Erasmus +

For primary school children, language learning is a significant step towards becoming successful communicators. Teachers must not ignore the value of early learning language skills. Research indicate that if teachers incorporate games and play in their instruction, English as a foreign language is better learned and used by primary level children. Teachers can improve motivation through games and encourage more interest. Teachers may also use appropriate games to help students develop self-esteem and self-confidence, which are both essential elements when coping with language learning. The partnership addresses pupils aged between 6-11 years in our classrooms. Starting from 8 or 9 years old children begin to grow a natural sense of curiosity of the outside world, fueled by the overwhelming amount of knowledge now accessible via the internet and smartphones. When handled wisely, this can be an asset and advantage in language learning.

The project also promotes English teachers’ professional growth and encouragement for self-improvement.

1. Promoting language acquisition and raising the participation of early-age students in language learning.
2. Raise student participation and encouragement.
3. To allow the sharing of best practices between EFL teachers across Europe.
4. To encourage English teachers to improve their careers.
5. Improving language learning and student skills development (by at least 10 points on a scale 0-100).
6. To build the self-esteem and confidence of the students in using English.
7. To cultivate respect for other countries, intercultural friendships and mutual acceptance/tolerance.

Teachers – primarily English teachers from kindergarten and primary level. In each LTTA activity we will ensure the participation of at least 3 of this kind of teachers / country. They will basically be primary level teachers that will be teaching EFL related lessons-and they will be in the spotlight for their work and tasks carried out during the implementation, both directly, by attending LTTAs, as well as indirectly, by implementing all the activities and games with their students before and after the exchanges.

Pupils-are engaged in the project’s online contact and cooperation, including playing games through their English lessons. The involved students will fall into the age group category 6-11, around 500 students altogether will benefit from the implementation. They will be at the center of all project`s events during the transnational conferences held periodically. Before LTTAs, they will participate in online meetings whereby they speak about their cultures and topic related subjects with their peers.

• C1 – Teaching with the help of games – existing practices in the partner countries.
• C2 – Using online games for teaching vocabulary and grammar.
• C3 – Teaching reading and writing by the help of dynamic and interactive games.
• C4 – Teaching listening and speaking with outdoor team games approach.
• C5 – Teaching English via online, interactive/dynamic and via various indoor / outdoor creative games.

Before the key events, teachers will work with their pupils on the topic of exchange, identify and test games and various activities. Based on the feedback received from the pupils, they choose the final activities they will conduct with host students during the LTTAs.

In C1, the host will organize table debates and workshops on the subject Teaching English through games approaches, in which participants give the presentations they had prepared and address the methodological implications of using games in language lessons.

In C5, participants bring together the activities and refine the final content and layout of the material produced – a free online database of

English games. All partners coordinate a local conference with teachers from EFL for disseminating results and sharing best practices.

Outputs: In C1 we conduct comparative analysis of partners` education systems, their EFL curricula etc. As a product of C2-C4, we will be developing 3 games sets which will be submitted during C5 to an open access portal and presented during the regional conferences. Other outputs include lesson plans produced in mixed teams, students` research, presentations about the partner countries, the recordings of the online meeting, the language portfolios, the twinspace, project`s website, the social media accounts, all the articles, testimonials, feedback papers, initial and final reports, the evaluation and the impact reports, the sustainability plan, the five local conferences held for disseminating the final results.

Improved professional human capital in schools while the English teachers grow effectively and build a European team that will collaborate outside the programme as well. Students will improve their English skills and and will therefore obtain better results at the end-of-cycle exams.

Kingsmoor Academy is smaller than the average-sized primary school. The majority of pupils are White British. The proportion of pupils who speak English as an additional language is higher than average. This is changing rapidly with a growing number of Eastern Europeans choosing to settle in the area and therefore changing the dynamics of the school. We are located in the town of Harlow which was built as a new town to house families from London after the Second World War, with a growing populations and lack of housing in London. We have 40 staff .The proportion of disabled pupils and those who have special educational needs supported by school action is below average. The proportion supported at school action plus or with a statement of special educational needs is slightly higher than average. The proportion of pupils who are supported by the pupil premium (additional funding given to schools for pupils who are known to be eligible for free school meals or in the care of the local authority) is slightly higher than average. We have 288 chldren on role with 43% SEN pupils, with the majority with speech and language and medical needs.

The current permanent principal took up post in September 2016. In her previous school she achieved the supported the school to achieve the Full International School Award. At Kingsmoor Academy we aim to create a caring community with high expectations where children are encouraged and enabled to succeed in all that they do. We aim to help pupils to achieve their all-round potential by providing a secure, happy, and stimulating learning environment. We aim to help pupils to become happy, inquisitive, confident, and motivated learners and citizens of the future.

We aim to work in partnership with parents to develop the children’s independence and foster a sense of responsibility for themselves, their behaviour and their learning, each other, the school community, the local environment and the wider, world environment. Staff embrace the opportunity to work with others to enhance the provision offered in school and embrace the opportunity to gain professional development form other professionals form other countries.

All of the teachers will take part in the project through a whole school involvement with the project and related activities. 5 out of the 8 staff have previous experience of taking part in international projects, including comenius, E-twinning, Erasmus+ projects and TIPD.

