Hand in hand Erasmus Project

Project Title

Hand in hand

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 2020

Project Topics

This project is related with these Project Topics: Environment and climate change; Inclusion – equity; International cooperation, international relations, development cooperation

Project Summary

The project was motivated by raising and extending a previous online collaboration to the school level. In both schools have aimed to be more prominent the ecological education and practice. Collaboration between a normal school and a special school is unusual, although the pedagogical benefits of this are clear. At Fót, we do not ready for disabled students because our circumstances do not allow this. However, some students with mild (Asperger’s) autism are already being educated in an integrated way and we have an increasing number of other students with SEN, and learning and behaving difficulties (BTMN). That’s a need to educate our teachers and after that they can educate these special children with results.
Sensitization is an important educational task regardless of age. A group of 13 students originally worked on this etwinning project. Three have left school by today. First of all, we would like to involve the remaining 10 students from Hungary in the mobility as a continuation of the project work of the previous school year. And young people in Cyprus have the opportunity to go to a normal school to abroad, where they are welcomed and can show what they are capable of, despite their disabilities. This has given us a bit via of etwinning work, but it is of a different quality if done in person. The family background of the Cypriot students does not allow them to travel abroad and gain experiences in other ways. An important educational objective for students with disabilities is to strengthen them and broaden their social competences and empower them to lead an autonomous adult life. Each child has a different level of self-sufficiency depending on their condition and basic diagnosis.
We are planning two meetings, one in Fót and one in Larnaka with 10-10 pupils.
School visits inspire every student in our school, and in the Cypriot school, Hungarian students meet children who cannot travel. They can see how the children are educated there, and meet special educators there.
During the personal meetings and between the two mobilities of the project the theme of the planned activities is ecological education. Both schools consider it important, there are good practices in both places that we can learn from each other. In this way, sensitization and environmentally conscious education are carried out simultaneously. It benefits both schools as a whole, not just the students involved in the mobility.
Even before the etwinning project, there was a positive bias towards Hungary in the Cypriot school, as the headmaster and one of the staff had completed their tertiary education here and they speak Hungarian well. This is why the application can be made in Hungarian although the project implementation language is English. We, the Hungarian side, are trying to do the coordinating role for the first time, it is easier if we can do it in Hungarian, while the Cypriots can follow and participate in the application process.
It is a pleasure for our students to communicate in English and encourage them to learn more intensively. Cypriot students, depending on their condition are learning a foreign language, too though obviously this is a different level. However, children also find that there are many other ways to communicate besides language.
Our strong intention to share our experiences in our schools and out of the schools.

EU Grant (Eur)

Funding of the project from EU: 25130 Eur

Project Coordinator

Németh Kálmán Általános Iskola és Alapfokú Müveszeti Iskola & Country: HU

Project Partners

• AGIOS SPYRIDONAS SPECIAL SCHOOL