app2d@te Erasmus Project

Project Title

app2d@te

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 2015

Project Topics

This project is related with these Project Topics: Intercultural/intergenerational education and (lifelong)learning; Key Competences (incl. mathematics and literacy) – basic skills; ICT – new technologies – digital competences

Project Summary

The general idea of our project “app2d@te” was to create a project that enhances our students’ and teachers’ ICT skills not only in the field of the usual office applications, but mainly in respect to coding skills, which importance increases every day.

We developped the idea for “app2d@te” because all participating schools agreed that the most important task of school in general is to prepare students for their future life, both private and professional life. In a world that is more and more digitalized and globalized, we believed that an international project providing our students with basic programming skills AND intercultural communication skills would help us fullfilling this important task in a very modern (app2d@te!) way.

The objectives of our project were to provide students with softskills they need for their life and a successful start into working life: motivation to work, the ability to unfold creativity, communication skills, a realistic self-assessment and the self-confidence to take weaknesses easy and to present strengths proudly. Also, we wanted to provide them with basic skills such as problem solving skills and a certain know-how in the digital world, which nowadays includes more and more coding.
We wanted to form a basis for individual learning, lifelong learning, teaching oneself and teaching others.

The project’s participants were about 18 students from each of the 4 partner schools in Finland, Italy, Portugal and Germany. They were aged 13-15 years with very different initial situations: Some found it easy to learn a foreign language, but were anxious about programming. Others were used to using computer software or have tried coding software, but were very timid when it comes to communication, especially using a foreign language.
This distribution of strenghts and weaknesses seemed to be a quite common phenomenon, not only among students but also among teachers (and other adults).
In this project, not only the students were the learning target group, but also the teachers.
The challenge of this project was to bring them all together and make them learn to benefit from each others’ strength in order to minimize their own weaknesses.

The variety of tasks and the methodology we used (e.g. peer-to-peer learning, indivual learning with the help of guidance videos, learning by doing, learning with games) helped everyone to become aware of their abilities, especially undetected abilities in the field of coding, and encouraged them to use the help of others where they felt unsure so that everyone could learn and teach each other at the same time and became highly motivated learners.

In the beginning of the project we started with a transnational teachers’ meeting where we made sure that the participating teachers are equipped with guidance videos to use in their classrooms and basic coding skills to be able to guide their students’ first steps into the world of programming.
The students got to know each other with the help of our Guess EU game (eTwinning project: a game to find a penpal). After that they started coding with the simple coding programme “Scratch” and made an animation about their schools which they shared in TwinSpace. Every school took part in the international “Hour of Code” week in December, where they had all students try out some simple coding steps.
During the first international teaching and learning activity, 4-5 students and 2-3 teachers from each country visited Finland, where they were taught how to use the 3D coding software “Kodu” and tried out LEGO robotics.
After the meeting, the coding skills were disseminated within the schools and the students coded different games.
In the second international teaching and learning activity, the participants learned about internet security and netiquette and provided their schools with rules and guidelines.
In the beginning of the second project year, another transnational teachers’s meeting took place to ensure evaluation and planning of the second year. Teachers learned how to use “Alice” (a gradually more difficult coding software than “Scratch” or “Kodu” that offers more opportunities) and “AppInventor” (a software to code apps for the use on smartphones or tablets) to use in their classrooms and make coding experience with the relevant software.
During the second project year, students learned during two more international teaching and learning activities how to use “Alice” and “AppInventor” software and designed their own animations and applications.
These learning games and the guidance videos and guidelines are the products of our project.

We are sure that not only these products but also less measurable results such as for example a change of attitude concerning learning and ICT and coding, better communication and foreign language skills and a better self-confidence are the positive impact and long-term benefit of our project work.

EU Grant (Eur)

Funding of the project from EU: 89350 Eur

Project Coordinator

Leine-Schule Neustadt & Country: DE

Project Partners

• Lumijoen peruskoulu
• I.I.S. “Falcone-Righi”
• Escola Secundária Antero de Quental