We in Europe – open-minded, but locally rooted! Erasmus Project

Project Title

We in Europe – open-minded, but locally rooted!

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 2017

Project Topics

This project is related with these Project Topics: EU Citizenship, EU awareness and Democracy; Teaching and learning of foreign languages; Creativity and culture

Project Summary

In recent years, our students have increasingly faced the conflict that the idea of European unity and community in peace and freedom that emerged after the Second World War and its terrible consequences is now confronted by a current of dangerous nationalism.
The requirement for schools is to make adolescents fit for Europe in many areas and the challenges of an increasingly technological and digitised world. Foreign languages are necessary to be able to communicate with others. For this purpose, we use digital media and an increasingly complex technology in many areas.
Our project helped students in these areas to learn and use the responsible use of new media in these areas.
They were also confronted with their own history in the classroom and experienced the achievements of democracy and the building of our society.
On the other hand, the students worked intensively to get to know and appreciate their own homeland. This made them aware of their own national identity.
Our project helped to work out and look at these two areas. As the title of our project “We in Europe – cosmopolitan but locally rooted” already made clear, our focus was especially on the interweaving of European, cosmopolitan and home-connected, local thinking. It made it clear that the two approaches together are important for us and our future, and not mutually exclusive.
Two schools – the Ruka School from Finland and the Ritter-von-Spix-Schule from Germany – were involved in the project. Both schools had already carried out a Comenius project and have known each other ever since. For this reason, it was possible to draw on existing contacts and to build on them.
Although the structures of both countries are different in their own way due to the different geographical conditions, there are also similarities. Both schools are located in cities with a similar population. Also comparable is the respective immediate proximity to a conurbation. (Kuusamo or Erlangen-Nuremberg)
The project lasted 33 months and began with a joint project meeting. Here the implementation of the individual sections during the duration of the project at the respective schools was discussed. In addition, a questionnaire was prepared to recognize what students mean by homeland. This was then evaluated during the project duration.
In the following, the two schools focused more on the concept of homeland in the classroom. The results were presented to the public during a summer festival.
In addition, an overview of regional traditions in the course of the year and special sights of our city was created on the homepage. At the end of the school year, the actions were documented in the school’s annual report.
The second year was marked by student exchanges. Here, a Finnish group of students in Germany was visited and vice versa. The students were accommodated in host families. A contact between exchange students and their host families took place in advance via letters and privately via Whatsapp and Instagram. The students documented their stay in a portfolio and reported on the exchange in a general meeting. Contributions were also published in the annual report at the end of the school year.
In the third year, the European idea would have been at the heart of it. It was planned that all classes would deal with the topic of Europe during the project week in the classroom. A project week, in which the project theme was to be taken up by all classes and presented with the participation of a delegation of the partner school at a German-Finnish school festival (03/2020 in Finland, 04/20 in Germany) with the participation of a delegation from the partner school, did not come about due to the pandemic. Nevertheless, some results were published on the homepage of the Ritter-von-Spix-School.
In addition to the increase in knowledge of the students directly involved in the exchange in relation to foreign language learning (English, Finnish and German), they also learned more about the use of digital media. The entire school family also got an insight into the peculiarity of another nation through this project, but also saw the similarities that unite us. The school family learned to appreciate their own identity, but also to be open to others.
There was also an opportunity to deepen the existing contact with the Ruka School.

EU Grant (Eur)

Funding of the project from EU: 67352 Eur

Project Coordinator

Ritter-von-Spix-Schule Mittelschule Höchstadt & Country: DE

Project Partners

• Rukan koulu