Geocaching In and Out the Classroom – Minds on the Move Erasmus Project

Project Title

Geocaching In and Out the Classroom – Minds on the Move

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: Creativity and culture; ICT – new technologies – digital competences; New innovative curricula/educational methods/development of training courses

Project Summary

Geocaching In and Out the Classroom – Minds on the Move We were 7 partner schools (with general education and vocational courses) from 7 different countries: Italy, France, Greece, Lithuania, Poland, Portugal and Spain. We worked with students aged 14-17, some of them were brilliant and very motivated, but a big number seemed to have lost interest in school and academic subjects; they needed to be sort of triggered in order to activate their learning potential. In our schools we also had relevant percentages of students with special needs, of any kind, and difficult social background. There were students from different ethnic groups, some of them still having problems with our countries’ main language; others came from poor communities and they had financial difficulties. In order to cope with this situation teachers were already using new teaching methods with a cross curricular approach – team/group work, class projects, peer to peer activities, new forms of learning outside the school e.g. museums, labs, theatre, educational trips and workshops, practical activities to develop soft skills, vocational courses, work placements, cooperation with the local institutions or business enterprises, participation to international projects. All these initiatives also involved disadvantaged students. More than two years ago Geocaching was not very much used in schools (and actually it is still quite uncommon), yet for us it proved to be a powerful way to arouse our students’ curiosity and put their minds on the move. The basic idea was quite simple: Geocaching is a treasure hunting game that exploits the use of a Global Positioning System (GPS) as well as other navigation tools to hide and seek a logbook, or objects, information, directions…, things which geocachers call “caches”. So, basically, Geocaching is an entertaining way to explore unknown places, usually a valid alternative to other more common free time activities; but we envisioned we could exploit its potentials to produce flexible, creative, innovative teaching/learning units and modules. Using the same approach and tools, and sharing our good practices, we created some Geocaching Trails in order to offer our students a first-hand-experience on some key areas: Tourism & Geography, Art, Food & Sports, and Science; each set of trails including INclusive prototypes that allow any person, no matter their impairment to perform it. At first teachers learnt how to devise effective Trails exploiting each partner’s expertise and background, then students tried, tested and validated the trails. In a second phase of the project, students learnt how to produce geocaching experiences by themselves and they thus became involved in peer-to-peer activities, inside their schools, but also for the sake of their local communities and, during some Blended Mobilities, their international friends. The creation of Geocaching Trails required the use of competences acquired with other key subjects like Maths, Information Technology, Physics, and Foreign Languages. These subjects are often perceived as difficult and boring, but presenting them as necessary to accomplish tasks relevant to the results of the project they became more meaningful and students’ performances and motivation in dealing with them improved significantly. At the end of the two years the partnerships produced and shared a series of Geocaching Trails that have been added to the school syllabuses and can enrich the students’ curriculum. In addition, the learning-by-doing process enabled students to acquire soft (transversal) skills that are extremely useful in their future lives: team work, critical observation, cooperation, negotiation, problem solving, resilience, creative thinking. To run the project, each partner school appointed a National Team/Club that coordinated, promoted and managed all the activities. There were also expert classes engaged in the validation process and all the school communities were able to participate to the school dissemination and training events. All the outcomes are now public on our webstite – https://geocachingerasmus.weebly.com/ – and several dissemination events have been arranged to share the expertise acquired. Local Education and Tourist Boards were involved and sustained the project by making results available through their platforms. Local media were invited to official events on several occasions in order to understand the potential of the project and advertise it. Thanks to the Project Website all the Trails are made available to a wider number of users, for an unlimited period of time. Our common goal is to teach in a positive environment, to students who are happy to attend school, and we strongly believe Geocaching gives our bows some extra arrows to shoot. The aim is to make students ready to meet the world challenges with a stronger sense of who they are, what they know and their potential.

EU Grant (Eur)

Funding of the project from EU: 160700 Eur

Project Coordinator

Istituto Professionale di Stato Giuseppe Ravizza & Country: IT

Project Partners

• Lycée Lucie Aubrac
• Vilniaus Juzefo Ignacijaus Krasevskio gimnazija
• Agrupamento de Escolas do Algueirão
• IES MORAIMA
• Zespol Szkol Ponadgimnazjalnych nr 2 w Kielcach
• GENIKO LYKEIO DIAPOLITISMIKIS EKPAIDEFSIS EVOSMOU