Rebuilding Primary Education with Mind Games Erasmus Project

Project Title

Rebuilding Primary Education with Mind Games

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: Key Competences (incl. mathematics and literacy) – basic skills; Research and innovation; New innovative curricula/educational methods/development of training courses

Project Summary

Rebuilding Primary Education with Mind Games (ReMindGames) project is based on the idea to make educational and social lives of students more meaningful and valuable by using Mind Games and to rebuild an innovative and modern understanding in education. Our goals are lined with the prority of using innovative methods like mind games at school as implied in 2020 Erasmus+ Guide.

With this Project, we aim to adapt the Mind Games to the curriculas indirectly, produce new mind games, exchange of games in different countries, organize national/international tournaments so on. and improve the psychosocial, competitive, collaborative and basic skills of our pupils. We have 5 partner schools from primary level. Our partners were selected by questionnaires and pointing method by the applicant organization Agrupamento de Escolas Trigal de Santa Maria. The questionnaire was added the to eTwinning, Facebook and Erasmus + Partner Finding portals. 12 answers received, then a Mind Games SWOT Analysis Questionnaire was sent to these 12 schools. After the selection, this partnership with the following 5 schools has been set up:

a-“Yedi Kuyular Primary School”, Antalya/Turkey, with 695 students of 5-11 aged, and 30 teachers.
b-“The Direzione didattica III° circolo B.Bonsignore”, Mazara/Italy, with 670 students 3-12 aged, and 70 teachers.
c-13th Primary School of Rethimno”, Rethimno/Greece, with 280 students aged of 6-12, and 30 teachers.
d-“Colegiul National de Informatica Matei Basarab” Valcea/Romania, with 780 students aged of 6-19, and 32 teachers.
e-“Agrupamento de Escolas Trigal de Santa Maria School” Tadim/Portugal, with 870 students aged of 3-15 and 63 teachers.

Each partner has stakeholders wiIn-school activities, pre-primary and primary level students will take part. Student age group is between 5-12. Thanks to the Mind Games Teams that will be created on the basis of classes, a wide range of students will benefit from the internal and external effects of our project. Each partner school will select at least 20 students to work in project teams actively. Participating students will be selected through questionnaires / interviews and scorring method.

After our SWOT Analysis applied in partner schools, it became evident that partners needed a more effective educational program and innovative methods. 97.1% of the 104 teachers who participated in analysis stated that mind games affect students mentally and socially in a positive way, 90.4% stated “Mind games help to prevent early school leaving”, only 46.2% stated that they are partially aware of the mind games in different countries.

We anticipate to reach the following objectives in the light of our SWOT Analysis:

1-Interaction of 5 partner schools to increase the use of the Mind Games in our schools by at least 70%
2-Producing at least 3 new mind games per partner school
3-Reducing the rate of early school leaving with the active learning environment and the problems of disadvantaged students by at least 50%

Our project is a prototype based both on the integration of Mind Games into school programs and on the exchange of good practices in European countries. In connection with the EU 2020 goals, our project will focus on:

*reduce early school leaving rates *gain innovative & cognitive competences *increase academic and personal achievements, enhance democratic values and social cohesion *promote international cooperation activities *improve linguistic skills

For the objectives and long term benefits above, the following concrete results will be put forward:

1-“Mind Games Research and Article”
2-“Mind Games e-Platform”
3-“European Mind Games Handbook/Booklet”
4-“Rebuild Education With Lesson Plans!” activities
5-“Mind Games National and LTTA Tournaments
6- e-Twinning ReMindGames projects

*We planned 5 Short-term student exchange for exchanging good practices. Participants will be 10-12 aged and from 4th-5th grades. 4 students and 2 teachers will join in each LTTA. LTTAs and the project will be combined with eTwinning and LTTA events will be transferred to the portal as content. Students will learn to cooperate in the best way via e-Twinning and will join online meetings and feel better before the LTTAs, also effective and constant dissemination will be fulfilled thanks to the virtual exchanges. They will learn storing, using web tools such as Padlets, and understand the main idea of the project through the e-Twinning. Through the tournament activities, they will develop group working, empathy, making analysis, critical thinking, researching competences and reinforced with permanent learning. Thanks to our project, the participants will make new friends, expand their EU citizenship identity, internalize respect for diversity as well. Innovative synergies that will be formed with this project activities, our schools will work to embed a more systematic, practical and active learning approach in organizational structures.

EU Grant (Eur)

Funding of the project from EU: 133596 Eur

Project Coordinator

Agrupamento de Escolas Trigal de Santa Maria & Country: PT

Project Partners

• Yedi Kuyular Ilkokulu
• DIREZIONE DIDATTICA “III CIRCOLO BALDO BONSIGNORE”
• Thirtheenth Primary School Of Rethymno
• Colegiul National de Informatica Matei Basarab