Romania

The third meeting was held in Batanii Mari, Romania on November 8-12, 2021. The subtopic of the mobility was “Tolerance through my eyes” and the main objective was to shoot a film with the same title. In addition, the calendar of the project as well as the seven-language dictionary were created. In addition to the students and teachers from Estonia, Lithuania, and Turkey, 28 students and 11 teachers from the host country took part in the event. Unfortunately, COVID did not allow our Portuguese friends to attend the event this time and they joined us virtually.

Before the mobility, students were asked to put down the national holidays of their homelands. To do that, GoogleDocs sheet was created by the hosting country and the document was filled in by the students of participating nations. To create the dictionary, the hosting school brainstormed common phrases, inserted them in English as well as Romanian and Hungarian in Drive to be translated by the rest of the participants.

The film, however, was shot on the spot. To begin with, the first part of the movie was filmed. The part is entitled “What is tolerance to you?” To do that, the students were first divided into five transnational groups. Then, they were asked to brainstorm ideas they associated with tolerance; later, they had to select 4-5 most important / relevant ideas and write them on sticky notes. After that, representatives of every group introduced their ideas, explained them if needed and stuck the notes on the whiteboard. Finally, every student was asked to pick out the most important idea for them and present it in the movie, which was filmed afterwards. To shoot the second part of the film, every group was given a topic (e.g. animals in zoos; the elderly; the physically / mentally disabled; ethnic minorities; refugees etc). They were asked to discuss whether the given issue posed any problems in their countries, what the government could do to solve the problem, and what an individual could do. The groups were told to ensure that each member within the group could express their opinion both, during the group work as well as in the movie. Finally, every group’s ideas were filmed. The movies were shown on the last day of the mobility in the final ceremony.

In addition, every participant could take part in a handicraft workshop in which students could try their hand at beadwork and make bracelets. The 2-day tour in the region of Transylvania gave everyone a chance to get some knowledge about the local culture and history.

Romanian team, thank you for an exciting week!!!