Berzelius
Start date: Jun 1, 2015,
End date: May 31, 2017
PROJECT
FINISHED
Our focus targets for school development at Berzeliusskolanl are mathematics, language development approach, grades and assessment, Learning Studies, internationalization and peer learning. These focus targets have been prioritized for a few years, and will now be developed further through internationalization and meetings with international colleagues. Our strategic development plan demands that we move perspectives of our focus targets outside of the school. The goal is to improve the skills of our staff and develop the focused goals of the school. The improved skills of the staff will in turn benefit the students and lead to better results in their education.
We have selected six partner schools that are working towards similar focus targets as our school. The Italian school is working with language development approach, which in our opinion, may result in a fruitful collaboration. The Turkish school is working successfully with mathematics, science and music, and the methods used here interest us and could contribute in our staff development. The Romanian school focuses on teaching about human rights and the concept of democracy, and that is a source for cooperation between our schools. Both Spanish schools in our application have slightly different focuses, which interests us and attracts us to visit both schools. One of the schools focus on technology, and we will have a future student exchange with this particular school in an upcoming K2 project. The other school works with language development and mathematics. This school also has an interesting concept for recess activities that we are interested in learning more about. Through job shadowing, and by sharing our experiences we will be able to develop our focus targets, and also be a part of developing the focus targets at the participating schools.
As regards to teacher training, and further education of colleagues the aim is to enhance the competence that teachers have in the various subjects that are related to the focus targets mentioned above. The course "English matters" combines educational structured training activities with classroom visits. Participants are given the opportunity to meet and interact with colleagues.
The course "Climate Change and Human Rights" in Portugal will teach us more about sustainable development and human rights. It appears to be a good course with excellent content, and it takes place both in- and outdoors. It will be carried out through presentations, workshop and travels and it will also enhance how we must work to reduce human activities that causes climate changes.
The course "Interactive Teaching - using educational / learning games in Order to Enhance Learners Motivation" is about developing e-learning materials and the use of digital tools in the classroom to motivate students. Students living is in many ways about games after school and this course will give the tools to make education more interesting.
The course "Using e-learning in the classroom" is all about how we can intergrate IKT in education by using a platform for teaching called Moodle.
The course "Immersion Courses in France for Secondary Teachers" is about developing the skills of the language teacher, and convey methodology that can be used in the classroom.
Number and profile of the participants:
24 colleagues will participate in this project. Some will participate in the courses described above, others will do jobshadowing with peers in the participating schools. The participants profiles: All the participants are teachers at Berzeliusskolan. Some are teachers in secondary school, while others are teachers in high school. All participants speak English at a level that will enable them to interact with colleagues at the participating schools. Some of the colleagues have been a part of an international exchange or project previously. These participants will bring with them their knowledge of international projects.
The results envisaged are that of improved skills of the staff and eventually the students. The staff will be enriched by the collaboration with peers abroad. The different methodologies of schools participating in this project will give all participants the opportunity to develop the focus targets at each individual school. All involved staff will at the end of the project have connections in Europe for further cooperation. Our project will be dissiminated through our communal network, politicians, parents, students and media. We will cooperate with our new collegaues through for example eTwinning but also other social medias.
The potential long term benefits will be that of life long learning, students better equipped to meet the challenges that exist in a global market (work, education, human rights), and staff better equipped to meet the challenges that are connected with modern teaching methods and the use of digital materials in the classroom.