Water can make a difference – we can make a difference Erasmus Project

Project Title

Water can make a difference – we can make a difference

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: Environment and climate change; Key Competences (incl. mathematics and literacy) – basic skills

Project Summary

Our partnership consists of 4 secondary schools from Italy, Spain, Slovakia and Germany. In all countries the impact of climate change has recently gained broad attention when young adults and especially students started to demand urgent political action to combat climate change by organizing and joining ’Friday for Future’ strikes in many European cities. All countries of our partnership have been hit by different effects of climate change. Spain faces the problem of water shortage, whereas Italy experiences heavy rainfalls and floodings. Slovakia notices an increase of floods and long-term droughts and a decrease in water resources and Germany has to deal with weather extremes and also struggles to meet the European climate goals.
Therefore the main goal of our project “Water can make a difference – we can make a difference“ is to raise awareness among the students, the new future generation, and to stimulate active participation in fighting climate change and its impacts. In the project the students learn how important water is for life by first looking at and examining visible impacts of climate change today e.g. floods, dry soil, pollution and then start thinking about planning the(ir) future in a more sustainable way, e.g. by creating future visions of cities and by designing and performing lessons for other students via MOOC (Massive Online Open Education Course). This way the participants of the project try to convince more students to actively support a more sustainable lifestyle.
In every country about 20 students (12-14 years) per project year will participate and become aware of the challenges of environmental protection and climate change. Every year different students and teachers will work on the impact of climate change and ways to meet this challenge. The necessary mobilities will be used to bring students and teachers from our schools together to work collaboratively in international teams on the various aspects of climate change (floods, pollution) and possible solutions (e.g. sustainable future cities) as we strongly believe that this problem can only be solved together the way it has just been suggested by the European Union and their “Green Deal“ plan.
We want to give a large number of students the chance to stay with a host family in a foreign European country, experience its culture and make new friends.
In the first year of the project the students examine aspects of climate change in their own countries and thus analyse the current problems they have to face. By comparing correlated cases of flooding, droughts or pollution, the students find similarities and differences in causes of these problems with water and realize how it is connected to climate change. By also exploring how their own cities have used water in the past and how it has changed until today,they understand the meaning of water for their environment and life in general. This will motivate them to find sustainable ways of using water and working with water. Possible solutions thought up by local associations and institutions will be included but the students will also create own ideas of how to deal with the problems. All these issues will be used for lessons the participants will design for the MOOC. By designing the MOOC the students will improve their ICT skills and by preparing the lessons they will use motivating methods mainly based on cooperative learning.
In the second year of the project the students will work in a more practical way by creating future scenarios or future cities that are sustainable and show how problems of climate change can be overcome. Those future cities/scenarios can be build by hand or can be designed at the computer. The participants learn how water can be used in a more sustainable way in the future and in a second step will create new lessons for the MOOC.
The idea of the project is to use the final product, the MOOC, to teach younger students about the importance of climate change. Because the lessons are created by students, we expect the younger children to respond to them easily. As the lessons will contain for example videos and quizzes, the younger children will learn in a playful, motivating way about serious issues. Thus they will not only become aware of the impact of climate change but will also want to save their own future by using more sustainable resources. Therefore the participants of the project will go into primary schools and teach younger children, but we would also like to encourage other teachers to use the lessons or to let their students create new lessons on climate change aspects.
The project will also serve as an important part of a more intensive collaboration with local institutions such as institutions for protecting nature and environment (e.g. Station Natur und Umwelt in Wuppertal).

EU Grant (Eur)

Funding of the project from EU: 131808 Eur

Project Coordinator

Erich-Fried-Gesamtschule Wuppertal & Country: DE

Project Partners

• INSTITUTO DE EDUCACION SECUNDARIA LA VAGUADA
• Istituto Comprensivo Sassuolo 4° Ovest
• Zakladna skola Okruzna 17, Michalovce