Puzzling Europe Erasmus Project

Project Title

Puzzling Europe

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 2020

Project Topics

This project is related with these Project Topics: EU Citizenship, EU awareness and Democracy; Creativity and culture; Teaching and learning of foreign languages

Project Summary

STARTING FROM OUR INDIVIDUAL ROOTS, LEADING TO WHAT WE SHARE is the main idea of our project. We all have roots in our national cultures, local or regional identities which we have to be aware and proud of. Knowing, respecting and enjoying each other`s cultural uniqueness as well as sharing common values enables us to be an active part of the growing European community of people, “united in diversity”. The title of our project “Puzzling Europe” reflects this process of nations growing together, coexisting and cooperating, while we are always aware that we are different and unique through our cultural heritage, language, lifestyle etc., but alike in many ways. In our project we want to support this European process of growing together on the small scale, for the microcosmos of students, teachers and families involved. Getting to know each other, finding evidence of our similarities and differences can be puzzling, too, hence the title of our project.
This project fills the European idea with life for our 13- to 15-year-old students. Each partner school involves a minimum of 20 students, learners of general education, in the project. The great diversity of schools in our team, from all geographical parts of Europe, with different economical, historical, political or social backgrounds, offers a chance for most intense interaction.
Our activities offer a good mix of academic approach, creative thinking and – most importantly – practical doing. We have chosen the acronym PURE of our project’s title because our main focus is on simple, down-to-earth activities that relate to the students’ daily life. Students experience and appreciate the cultural heritage of the partner countries through traditional activities like singing folk songs, cooking typical meals of the partner countries and practising folk crafts. They interact and are physically active through sports, folk dances and traditional games. They improve their language skills by teaching each other lessons of their own languages and by comparing the structure, meaning and importance of proverbs in several languages.
Each activity needs intense use of spoken or written English. Learning languages gets a practical meaning for our students. English as our lingua franca is the means of understanding in this project, but we expect the students will communicate in other common languages like German or French, too. We hope to encourage our students in learning foreign languages, not just in school and in lessons, but through interaction with people from other countries in the project and beyond.
In five project meetings the students experience the partner countries’ culture and lifestyle, especially through their stay in host families. Like this, the project reaches many people in and outside school. Personal contacts demand tolerance and they help to overcome prejudice. In times of fake news, where social media seem to determine opinions more than reality, we want to give our students the opportunity to travel and see for themselves how peers from other nations live and think.
Our final product, the collectively created European Puzzle, symbolizes shared values and perspectives. It will be a lasting memory of the project spirit and motivation for students and teachers to take part in future projects.
We expect for our students an enormous increase of knowledge, competences and skills which will be fundamental in shaping their personalities.
Teachers are learners in all aspects of this project, too. One meeting of teachers, without students, gives us the opportunity of intense exchange on teaching methods and teachers’ working conditions. In this aspect, too, we expect to find similarities and differences, which will lead to enriching our own professionalism with ideas and experiences of the colleagues from the partner countries.
Only transnationality makes it possible to learn from each other in such a great variety of topics and fields. We need to look beyond borders to experience new ways, attitudes, mentalities and to overcome hindering routines and stereotypes. That’s why we appreciate this project as a unique experience which will form personalities and linger on. From previous projects we know that participating in an Erasmus+ project can be motivation for our students to go abroad after school and study or live in another country.

EU Grant (Eur)

Funding of the project from EU: 197725 Eur

Project Coordinator

Matthes-Enderlein-Gymnasium Zwönitz & Country: DE

Project Partners

• Hankoniemen yläaste
• Agrupamento de Escolas de Ponte de Lima
• Pagkyprion Gymnasion
• Osnovna Sola Verzej
• 1st Gymnasium of Heraklion