Stars in Europe Erasmus Project

Project Title

Stars in Europe

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 : Strategic Partnerships for Schools Only

Project Call Year

This project’s Call Year is 2016

Project Topics

This project is related with these Project Topics: New innovative curricula/educational methods/development of training courses; Natural sciences

Project Summary

The project “Stars in Europe” aims at the implementation of modern teaching methods, at the promotion of science and at inter-departmental collaboration. The project started with a rarely used telescope housed in an observatory cupola on top of a school. And with astronomy regarded as a highly complex field of black holes, dark matter or string theory, to many people this particular brand of physics, like unfortunately so many areas of natural sciences, seems complicated and unrelated to anything of practical importance. The fact that stars are represented in many pieces of art and literature and that we often refer to model characters as stars (the criteria for which differ depending on time and culture) adds another level to this topic which offers both, a practical and a cross-curricular approach to learning. So the project developed with the two premises of “stars” and “practical work/ application across the curriculm” in mind, underlining the importance of the natural sciences and its connection to many aspect of the world (in contrast to the often isolated view of many students). Our objectives were the popularization of scientific and connected thinking, starting from oberservations and discussing them. This way students learn about sciences, about using a common foreign language on a purpose that has nothing to do with foreign language classes, and they learn about each other.
We are a group of four schools from Siauliai/ Lithuania, Karlsruhe/ Germany, Montalbano/ Italy and Varda/ Greece. None of our students speak English as a first language, so they all meet on equal terms. The schools are different in size, organization and intellectual outlook, so we could use the different approaches to the humanities, to project-oriented work or simply to forms of teaching to learn from each other. We involved our students in active, cross-curricular and to some degree self-organized learning, so the schools and teachers had to adapt to these requirements as well, which also offered a welcome opportunity for school development.
First, students engaged in night sky observations in all four countries, they learned about constellations and the myths behind them, the atoms and molecules that make up stars and the universe and ancient and modern methods to gain knowledge about the Earth and the universe. Students applied their knowledge by establishing various astronomical instruments in our schools: Visible ones like sun dials so there is a permanent reminder of our project on school campus; and seemingly primitive instruments like astrolabes and planispehres, so future generations of students can take their first steps into astronomy by relying on their own eyes.
Second, students measured the level of light pollution in all four countries by using a modern, easily accesible tool, an app on their smartphones, and compared and discussed the data. We rose the awareness of our students to the significance of light at night which can have an effect on future planning of lighting reduction measures and in any case it raises students’, parents’ and neighbors’ awareness for their environment.
Third, the metaphorical idea of stars or leaders as model characters: leaders change over the times and they are different from culture to culture. Who are and what makes them leaders- students found out about present or former stars and leaders, they collected and analyzed biographies, found criteria and tried to establish cultural patterns. All this required a lot of communication and relying upon each other.
Finally, students worked intensely on the representation of stars in arts, retracing myths and beliefs about starts in literary and artistic work and creating a wide range of pieces of art, showing their own creative approach to the topic, thereby connecting the seemingly isolated natural sciences with their own experiences and everyday life, deepening the understanding of science’s importance.
Apart from the visible results of our project, like the astronomical devices or our leadership guide that build the basis for further work in this area, this project also encouraged teachers to integrate the cross-curricular work on the natural sciences in their curriculae and to use innovative teaching methods, which many future students will profit from. However, we deem the most important long term effect to be about communication, about raising cultural awareness and about bringing Europe closer together. Through this project, every participant was able to experience the importance and advantages of the European Union and of being a European citizen, which is a value in itself.

EU Grant (Eur)

Funding of the project from EU: 87955 Eur

Project Coordinator

Max-Planck-Gymnasium & Country: DE

Project Partners

• Istituto Statale d’Istruzione Superiore “Pitagora”
• GENIKO LYKEIO VARDAS ILEIAS
• Siauliu Lieporiu gimnazija