Lessons on the past – keys to the future Erasmus Project

Project Title

Lessons on the past – keys to the future

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

Project Summary

The motivation for this project is the advancement of digital learning methods with a high degree of learner activity. As lots of digital tools tend to put the learners into rather passive roles, our schools have sought for approaches to digital learning that put students into more active roles. In the field of general didactics, Jean-Pol Martin proposes the LdL method (Lernen durch Lehren) where the students become teachers to increase learners’ activity (see www.ldl.de). We aim to introduce LdL into the field of digital teaching.
Our schools have already gained considerable experience in using a digital learning platform called “itslearning” (www.itslearning.com). This platform offers the possibility to create digital learning environments, which are a self-explanatory combination of materials, tasks and tests that enable the learner to choose an individual path of learning. So far these digital learning environments have only been created by teachers. We’d like to involve the students in the creation process of digital learning environments. To create digital learning environments, suitable content is needed that is both interesting and motivating for the participating students. For this project, we focus on aspects of joined history between Norway and Germany that are still relevant today and might become even more important in the future. Those aspects are for example historical trade links in the era of the Hanseatic League compared to contemporary economic connections.
Our project therefore has four main objectives. First and foremost, it aims at developing the participants’ digital competence by jointly creating digital learning environments. Secondly, in dealing with important chapters of history connecting Norway and Germany, the students gain a deeper insight into their countries’ shared history and resulting contemporary implications. Thirdly, to organize their international cooperation and optimize their results, the students train self-assessment and peer-reviewing. Finally, the project will contribute to the development of their foreign language skills both written and oral because English will be the main language of communication.
Regarding the participants, the project involve about 85 students aged 16-18 as well as 5 teachers from Walddörfer-Gymnasium in Hamburg and Knarvik vidaregåande skule in Knarvik. In Germany, the students will be the same over two years while in Norway a new group joins the project in the second year. Additionally, teachers from the two involved schools and teachers from other schools in the respective regions will be trained in the third part of the project. Finally representatives of itslearning will train the teachers involved in the project and representatives of historical institutions will take part in the project, too.
The centrepiece of the project’s activity is the creation of digital learning environments. Before the students are introduced how to build these environments, the teachers will be further trained at the itslearning headquarters in Bergen/Norway. After building digital learning environments with a national perspective in the project’s first part, the students will meet in Hamburg to discuss their work and start binational work in the project’s second part. There the focus will be put on combining the different national perspectives on a common historical topic. In the beginning of the third part there will be a second student meeting in Knarvik. There the German students will introduce the new Norwegian students to the project and new binational groups will be formed for the third part of the project. In the latter the students will focus on a new historical topic with a systematic focus on contemporary implications. In the end teachers from both schools and their surrounding regions will be trained on how to use digital learning platforms to increase learner’s activity. In terms of methodology, the project hinges on the above mentioned LdL approach. Furthermore, self-assessment and peer reviews will be used as guiding principles.
The most tangible result of the project will be the digital learning environments created by the students in the three project parts. These will be used both as examples for teacher training towards the end of the project as well as teaching material in history classes in the following years. Thus the project’s products are aimed to have a longer-term benefit for students and teachers in both schools and beyond. Secondly, the students’ and teachers’ digital competence and language skills will increase. Thirdly, by focusing on the shared history between Norway and Germany, the students will gain a deeper understanding of our shared European heritage and common values, which will facilitate the students’ orientation in a a globalized world.

EU Grant (Eur)

Funding of the project from EU: 52814 Eur

Project Coordinator

Walddörfer-Gymnasium & Country: DE

Project Partners

• Knarvik vidaregåande skule