„SCHOOL CLOSER TO EUROPE” Public Primary School N°1 in Głuchołazy Number of teaching staff: 34 Number of schoolchildren: 408 Number of classes: 20 The school is located in a small town and that is why we may often hear the opinion that these types of institutions tend to be old-fashioned, fossilized and they do not create any space for their students’ development because they present a poor offer of educational undertakings as well as they do not keep in touch with any European institutions. We obviously object to the above mentioned opinion, nevertheless this stereotypical image still existing in the awareness of so many people (especially among the inhabitants of big cities) has given us food for thought. It has forced us to the analysis and taking steps which aim to give our school the European character. All these have resulted in the project entitled “School closer to Europe.” The teachers employed at our school are very active, operative and well-qualified. They possess both the awareness and the need of developing their own skills and teaching competences. The teaching staff is creative and full of excellent ideas and positive energy which may be used to bring benefits to equally students and our institution too. Since we have been creating the plan of development for our institution which is the income of discussions, analysis and estimation of the previous activities, we have come to the conclusion that we have to fight against the stereotypical image and reach out to new trends and students’ interests. We want to devote this year to the development of our educational abilities and skills in the field of teaching the English language and “going towards” Europe through letting our students get in touch with native speakers, foreign peers and promoting European ideas on the local field via organising pro-European parties and events. We wish our actions of increasing students’ language competences would realise them that they are young and fully fledged citizens of Europe. We aim our activities at bringing expected results, hence we are planning to make intensive movements in different fields. There are various activities included in our plans, such as: • Training the teaching staff abroad (methodical and language trainings, language courses) • Methodical workshops for other teachers • Language courses for teachers • Modification of school programmes adjusted to modern teaching methods • Implementation of CLIL method • Cooperation with the abroad institution • Inviting an English speaking assistant to our school • Pro-European initiatives and events (Days of Cultures, European Days, Days of Foreign Languages, etc.) We categorised five teachers for this project: - 2 teachers of English - 2 teachers of the early-school education - 1 teacher of Polish Teachers chose such courses from among the broad training, which fully meet their training needs. Our teachers chose methodological courses for themselves (raising qualifications in the teaching of foreign languages) which will enable the change and modernizing methods and forms of our work. Teachers of other school subjects decided on language courses. Desire for the learning of foreign languages is very important among our staff, because it will let us diametrically to change the manner of the learning of foreign languages at our school. Extending beyond English lessons and including elements of the linguistic education in other school activity will be a milestone in the educational process linguistic of our pupils and will contribute to the significant efficiency improvement of our work. In this way we will be able to carry much more interesting projects out and involve other teachers into their organization. Moreover our pupils will stay "immersed" in the language, what will cause the rapid growth of their competence and increasing motivation to their work. During our project we are planning the following actions: Teachers going for trainings after their return, they will organize the number of workshops and activities serving the dissemination of results. Training the rest part of the staff will enable for implementing new methods on all school subjects and modernising methods in our school. As a result, we are going to undertake the cooperation with the institution abroad, as well as we plan to invite the linguistic assistant to work in our school. Implementing new methods, as well as other activities, they will be aimed at improving the quality of learning languages, as well as promoting the knowledge about various European countries, promoting the idea of integration and the European cooperation, propagating of the tolerance and the openness, modernizing our school and preparing pupils for active citizenship on the local, national and European level.