Visibility of eTwinning Projects Group July 2011 Newsletter
-----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------wonderful drawings that illustrate the different
fables, made by Polish pupils.
The result of collaboration with another school in
Poland was an online magazine and guide. The
pupils of both schools produced a guide in the form
of a PowerPoint of their respective provinces and
three issues of a magazine online called Dialogos.
Both the guides and the magazine were made
entirely by students, who for the first time tried
not only to write but also to lay out a newspaper.
They exchanged e-mails and news about the
organization of their schools using English as the
language of communication. The eTwinner school
was recognized by the Polish Agency for its work.
Some important data related to the countries with
which the Italian schools have implemented or are
implementing projects state that out of about five
thousandth projects approved in 2005-2010 by the
Italian Agency, more than a thousand were made
with Poland, that is to say that this country has set
up a quarter of projects with Italian schools. There
are 32 countries involved in eTwinning, the
European Union plus five others that do not belong
to UE, ie Croatia, Iceland, Norway, Switzerland and
Turkey. The reason for this close link between the
Italian schools and the ones in Poland has attracted
the interest of national unit responsible for the
school in the two countries.
An eTwinning project is an excellent teaching tool,
which is valid for all disciplines. In particular, to
learn the history of our country through the eyes of
students from another country; to compare the
geographic features and how they affect society; to
see how cultures can cross. The students exchange
information about their living environment, talk
about their schools, their countries and regions,
discover that their common house is Europe and
that, therefore, they must take care of it in the
same way they take care of their own. Generally
speaking, in eTwinning projects the work of schools
juxtapose, without any of them being in a closer
connection. It is in the vows of those who care
about eTwinning to arrive, some day, at a true
fusion: it means that eTwinner schools, working
together, get a result that enhances the common
work.
In my school, in recent years, we have organized a
dozen projects, obviously with different results, the
quality, or otherwise, of them has been determined
by the choice of topics, more or less in line with the
interests of students, but also from participation
and relationships with partners, diligent or less
constant, friendly or too formal, and yet the setting
given to the project from the outset, agreed or
simply accepted.
I tried to bring eTwinning projects in the curricular
activities of my school, believing that the