Be fair – take care! Erasmus Project

Project Title

Be fair – take care!

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: Health and wellbeing; Environment and climate change; Social dialogue

Project Summary

Participating in our project entitled “Be Fair-Take Care” were five small primary schools from the following European countries: Austria, Cyprus, Finland, N. Ireland and England (up to 600 participants including all staff and pupils). The students at each school had limited experience of different cultures due to their rural location. The project aimed to broaden these experiences introducing children to other experiences and ways of life and introduce a common European identity.
The main objective of our project was to help students to change a part of their lifestyle in order to be fair to themselves, to others and to the environment. An understanding of healthier lifestyles and taking care of the natural world is essential for all Europeans. We believed that if we could change some of the habits of our students, they could be a catalyst for change in their family and in the wider environment for a more sustainable future.
Some of the activities which supported our aims are as follows;
• Taking care of ourselves:
we read stories such as ‘Little I am- me’ and ‘Elmer’ and created our own stories, discussed the idea ‘I feel well when’, made posters to communicate this, talked about healthy and unhealthy lifestyle. Every school had a healthy choice topic where they focused on sleeping, eating and physical activities to promote well-being. Across the countries there were competitions to motivate the children, for example a skipping competition.
• Taking care of others:
we shared and swapped friendship stories and songs, communicated with pen-pals, participated in group skype sessions, hosted European school staff and studied children’s rights. To help them learn more about their European friends’ everyday life we sent mascots as reporters to every school to find out about their habits, pertaining to lifestyle, fairness and environmental issues which were recorded in a diary. All of these activities drew out similarities and differences between the countries.
• Taking care of the environment:
we looked at humans’ carbon/ ecological footprint, how to select Fairtrade or local produce, grow healthy food and herbs, recycle waste, using junk for modelling and art, reduce litter including a litter collection and understand how energy is generated and how to conserve it.
As a result of these activities children across all of the countries have developed healthier lifestyle habits seen in ways such as preferring Fair Trade products and asking parents to buy them, anecdotal stories of children wanting healthier foods, choosing healthier modes of transport and taking up new hobbies and handicrafts such as playground games, skipping etc. Children now try to use in their everyday routine some of the “tricks” we presented to them in order to reduce their litter and take care of their environment.

Teachers also benefitted by getting to know the educational systems of the participating countries, experiencing different styles and methods of teaching and exchanging materials with foreign teachers. The establishment of relationships between teachers of partner institutions in a professional and personal dimension was another great benefit of the project. The need to speak in a foreign language in order to communicate improved the knowledge of a foreign language for the staff involved. Their ICT knowledge was improved as well.

This project had a whole school impact. Schools have strived to encourage all involved persons to keep these new habits after the end of the project in order to achieve long term benefits to both themselves and the wider world. Some schools have raised their profile in the local community through communicating about the project. We have seen a domino effect in the lifestyles of the children, and that collectively a bigger difference can be made for well-being of themselves and others. Therefore, we believe this project could have a wider impact than for our five schools.

EU Grant (Eur)

Funding of the project from EU: 60030 Eur

Project Coordinator

Volksschule Scheffau & Country: AT

Project Partners

• GORRAN PRIMARY SCHOOL
• DIMOTIKO SCHOLEIO KATO POLEMIDION 17 – MELINAS MERKOURI
• Pyhällön koulu
• Gamlingay First School