United but different: cultural identities – European values – shared challenges Erasmus Project

Project Title

United but different: cultural identities – European values – shared challenges

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 2019

Project Topics

This project is related with these Project Topics: Cultural heritage/European Year of Cultural Heritage; EU Citizenship, EU awareness and Democracy; ICT – new technologies – digital competences

Project Summary

In March 2021, Pius-Gymnasium Aachen and its two partner schools, the Colegio de Bachillerato in Barcelona/ Spain and the German-speaking branch of the F. X. Šaldy-Gymnázium in Liberec/ Czech Republic, successfully completed their joint project “Together, but different: cultural identities – European values – common challenges”. From October 2019 to March 2021, a total of 190 pupils aged 15 – 18 took part in our project, as the project planning had roughly predicted in advance. However, due to the Corona pandemic, an encounter in presence could only take place in Liberec and Barcelona in October 2019. The planned return visit to Aachen in March 2020 was cancelled due to the lockdown situation in Europe. A virtual meeting could not be prepared in the short time available for this date. However, due to the ongoing pandemic situation in Europe as a whole, the planned encounters in October 2020 and March 2021 were conducted as virtual encounters that were prepared and conducted via the European learning platform TwinSpace, which also served to document all our results (cf. https://twinspace.etwinning.net/91884/home).
At the end of our project, we can finally say that despite the pandemic conditions, we were able to work on the content of all planned four modules that were to be covered over the two project years. As partners we worked together in a product-oriented manner and were thus able to lay the foundation for our interactive, digitally supported touring exhibition as it originally had been planned. We can present the following results: The first module dealt with national and cultural identities and the deconstruction of common stereotypes. We conducted an online survey in each country with 100 participants in four age groups, analysed the survey digitally and presented the results graphically on 7 roll-ups for our exhibition visitors. On the basis of the evaluations, the students* critically examined the topic of national stereotypes and made explanatory films, which received an audio track in our languages of encounter: German, Czech, Spanish and English. The explanatory films were programmed in an app for the planned exhibition so that visitors to the exhibition can access them in their preferred language via tablets in tablet stands. In October 2020 module 2 (European values and European identity) took place virtually from the participating schools’ locations , as face-to-face teaching was possible at that time. Based on a digital brainstorming with the tool AnswerGarden, the pupils*’ ideas about cohesion in Europe were collected in advance and visualised in initial collages; exhibits were generated. An impulse film introduced the pupils to the European values. In nationally mixed groups, they worked out explanatory texts on the various values via Etherpads and transferred the resulting texts into QR codes, which were made accessible on cardboard cubes for an exhibition. For 12 EU values, 12 cubes were created; each cube shows a QR code with an English, German, Czech and Spanish explanatory text behind it. The pupils* also designed logos for their values for the exhibition. Module 3 (European Heritage Sites) and Module 4 (European Challenges) were combined in the virtual meeting in March 2021. All pupils* were in a domestic lockdown and were supervised online by their teachers*. They were first introduced to the topic of “cultural heritage sites” via an impulse film and then familiarised with the digital tool Padlet for creating digital pinboards. In pairs, one German and one Czech or Spanish pupil each created a pinboard on a European heritage site on the basis of a requirement profile for the Padlet. The pinboards are available as PDFs and digitally and could be made accessible in an exhibition as posters and via link. They were made available to the school community in excerpts and via link in the annual magazine of Pius-Gymnasium. In Module 4, the pupils* engaged with three different explanatory films on the basis of an accompanying worksheet: pro and contra EU, the history of the EU and the ten biggest problems of the EU. Afterwards, the two partners met via Jitsi or Discord for an interview. They exchanged their personal views on the problems, advantages, disadvantages and challenges of the EU. Together they were to document their interview entitled “Next Generation EU” via Etherpad. The interviews are available as PDF files for documentation in the exhibition. In the remaining school year, all participting schools carried out an evaluation of our joint project and led through a follow-up. All coordinators of the schools involved kept themselves busy with drafting their final reports by the end of August.

EU Grant (Eur)

Funding of the project from EU: 63062,9 Eur

Project Coordinator

Priv. Bischöfliches Pius-Gymnasium & Country: DE

Project Partners

• INSTITUCIO PEDAGOGICA SANT ISIDOR, S.A.
• F.X.Saldy Gymnasium