Our school educates students with special educational requirements in 3 forms of schooling:

• day schooling of children / students with special educational requirements (preschool, primary, secondary school, lower secondary school);
• homeschooling of non-transferable students;
• therapeutic-educational support services for children / students with special educational needs integrated into mainstream education.

We want to come to meet our students, to be able to prepare them for life and therefore we believe that participating in these projects could be to our advantage.

We are a family, not just a team and we have the same goals: to form healthy characters. The persons involved are: Director Liviu Moise, Psychologist Roman Augustina, Psychopedagogue Rodica Drăghiță, Psychopedagogue Dăneasă Mihaela.

We have no experience in previous Erasmus projects but we like challenges and we want to learn. We believe this project could be vital in helping our students develop both their English skills but also their interpersonal skills too.

I am a beginner, but I have already participated in 2 projects. I successfully completed both. I also received a quality certificate. My pupils enjoy participating in projects very much and want to work on more. I am also connected with my partner teacher who is kind and reliable. My headmistress and school management also support us and give us room for project implementation. I am grateful for this opportunity.

• Number of staff 65 (educators and teachers).
• Teacher in our school 53.
• Subjects – I teach English and German languages, history and human science.
• We are a public school specializing in robotics and foreign languages.
• We are a selective school – children must have good grades, are members of the Most handball club (Black angels).
• Our school can offer smart children, aspiring pupils, good staff.
• My motivation was to further develop my pupils in English language. I was very interested in the topics and my students wanted to participate in projects. And I’m a beginner and I want to learn new things.
• In our school, the people running the project will be Nikol Vavřincová, Martina Korandová, (Ondřej Václavek, Michaela Rejčová, Jana Miklovičová,
  Ivana Kůrková) we are reliable partners for cooperation.
• I want to improve myself as a teacher and speaker in a foreign language and I want the samee for my pupils.

 Nikol Vavřincová

Hasan Tan Primary School is a Public School in İstanbul, Üsküdar which has 758 students ages between 5 – 10 and from kindergarten ,1st grade to 4th grade.

Our School proceeds with 24 Primary School Teachers, 2 Special Education Teachers, 2 Preschool Teachers, 2 Special Education Teachers, 2 English Teachers, 2 Guidance Counsellor Teachers, 1 School Principal, 2 School Principal Assistants.

There is a Library, a Mind Games Class, a Robotic Coding Class and a Multipurpose Hall in our school. We have a lot of activities in our school such as National Folk Dances, Modern Dance, Drama, Mind Games, Chess, Robotic Coding. In 2015 “Call For Proposal” period, School Principal Tufan Arıca carried out a project of Erasmus+ KA101 Programme called “Teaching and Practicing Reading Policies in Europe”. He participated the 10 days courses in Germany, Portugal and Lithuania in 2016. Within the scope of Erasmus+ Main Action 2 Strategic Partnership Activity, Mr. Arıca was the Project Coordinator of the project named “I Learn With C.A.K.E, I Grow With C.A.K.E” between September 2017 and June 2017. It is a project which was eligible to be supported during the 2017 Call For Proposal Period.

Our School is one of the 400 schools chosen for “Harezmi Education Model” led by İstanbul National Education Directorate in 2019-2020.The eTwining Project “Twinners on the Road” conducted by the School Principal Tufan Arıca received the National Quality and European Quality Sticker in 2018. He also received the National Quality Sticker with “Smart Class” Project. One of our Primary School Teachers Metin Etçi is leading 3 eTwining Projects in 2019-2020.

School Principal Tufan ARICA has attended EU Project Preparing Techniques Course, Project Monitoring and Evaluation Techniques Course, İlköğretim Kurumları Standarts(İKS) Application and Evaluation Seminar, Teaching Communication Skills Educational Administration Seminar, Identifying and developing Web 2.0 Tools Course, New Approaches in Education Course, Interactive Classes in Fatih Project course. Our School staff attend the training given by Provincial Education Directorate and Üsküdar County Education Directorate.

Initial Meeting

Today we  have celebrated the first meeting with our partners of Erasmus project: United Kingdom, Turkey, Romania, Czech Republic. It has been lovely to meet all of them and we found it very useful to understand our project. This year is going to be difficult to be able to make videoconferences with the students of the different countries because the students are not at the school and they are not attending to the classes. They are working on line. We postponed the student experiences to September.

Next meeting is on 2nd March and the tasks to do before are:

• Some information about our schools and  the local area.
• How we currently teach English in our schools. What works well?
• What the main aims for our school for this project. What do we think we need to help with/improve on?

Hope that all goes well.

Meeting

The meeting was at 3:30 UK time with our partners by Zoom, the 2nd March. We have the aim to prepare a 5-10 minutes presentation that we can deliver to each other. It was included:

• Some information about your school, the local area etc.
• How we currently teach English in our schools. What works well?
• What the main aims for our school for this project. What do we think you need help with/improve on?

It was amazing to share our school curriculums and services. It was a pleasure  to meet us again and we have planned to book another meeting soon. Here we attached a picture to show you the zoom meeting. We are looking forward to seeing you soon.