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WE Learn and COMmunicate Ensemble
WE Learn and COMmunicate Ensemble
Start date: Oct 1, 2016,
End date: Jun 30, 2019
PROJECT
FINISHED
Since the 2011 Council Conclusions on early childhood education and care, there is an increasing emphasis on the importance of early years institution-based provision, not only for parents' labour market participation, but also to mitigate socio-economic inequalities and most importantly for children's personal development. At the same time pre-primary teachers are struggling to address the heterogeneity of needs, background and learning abilities of children in mainstream ECEC institutions. This is a challenge that we need to address in order to foster open, inclusive, embedded in the digital era education. For the reason that as stated in the European Commission staff working document: "Supporting the Teaching Professions for Better Learning Outcomes" - teaching professionals are the most important determinants of how learners will perform; and it is what teachers know, do, and care about that matters.The WE Learn and COMmunicate Ensemble (WELCOME) project will combine the efforts of 8 relevant organisations from 3 European countries (the Czech Republic, Slovakia and Bulgaria). The key objective of this project is to fully integrate children with diverse learning needs through contributing to the enhancement of quality in ECEC, i.e. assist teachers in in mainstream pre-primary educational institutions, who lack resources, competencies and comprehensive approach, to manage successfully a heterogeneous class/group and communicate more effectively with children with diverse needs. The project will also contribute to reducing disparities in learning outcomes affecting children with disadvantaged and/or from diverse backgrounds. The tangible intellectual outputs to be produced are:WELCOME Teachers Manual - practical handbook designed for ECEC teachers who are in need of innovative and comprehensive resources, competencies and modern approach to manage successfully a heterogeneous class/group and communicate more effectively with children with diverse needs in mainstream pre-primary educational institutions;WELCOME App for smart devices - to allow interactive and tailor-made application of the WELCOME approach);WELCOME Workshops (guide for conducting and content) - to support teachers in conducting workshop activities themselves and train other teachers from partner kindergartens on how to apply the WELCOME approach in practice.WELCOME Dissemination Conference (large-scope international event) – to promote project’s success, but mainly to foster transnational cooperation on the topic and allow for wider impact.The WELCOME project will be delivered across 33 months and foresees involving in project activities more than 4000 pre-primary teachers, children in ECEC, education stakeholders, high-level policy makers, academics and professionals. Extensive testing, piloting and evaluation will be performed to validate the produced outputs and increase potential for sustainability.Impact is envisaged at various levels as follows:- improved awareness, practical skills and competencies in achieving best possible results and learning outcomes in heterogeneous environment and settings;- enhanced knowledge and ability to apply methods and techniques to manage groups of children with different needs, background and learning abilities through innovative approaches; - enhanced use and applicability of modern technologies in ECEC for open education in the digital era.- full integration of children with diverse learning needs into mainstream ECEC;- increased attainment levels and motivation to learn.