Fairy Tale Bridges of Europe Erasmus Project

Project Title

Fairy Tale Bridges of 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 2018

Project Topics

This project is related with these Project Topics: Inclusion – equity; Teaching and learning of foreign languages; Quality Improvement Institutions and/or methods (incl. school development)

Project Summary

The Fairy tale Bridges of Europe is our first approved Erasmus+ KA210 project, that we coordinated. The idea for the project dates back to the time of the Comenius projects, when we experienced how great impact international activities can have on kindergarten work. To make it easier to connect with children, we once again chose a world of fairy tales that is close to children. A project was created the way that touched on social inclusion and early language teaching, two priorities of our organization. We chose the areas because we wanted to deepen our knowledge in the field of social inclusion, learn about the challenges they face in other, related organizations across Europe, learn new ways to solve these challenges, learn examples of good practice and share experiences with employees in partner organizations. We chose the field of early language teaching, both mother tongue and foreign language, as we have many years of experience in this field. We wanted to pass on our knowledge to preschool teachers across Europe, but we also wanted to get acquainted with the methods of early literacy in other preschools and schools, methods of working with children in multilingual families and good practices in learning a foreign language for preschool and first grade children.
We invited 5 partners to the partnership, including two newcomers in the field of Erasmus + projects, and the amazing journey began. Each partner organization is a specialist in one of the areas we wanted to strengthen; we all come from different cultural and / or geographical areas and face different social groups and different challenges. We hoped for a diverse range of activities, methods and examples of good practice, and we got it.
We planned 5 learning / teaching / training activities, one in each of the partner organizations. Each meeting had a specificdifferent – topic related to the objectives of the project. The host organization, which is also an expert in the field covered by each meeting, prepared lectures, presentations and other activities to disseminate knowledge and gain international experience, and each partner had to prepare an analysis of the situation in each field in their own organization and country and present specifics. Thus, we ensured knowledge of the situation in the project areas in all partner organizations and countries. We successfully carried out 3 physical mobilities, and then the Covid-19 pandemic crossed our plans. Despite the extension of the project for a period of one year and a great desire to carry out physical mobility, due to unstable conditions, safety of participants and limited time, we finally decided to hold the last two meetings virtually. Our final conference was also held in virtual form. It was attended by 74 teachers and preschool teachers from all over Europe.
During the individual meetings of the partners, we were in constant contact and Vrtec Galjevica, as a coordinating organization, coordinated the work and supervised the current performance of certain tasks. In this way, we ensured that the project was “alive” all the time and that the participants had a sense of information and active involvement.
When we applied, we anticipated that we would achieve a lot in the project. We can proudly say that we have achieved all the results. Mascots have come to life in all partner organizations, some will continue their project path in new projects, the fairy tale book includes more than 10 fairy tales from 5 countries, an electronic manual for English teachers will soon enrich many foreign language lessons in all partner organizations, and the voice about our project spread among the general and professional public with the help of many publications in print and electronic media, proceedings of professional conferences and professional journals.
The long-term effects cannot yet to be seen, but we anticipate that they will be noticeable especially in the field of international involvement of all partner organizations, more frequent use of fairy tales in working with children with special needs and greater motivation and self-confidence of preschool and school teachers in foreign language teaching.
All partners have already joined new Erasmus + projects in 2020, and we also plan further cooperation in a joint project and eTwining projects.

EU Grant (Eur)

Funding of the project from EU: 77184,29 Eur

Project Coordinator

VRTEC GALJEVICA & Country: SI

Project Partners

• Zakladni skola a Materska skola Opava – Male Hostice, prispevkova organizace
• Vedruna Escorial Vic
• Vrtec Crnuce
• Nuova Direzione Didattica Vasto
• Djecji vrtic Obzori