Play Seriously, Learn Playfully Erasmus Project

Project Title

Play Seriously, Learn Playfully

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: ICT – new technologies – digital competences; Key Competences (incl. mathematics and literacy) – basic skills; International cooperation, international relations, development cooperation

Project Summary

Although the project period had to be extended and the last phase of the project period was full of challenges due to the uncertainty caused by Covid19, we still could achieve the aims we formulated in the project plan. The international cooperation between the four participants /College San Francisco Jesuit High School, Tudela, Spain, Thisted Gymnasium STX of HF, Denmark, Kostka Public Jesuit High School, Krakow, Poland and Fenyi Gyula Jesuit High School, Miskolc, Hungary/ worked well and together we were able to tackle the difficulties and find solutions. Even the final product, the board game was created, its paper version was produced, and its online version was shared locally and internationally with the project participants Through the project period, each mobility was well prepared and followed the structure outlined in the project plan and as a flexible solution to the restrictions caused by the virus, the last mobility was successfully realised as an online mobility.
Participants could enrich a lot by the international cooperation; both students and teachers could understand the different educational systems of the participant countries. As a result, we could merit from the good practices implied in the school’s everyday practice, which was an additional result of the project.
In each mobility, 21st century teaching and learning methods were applied. Parallel to creating the board game these innovative activities also made possible to transform the participant schools into a digital laboratory, which was exciting and fun at the same time. Students acquired critical thinking skills and promoted their media and digital literacy to a great extent. This outcome was achieved both as a result of the content of activities organised in the mobilities and as a result of the methodology applied there. Each school contributed to the success of the project with their own expertise, which made the mobilities colourful. Students learned a lot about responsible Internet use, the possible dangers of personal data misuse and could recognise how social media can alienate people while playing board games can build community and the fact that playing together can also mean learning together.
During the mobilities also in the follow up activities, special emphasis was put on developing the soft skills of the students and of the teachers, which enhanced collaboration and communication. The evaluation following each mobility proved how much participants enjoyed the project work and the social and cultural activities, too. Families hosted students and this way everybody could experience cultural differences at close quarters and it worked very well, students and teachers made long-lasting friendships. The cultural and social activities were also organised in a creative, lively way, thus students could learn about different nations in a playful way e.g. in a treasure hunt. Cultural programs were integrated into the mobility timetable to gain insight into the cultural heritage of each country allowing participants to enjoy the colourfulness of Europe from south to north and from east to west.
Creativity played an important role in each and every activity that also contributed to the success factor of the project and motivated teachers to renew their teaching practice and made students realise that learning could be fun. The teachers also created an activity bank via Google classroom.
Another success factor of the project was that we could involve more students and teacher as we originally planned. It partly meant that the host country could activate at least five extra teachers to prepare and actively participate in the workshops and ten extra students could join the project team on the spot. In addition, we invited partly new students and teachers to the different mobilities. It also resulted that extra effort was made to prepare the participants and to provide needs for students from unstable background; it practically meant financial aids and language tutoring. Following each mobility we shared the results with the whole school by giving presentatios on the learning and cultural activities of the mobility.
The project management worked hard to implement the project results and harmonise the different expertise participants had, we used various online tools to achieve this e.g. Zoom conference, Google classroom, eTwinning, etc.
The final product, the board game shows the richness of the participant countries and the game promotes learning about the participant countries in a playful way and exhibits the creativity of the students, as it is totally the fruit of their work. They together worked out the design of the game by using different digital apps and put the questions and rules together. The product itself is a proof that collaboration is fruitful and you can learn playfully and play seriously.

EU Grant (Eur)

Funding of the project from EU: 107873,8 Eur

Project Coordinator

Fényi Gyula Jezsuita Gimnázium és Kollégium & Country: HU

Project Partners

• COLEGIO SAN FRANCISCO JAVIER
• KOSTKA Publiczne Liceum Ogolnoksztalcace Jezuitow im. sw. Stanislawa Kostki
• Thisted Gymnasium STX og HF