OVERVIEW

It is commonly known that, together with a high quality education in new fields, mobility and collaboration between Europeans, especially within the educational and academic community, is the main purpose of Erasmus Programme aiming at the European Union integration. However, no one could approach anything beyond their own country and culture, if they had not previously begun with what significant exists in their local environment, let alone if their local history and monuments have ecumenical dimensions. Ιt is also equally important what could bring together different nations, ages, languages, religions etc.

What else, if not the Art, could be the most successful interconnection bridge? Under this reasoning and according to objectives and priorities of the “Strategic Partnership” (Key Action 2), Music High School of Kavala intends to be approved as Coordinator in a new project based on the following double pillar:

1. on the Art, particularly on Music Art and Education;
2. as well as on the common European cultural heritage.

The project “Singing and Making Melody in your Heart” (SIMAME) aim at raising awareness on intercultural competences through implementing a set of cultural and art activities such as singing (choral ensemble), painting and visiting archaeological sites and historical landmarks, particularly on music art and education, as well as on the common European cultural heritage, to drive the production of a novel pedagogical approach for the schooling sphere.

The anticipated competences addressed by project SIMAME are globally: mutual knowledge, respecting and understanding foreign cultures; appropriate socialisation; collective activity as learning motivation in education; promotion of social cohesion and European active citizenship; encouragement of the intercultural dialogue; promoting motivations for learning foreign language; cooperation between people from different cultural backgrounds; intercultural communication through the international language of art and the creation of a choir; improvement of skills such as the abilities to work as part of a team and to interact with other social stakeholders, and; improvement students’ sense of self-esteem.

Regarding the first pillar of our Project, that is the art of Music, we aim to give more emphasis on it, because of two reasons: a) the type of our School specialises in Music art and education and b) Music incorporates in itself everything, being simultaneously international language, history, religion, mathematical science etc. It also includes even the second pillar of the project being presented now, that is all the main roots of what is European culture and values: ancient Greece, the Roman Empire, and Christianity.

In this context, we do not isolate any type of the world music, particularly our Greek folk music in common with ‘Byzantine’ choral music or the relevant “ottoman music”, as parts of the whole Mediterranean and European types of music. That’s why Music High School of Kavala, starting from it, plans to organise festivals, conferences, concerts and online educational programs on the Art of Music.

IAAD designs and produces an OER platform incorporating the learning activities with a focus on non-technical competences, so called "soft skills" or "behavioural know-how". The platform allow an open access to all project's results. Its creation and maintenance by IAAD until 2025 represents a key instrument for learning activities, but also dissemination and multiplication developments, whilst providing conditions for awareness and understanding of the project. Culture and arts initiatives increasingly tap into the broad solution-oriented field of social innovation in the schooling sphere to amplify their impact upon their communities and audiences using approaches such as immersive technologies (AR, VR and XR), which will be explored with a focus on real life applications.

Coordinator: Music school of Kavala, Greece

Partners:

• Asociación de Innovación Formación y Empleo para el Desarrollo Sostenible, Spain
• Agrupamento de Escolas de Paredes de Coura, Portugal
• I.I.S.S. "Carlo Maria Carafa" Mazzarino, Italy
• Mousiko Scholio Trikalon, Greece
• İstanbul Avrupa Araştırmaları Derneği (IAAD), Turkey (Istanbul)

Erasmus+ results platform (soon to be released)

Website

Facebook (soon to be released)

Under development