Back to School Life Erasmus Project

Project Title

Back to School Life

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 : Strategic Partnerships for Schools Only

Project Call Year

This project’s Call Year is 2016

Project Topics

This project is related with these Project Topics: Early School Leaving / combating failure in education; Creativity and culture; ICT – new technologies – digital competences

Project Summary

The project called “Back To School Life” aimed to work on the most effective ways to cope with diversity in classes, to reduce early school leave (ESL), to reinforce the inter-cultural awareness, to raise the parental involvement in children’s education and raise the quality of education using ICT. The activities and workshops planned in the project got the students with tendency of early school leave back more into school life, parents and students back into more social life, seniors back into more active life. Running this Erasmus+ Project, we shared our experiences for teaching culturally diverse students and applied new policies about how to tackle ESL. As partners involved in this project we believed that “everyone learns differently and everyone has unique interests, but some techniques and methods are more effective than others”.

7 partner countries; Finland, Spain, Portugal, Romania, Lithuania, The UK, and Turkey participated in the project. Spain, Romania and Turkey and Portugal had the higher ratio of ESL. Lithuania had a small school in a small city. However the ratio of ESL was not high. Finland had the best educational system and they shared their experiences and expertise with the other project partners who had more diverse classes and high possibility of ESL

At the end of the project, a report on “What Works Best for Our Students”, was shared.
A booklet for educators “Practical Strategies and Team Building Activities to Prevent ESL” and
A booklet for parents “Creating Effective Home and School Partnerships for Student Success” were written.
Book called “Martı– Seagull” was turned into audio book.
Calendesr illustrated with the project photos were printed.
Mini winter olympic games were organised.
Mini concerts, finger puppet shows, stage performances were presented.
International chess competition was held
Several art and sports activities were organised.
Nursing home, school for disabled students were visited.

With the help of the project activities we were able to;
– move the issue to the European dimension
– provide opportunities for teachers from partner schools to work closely together and enhance transferability of experiences and expertise
– exchange measures and good practices about educational games with each other for tackling the absenteeism and ESL
– enable students to learn more about people from different cultures and traditions other than their own
– reduce ignorance, suspicion or fear of those who are different from themselves by knowing and understanding each other
– enable educators and students become more sensitive to the disadvantaged students
– break down barriers where all children will feel valued and can learn through classroom activities and games that gave kids the
opportunity to interact with different groups

Several art and music activities, workshops which have been added in the project will enable students to built up bridges between diverse groups in classes. We aimed to get the students’ attention on environmental issues by using many different types of recycling materials during activities. Such activities, workshop and community services were successful ways for prevention of early school leave.
Parent involvement activities that were effectively planned and well implemented will resulted in substantial benefits to children, parents, educators, and the school. The activities and workshops planned with seniors in nursing homes enabled students to understand and respect all the stages of life. Students co-operating in activities with disabled groups raised the awareness level and respect for the others.

The school councils had a key role in the development and running the project. Community participation was an important aspect of our project. We aimed to develop entrepreneurship, care of environment, mutual respect, friendships and teamwork skills. Team work and leadership skills will be encouraged through art activities and workshops. Throughout the project children from all schools communicated in English but all children also learned common phrases from the language of each country and had the opportunity to use and build on their own language skills.

Teachers were able to observe the teaching and learning activities on the spot during the transnational visits which helped them enrich their teaching methods and techniques. They were able to get information about the different cultures of each other. Teachers became more aware of how projects are run, the expectations and the positive impact on teaching and learning. This project gave teachers the opportunity, time, and space for innovation, teamwork, feedback, self-reflection and evaluation for continued professional development.

The project enabled teachers;
– be forward thinking
– be an eager learner for new teaching methods
– be a builder of relationships
– be equipped to teach all levels of learners
– be able to implement technology

EU Grant (Eur)

Funding of the project from EU: 163895 Eur

Project Coordinator

Kenan Cetinel Ortaokulu & Country: TR

Project Partners

• Scoala Gimnaziala Nicolae Iorga
• Ballysillan Primary School
• Joniskio r. Gasciunu pagrindine mokykla
• JYVASKYLAN YLIOPISTO
• Gondensino – E.E.P., LDA
• IES Fuente Grande