Visibility of eTwinning Projects Group July 2011 Newsletter
-----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------eTwinning: Virtual Travels Around
Europe Without Troubles and Extra
Costs
By Cinzia Colaiuda
Cinzia Colaiuda is a teacher of German at Istituto
d'Istruzione Superiore "Ovidio" in Sulmona, Italy
and an eTwinning Adviser.
The integration of eTwinning projects into the
curriculum or their use as after-school activities can
be seen as a new way to teach or to learn foreign
languages and to ―meet‖ other cultures through a
simple mouse click.
You only need a computer and an Internet
connection without extra costs for you or for your
school. With a little bit of sense of adventure you
can start a virtual travel around Europe with your
students discovering many of the obvious, and a
few of the hidden, facets of other European cultures
and populations.
Are new technologies an unexplored universe for
you? Don‘t be afraid! Your young pupils, real digital
natives and contemporary Ulysses in a connected
world, will help you to surf beyond the pillars of
Hercules through the Internet meanders. Here you
will find a community of teachers that will be your
educational consultants and facilitators if you have
any problems. Furthermore, eTwinning always
presumes in-service training phases for European
teachers through several training activities and
events.
If you think eTwinning means problems with pupils,
parents, teachers and head teachers, you can sleep
soundly. With eTwinning your pupils can work in a
protected virtual space with other European
students by using synchronous / asynchronous
communication and socialisation forms. This
educational area is not only a secure place where
they can learn how to become European citizens,
but also a language training venue where they can
use foreign languages or their mother tongue in a
natural and spontaneous way. Furthermore, the
development of eTwinning projects supports their
flexibility, creativity and spirit of entrepreneurship.
Sitography:
Communities of practices
http://www.infed.org/biblio/communities_of_practic
e.htm
Key competences for lifelong learning
http://ec.europa.eu/dgs/education_culture/publ/pdf
/ll-learning/keycomp_en.pdf
Education and training 2020
http://europa.eu/legislation_summaries/education_
training_youth/general_framework/ef0016_en.htm
http://eurlex.europa.eu/LexUriServ/LexUriServ.do?uri=OJ:C:
2009:119:0002:01:EN:HTML
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
In this way eTwinning promotes a new form of
intercultural and plurilingual education, and
encourages a democratization process of language
acquisition towards the main goals of the new
European strategic framework ―Education and
Training 2020‖ (ET 2020).
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