Radio Project with Chelmsford Community Radio Erasmus Project

Project Title

Radio Project with Chelmsford Community Radio

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: ICT – new technologies – digital competences; Creativity and culture; Regional dimension and cooperation

Project Summary

Two school years with restrictions also massively changed the project work and meant that the pandemic released new energies in the pupils involved in the project and their project work gave them psychological stability. These aspects in combination have given the project an extraordinary boost.
The original plan to create broadcasting modules for an already existing programme was completely changed. From March 2020, the students have broadcast a 60-minute programme every week and have personally exceeded their own expectations. With the return to face-to-face teaching, the programme became fortnightly segments. 50 programmes were broadcast. In the course of the project work, the students showed preferences and used their skills in a targeted way. Working independently in a team, planning the content, conducting interviews, translating and recording the broadcasts and editing the programmes, as well as leading workshops, has significantly advanced the students in their personal development. The broadcast segments were independently contributed and implemented by the pupils. In the context of all town twinning activities, this is the only project that runs regularly and shows that twinning is alive and well in these difficult times. All exchange trips and twinning activities were cancelled. That the radio project has kept twinning going is particularly noticed by the population and the municipal bodies. In addition, the radio project gave the pupils a sense of purpose in their actions in times of the pandemic and contributed to a positive sense of self, as the radio shows are not only broadcast in Chelmsford, but are received worldwide, therefore also in Backnang, in the family environment.
The mobility actions of the project could not be carried out. Both schools were creative and looked for other formats. The Boswells School had the idea of establishing pen-pals for different year groups. Pupils from both schools were interviewed on the radio programmes. Furthermore, virtual meetings took place, organised by the teachers involved or independently by the pupils.
Many students also arranged team meetings with their partners and joint activities across time zones and national borders. This also contributed to the expansion of the students’ digital skills and promoted the mental health of the students, who exchanged information about their daily pandemic life across national borders. Joint broadcast contributions could also be shared quickly and easily via digital channels. The students organised this channel on their own and thus used and expanded their digital skills in a targeted way. A podcast group was established at the Boswells School. For the supervising teachers at both schools, the last few months have also been particularly challenging and have demanded a lot, both privately and professionally. Keeping in touch with the pupils in everyday life was difficult, the pedagogical challenges great. Besides, keeping the project going was only possible because the students at both schools worked on the project mostly independently. The implementation of the project week in the curriculum of the bilingual lessons of year 7 could also be maintained because the pupils led the project week independently. Due to the expansion of the broadcasting contributions, the pupils have developed their competences on significantly more levels. Their linguistic competences have increased significantly and have measurably improved in class, in addition to self-organisation, independent work in a team and a high degree of professionalisation in dealing with digital media. The pupils’ broadcast contributions covered a much broader spectrum of the EU’s list of priorities and thus of priority topics because there was more room for them. Topics such as ecology, democracy education and globalisation were covered in different forms. The pupils became more aware of the role of radio in the context of the public broadcasting mandate because they are responsible for the complete broadcast content and thus have to meet the requirements. In these aspects, the project is clearly more advanced. Active partnership is lived and is anchored in the awareness of the population. The radio project is established and the strengthening of the partnership between schools and cities has been achieved. There is a great desire to enable direct exchanges with pupils from both countries in the future in order to get to know each other personally and also to carry out project work on site. To have carried out this project so successfully despite the pandemic fills everyone with great pride, provides a foundation for the permanent commitment of all partners and thus ensures the continuation of the project in the future.

EU Grant (Eur)

Funding of the project from EU: 18000 Eur

Project Coordinator

Max-Born-Gymnasium & Country: DE

Project Partners

• The Boswells Shool