The heritage of the past, the experience of the present and the promise of the future Erasmus Project

Project Title

The heritage of the past, the experience of the present and the promise of the future

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 2017

Project Topics

This project is related with these Project Topics: Integration of refugees; Creativity and culture; EU Citizenship, EU awareness and Democracy

Project Summary

Based on Theodore Roosevelt sentence ”The more you know about the past, the better prepared you are for the future” we have planned and implemented our project.
Our main objective was to find out the links between different cultures that make up the European Union, compare them and draw conclusions about the differences and similarities that enrich and unite us. And satisfactorily during our visits to our partner countries our students and we as techers have learned a lot about their history, culture, language and traditions.
Another focus of our project was “migration“:
We have worked alot and made a lot of researches on migration to Europe in general and specifically the reasons and results of migration in each single partner country in this project. We have made a lot of interviews on different topics, we have visited refugee camps, we have made posters, we have made video films about their expectetions, their lives now and their future plans.

Another main topic was laguages: We have made researches about the disappearing languages, what can be done tohelp them survive, the importance of mother langiage, also for the refugees and migrants, we have talked about the importance of bilingualism and multilingualism in our globalised world.

The basic purpose of the project was to train individuals and to help them to integrate into the cultural identity of our age, to approach everyone with respect and understanding of different cultures, to recognize cultural richness and diversity, to see culture as an area for creating not demanding resources, and to believe in the necessity of creating economic and social sustainability.
Based on these purposes we have addressed the following topics in this project:

1.Intercultural dialogue: for example: our workshops on “Being different being unique”, cooking workshops, painting t-shirts

2.Linguistic diversity: for example: our dictionary of words of friendship in 5 languages: Turkish, Italian, German, Spanish, Macedonian

3.Common Cultural heritage: for example: our visit to places like Blue Mosque in Istanbul, which was a church, then a mosque and now a museum about two religions

4.Globalization and disappearing cultural identities: for example: our survey about disappearing languages

We have contibuted to intercultural dialogue between five partner countries in our project. Our students who took part in this project, their parents, their families and many other people and institutions who somehow came in contact with this project have experienced the lives of people from another culture and have most probably improved a sense of understanding, a sense of belonging, and a sense of being a community as a whole, especially being a European community, where we have no more checks on the borders.

1. With the help of our workshops for example theatre workshop in Germany about role plays, interviews we did in Italy with the refugees, videofilms we did with our migrant neighbours, and researches on the Internet our students have gained a tool for the prevention and resolution of probable conflicts they may have in the future. They have also learned the respect for human rights, democracy and the rule of law for example as a result of making a power-point presentation onthe rights of refugees in Europoean countries.

2. With the help of a survey, and researches and powerpoint presentations on one´s own knowledge of languages our students have improved a sensibility towards their own multilinguality and towards disappearing languages. They have improved respect for linguistic and cultural rights, peaceful co-existence in multicultural societies and the preservation of our biocultural heritage.

3.After learning more about our parner countries´ social values, beliefs, religions and traditional customs and history our students and we as teachers as well have gained the ability to identify with others from similar and different mindsets and backgrounds. This project has provided an automatic sense of unity and belonging within a group and allowed us to understand previous generations better and the history where we come from and thereby to understand the mindset of the new generation who have their roots in the old civilisations.

4. As a result of our various and multifaceted activities our students have learned about identity and cultural diversity and we suppose that these skills will help them live and work together in diverse communities, both in their country and the whole world. This ablility will also help them develop their identity and sense of belonging which are fundamental to their personal well-being and the achievements of a flourishing and cohesive society, where there is no preudices, no discrimination and no wars.

5. We rose awareness for the safeguarding of common cultural heritage in EU countries and to strengthened the student´s understanding of the importance of the past of nations and countries on their lives today and in the f

EU Grant (Eur)

Funding of the project from EU: 119808 Eur

Project Coordinator

Geschwister-Scholl-Gesamtschule & Country: DE

Project Partners

• IES Cañada Real
• IIS GOBETTI MARCHESINI-CASALE – ARDUINO
• Prendergast school
• BAYRAMPASA TUNA ANADOLU LISESI
• LPo Albert Camus
• Sredno opshtinsko uchilishte Gjorche Petrov