4th student exchange in Greece

4th student exchange

25-29 November 2019

Athens, Greece

The students spent five days together with their peers and stayed at host families to get acquainted with Greek culture and lifestyle. They attended Chemistry, Maths and English lessons to get familiar with the Greek education system. The students presented their findings on their towns from the minorities’ point of view and showed the promotional videos made about their own towns. They also participated in project and team-building activities in mixed-nationality groups and took part in cultural events to learn about each other’s traditions establishing friendships, communicating in foreign language, learning each other’s mother tongue, gaining teamwork skills in an international environment. They visited places that are part of Unesco Heritage and took part in workshops to create their own European Heritage tours and make preparations for the formal debate.

By the end of the mobility the students had improved their acting and argumentative skills through drama and debate activities.

All participants' intercultural, linguistic, social and digital skills were developed and all the activities as well as acquired knowledge and skills were documented in Europass Mobility documents.

The main theme of the mobility in Greece was National Heritage sites, our towns from the point of view of minority groups, drama and debate. Students and teachers took part in the normal activities of the Greek school taking part in lessons and workshops. The participating teachers observed lessons and took part in discussions with a view to exchanging good practices.

Before the mobility, students had done a research about their towns’ minority groups and their associations interviewing various community members. During the mobility they presented their findings in presentations and also played the promotional videos they had prepared. Students had also done some research about different Unesco Heritage sites of their countries and collected information, pictures and links, all of which were used by multinational student groups that created presentations on itineraries for a European Heritage tour. Students also prepared for and participated in a formal live debate on the topic of ‘Sustainable urban development is a myth’ and they did an excellent job presenting their arguments.

All the activities planned for the meeting could be fully completed and these activities had a strong team-building effect and contributed to the strong relationship between partners.

FORMATIVE ACTIVITIES:

Digital skills: creating digital presentations, creating films

CLIL workshops for students on the topic of Chemistry (soap making), Maths (The Golden ration) and English (problem-solving activities).

Drama workshop for teambuilding and improving cooperation and creativity.

Live Debate 4: A formal debate on the topic of urban development. „Sustainable urban development is a myth.” The students were prepared for the debate during workshops. Prior to the meeting they had also brainstormed and exchanged ideas on the topic on a forum on Twinspace. The debate was recorded and shared.

Project meeting for teachers: the participating teachers discussed issues related to project implementation and planned the forthcoming activities. They also set the dates for the online debates and agreed on activities related to Christmas. Evaluation tools were also designed and the activities until the end of the project were revised. The next student exchange was prepared.

WORKSHOPS:

Students took part in interactive quizzes created by their peers on national heritage sites

Students planned and presented European Heritage Tours based on the materials students had compiled before the meeting.

Workshops were organised to prepare students for the live debate.

STUDENTS PRESENTATIONS on the topic of the meeting: Our towns from the minorities’ point of view. Greek students presented during the CLIL lessons.

EXHIBITION of the results and collaborative products: presentations of the Heritage tours and the live debate.

CULTURAL VISITS.

During the sightseeing tours students acted as tour guides in order to practice their language and communication skills as well as strengthening their connection to their national heritage. The following cultural visits were organised:

- Visit to the shooting range field and The National Resistance Museum in school’s vicinity in memory of the aggression and innocent victims of 1944.

- Tour around the Byzantine churches of Athens

- Visit to Panathenaic Stadium, which hosted the first modern Olympics games.

- Visit to Basil & Elise Goulandris Foundation, which hosts a fascinating collection of Modern Greek Art as well as some masterpieces of European painters

- Visit to the Acropolis and the Acropolis Museum.

- Visit to Delphi Archaeological Museum and site

- Visit to Kaisariani Town Hall

Every visit was combined with guided tours and interactive tasks.

DISSEMINATION

The presence of foreign students and teachers was known by all school students, parents, and staff. Local authorities, representatives from the schools of the region as well as the media were invited to attend project activities. A meeting with the mayor was organised and the project was promoted. Every activity and result has been published on all project platforms and the participating students and teachers gave a presentation to their peers within their own institutions after the mobility.

EVALUATION

At the end of the mobility the participating students and teachers completed questionnaires with observations, assessment and comments. Their experience was analysed within project teams and their reflections were collected in the project blog in the form of a diary as well as different testimonials about the experience. A blog entry jointly edited by the partner countries was made for each day. In the fourth project newsletter (compiled by the Greek team) a detailed description of the mobility is given accompanied by reviews written by all partners.