From old to new and back again: studying European cultural heritage through time Erasmus Project

Project Title

From old to new and back again: studying European cultural heritage through time

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; Creativity and culture; EU Citizenship, EU awareness and Democracy

Project Summary

The project ‘From old to new and back again: studying European cultural heritage through time’ (EHON) was a cooperation between an Art Study Program in Belgium and one in Italy. Its aim was to cooperate on the topic of cultural heritage to show the students that our cultures share certain values and also differ in others. In this project students would not only get to know the other culture, but also their own in a more profound matter.

The first half of the project was more or less carried out as planned. There was a preparatory visit from the Belgian teachers to the Italian school in September 2019. The Itallian teachers had already visited the Belgian school the year before so the preparation phaze in each institution went smoothly. The teachers prepared the students for the project, prepared the necessary teaching activities, carried out research on the topics,… Also an Etwinning project was started up and its Twinspace was used to share some activities at the home institutions.

The first leg of the exchange, in which the Belgian students visited Palermo from the 10th to the 15th of February 2020, was prepared and carried out. Only one week later Italy went into their first lockdown. During this first exchange week, students were immersed in Italian culture, art and traditions. The Belgian students stayed in host families which maximized the cultural confrontation: living in an Italian family for a week, often with family members that sometimes only spoke Italian, being confronted with a more tactile and extravert family life, trying out traditional food and drinks, often made deep impressions on our students. The students got acquainted with culture in Palermo and worked together on the project with their Italian counterparts. After a one-day touring of the most famous landmarks in Palermo, they created a joint comic book together and got an insight into different ways of teaching art. It turned out there were quite some differences in the way artistic subjects were taught in Italy and in Belgium, which made the learning experience also from this point of view richer and more in depth.

The second exchange week, in which the Italian students would have visited Belgium, was unfortunately cancelled due to Covid. The pandemic situation at that moment didn’t allow any travel and schools were closed at that moment in both countries.
We applied for an extension of the project, hoping to organise the exchange in the fall, but since the Corona-situation never improved drastically, the mobilities were nog carried out . We still tried to start up some joint initiatives, but teaching was mainly online complete focus lay on reducing the learning delays from the previous year. Hence the student groups did work on sharing cultural heritage and showed to the other group what they had done at school (e.g. a Sicilian cookbook, a Sicilian buffet, a mixed art project on old-new heritage, personalized heritage postcards,…), but they were not able to work together on the second outcome of a joint exhibition.
Again due to covid-restrictions the final exhibitions could not be carried out and dissemination of project results was mainly carried out online.

We still are convinced though that this project has been a true learning experience for the students involved: they became aware of the cultural heritage surrounding them, they were confronted with a different cultural mindset during the family host-stays, they learned about different kinds of art and cooperated with other future artist. Most of all though, we think they have grown on a personal level: they have become more independent, more self-confident and have grown in their reflection and cooperation skills. The positive effects are evident in the results of the Questionnaire both Belgian and Italian students have answered at the end of the project. More than 80% of those who answered are more aware of belonging to Belgian or Italian culture while almost 90% think their feeling of being European has increased. According to their personal experience 70% think communicating in English has improved after participating in the project; 37% have developed personal relationships while 43% feel they have become more self-confident.

Also for the schools themselves this was an interesting project: the art division have gotten to know each other better, the ties with external organisations such as the heritage service of the Annuntiates and the Palermo Museums were intensified and the educational value of cultural heritage has become clearer. The ties between the partner institutions will continue through a newly approved KA2-application and the long-term cooperation possibilities with heritage players have been specified in a new development plan. In Belgium, also a new application together with the heritage service has been approved under Eramsus+. So we hope this project will certainly continue to leave its traces in the coming years.

EU Grant (Eur)

Funding of the project from EU: 17390 Eur

Project Coordinator

Heilig Hartinstituut Pedagogische Humaniora & Country: BE

Project Partners

• LICEO ARTISTICO STATALE CATALANO