Visibility of eTwinning Projects Group July 2023 Newsletter
how the Hands on our Future project was born . Its name has a twofold meaning : employing practical activities connected with the real world and empowering students to make changes in their lives so that they contribute , according to their age ( 13-14 year-olds ), to the achievement of the sustainable development goals .
Partners All the three partners are accredited institutions in the field of school education : Școala Gimnazială ” Otilia Cazimir ” Iași , Romania ( 2022-1-RO01-KA121-SCH-000055602 ), Escola Diocesana de Navas , Spain ( 2022-1-ES01- KA121-SCH-000054476 ) and OŠ Gustava Šiliha Laporje , Slovenia ( 2022-1-SI01-KA121-SCH- 000057912 ).
Objectives We aimed at giving our students the necessary knowledge , skills and values to address interconnected global challenges , such as consumerism , fast fashion , lack of basic facilities , unsustainable use of resources , with the purpose of empowering them to take informed decisions and individual or collective actions to change our society .
At the same time , our goal was to help learners become familiar with some cultural aspects of the countries involved in the project , while using English and ICT tools .
Topic The general topic of our project was sustainable development but , as this is a vast field , we chose to focus our attention on three SDGs , according to our needs and strengths : SDG 11- Sustainable cities and communities , SDG 6-Clean water and sanitation and SDG 12- Responsible consumption and production . However , as the sustainable development
goals are interdependent , we basically touched all of them .
Methodology The pedagogical approach used in our project was project-based learning ( PBL ). In PBL , students study the curriculum guided by a meaningful question to explore ( called essential or driving question ), a challenge to design or create something , or an engaging real-world problem to solve . Before they can accomplish this , students need to inquire into the topic by asking questions and developing their own answers . This does not exclude teacher ’ s traditional involvement , who organizes facilitation activities or lessons . To demonstrate what they learn , students create high-quality products and present their work to other people , preferably outside the classroom , according to the topic . Students often do project work collaboratively in small teams , guided by the teacher . According to the Buck Institute for Education , PBL is “ a systematic teaching method that engages students in learning important knowledge and 21 st century skills through an extended , student-influenced inquiry process structured around complex , authentic questions and carefully designed products and learning tasks ”.
We started from the general essential question How can I , as a teenager , become a more sustainable person ? We organized facilitating activities and guided our students towards individual and collective research in order to elaborate personal answers to the question .
Activities The project consisted of an introductory module and three main ones , each corresponding to an SDG : Sustainable cities
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