English Language For All Teachers

BODRUM, TURCHIA

30 giugno-4 luglio 2025

PREMISE

Two considerations:

-       Every lesson had different methodologies: we listened to the teacher, we worked in small groups, we were standing and doing physical exercises, we built small objects and billboards, we presented our ideas in front of the class, we discussed and exchanged ideas.

-      During explanation, the teacher underlined some English expression: she was going to create with us a vocabulary of English scholastic and pedagogical expressions for teachers. For the same reason we also used a book, The little prince, in the English language version.

30.06.2025

The first day I went to the place of course, I met the other participants and we were welcomed from the teacher.

Each one presented himself and we started activities. The teacher underlined the importance of focusing on the student’s needs and on social skills, not only on competences. For example: when and how do we let students communicate during lessons. Then we confronted each other about the importance of creativity and imagination and about critical and creative thinking. There was another interesting question from the teacher: where and who do I look at during my lesson? After this question we did an activity about leadership. In the end we reasoned how much it’s important for students to feel security, pleasure and confidence. We had a homework: we had to create a school programme for five days with creative activities every day.

01.07.2025

The theme was the creative thinking. The teacher showed us slides about the difference between creativity and innovation, about the benefits of creativity, about the creative process (design, brain storming, thinking, vision and ideas, research, inspiration): creative thinking is important because it drives new ideas, encourages and creates a safe space for experimentation and risk-taking. We commented on some Einstein words: “We cannot solve our problems with the same thinking we used when we created them”.

We had slides on abstract thinking, storytelling, drama techniques. We tried to answer to some questions, for example: why do students love acting? We talked about how important it is to create and build another character: the students feel themself freer. We had an interesting activity: we had to listen seven songs and to imagine which subject and which topic to explain on that.

02.07.2025

The teacher showed us some slides on the lateral thinking, supported by De Bono’s research: convergent thinking (using logic) and divergent thinking (using imagination) together make lateral thinking possible. We talked about what we have to do as teachers: also be a coach, a mentor, an organizer of their private education. What are the methods connected to the lateral thinking? Brainstorming, debate, discussion, conversation, sharing the ideas, practise, evaluation. We were invited to select and define ideas, to generate ideas, to capture and work with output: the result should be new ideas.

Then we worked with a slide representing six colorful hats or attitudes: process, facts, feelings, creativity, benefits, cautions. It would be important to have every colour attitude in a team of people. After a break, we had a nice game called Human bingo, by which students could know better their classmates.

03.07.2025

A question from the teacher: how can technology be useful at school? Each one of us had to build a programme of school activities made by tecnological tools. y sharing ideas and results we were able to learn about Padlet, Book creator, Kanva, Quizizz, Kinemaster, Plikers, Eduboom, Real animals, Plantnet, Google lens, Comica and other digital applications . We spoke about how was school during pandemia: for example in Türkiye there was a national website with lessons already prepared for teachers, video cameras during lessons were closed and there was a tv channel with public lesson for every type or level of school.

In the second part of the day, we had outdoor lesson and we went to an important place in Türkiye: Pamukkale.

04.07.2025

The teacher showed us slides on learning situations that we can carry out in class and outside: storytelling, living library, reader’s theatre, public cafè, flashmob. Later we focused on the collaborative learning and we had to find words, activities and strengths of this methodology. Then the time had come for the delivery of certificates, for photos, for best wishes and for a good cake.

In the second part of the day, we had outdoor lesson and we went to two important places in Türkiye: Mileto and Efeso.

CONCLUSIONS

Erasmus+ mobility was a great opportunity to grow, as a teacher and as a citizen of the world. The course was certainly the main learning activity, very rich in content and interesting, but not the only one: by curiosity, observation and meeting it was possible to learn continuously, every day for the whole day. Long live Erasmus!

Photographs