bring students and teachers from our schools together to work collaboratively in international teams on various youth novels (plot, character, themes) to create compartments of the ‘Story Train’. This way a large number of students should get the chance to stay with a host family in a foreign European country and experience its culture. Unfortunately Corona interfered with our plans in the second project year so that travelling abroad was not possible.
As preparation of the exchange weeks the students in all countries chose two novels from a list of youth literature put up by the teachers. The list contained novels by authors from all participating countries and was sorted out by themes such as fantasy and friendship. The students also started using the eTwinning platform to exchange their personal files and to introduce themselves to the students from other countries via e-mail. After reading their chosen novels they did creative assignments in which they discussed the novel’s topic and impact on them.
In the exchange weeks the students worked in international teams which have been reading the same novel. They talked about the characters in the novel, the plot and the themes in English. Then they got the task to promote their novel by e.g. performing scenes from the novel, creating literary landscapes for a scene or dressing up like a character and giving a speech. Every international team was asked to built one compartment of the ‘Story Train’ choosing their own creative way to promote the novel. In the end all contributions to the ‘Story Train’ were put together on a webpage.
The idea of the project was to present our final product, the ‘Story Train’ to other students, teachers in each participating country’s schools, other schools and the local libraries. We wanted to enable everyone who is interested in this new approach to literature to use it as means to make students interested in the novels that are promoted in the ‘Story Train’. We also would like to encourage other teachers to let their students create new compartments and add them to the train if they want to recommend a new novel. Students from our project went into classes of Primary schools and kindergartens to read out to younger students and children to wake their pleasure of reading.
The project also serves as an important part of a more intensive collaboration with local libraries. Thus the ‘Story Train’ bears the chance to be continued in future years.

EU Grant (Eur)

Funding of the project from EU: 107587,2 Eur

Project Coordinator

Erich-Fried-Gesamtschule Wuppertal & Country: DE

Project Partners

• OSG Gemini College
• Istituto Comprensivo Sassuolo 4° Ovest
• INSTITUTO DE EDUCACION SECUNDARIA LA VAGUADA