Small steps go far

"<< Background >>In 2019 Vinstra ungdomsskole formed a partnership with Gustave Flaubert College using eTwinning with a project entitled ""European Partnership"". During the pandemic we have kept in touch using e-mail and Zoom-meetings. From this the project ""Small Steps Go Far"" was realized after years of planning. We applied for this project to get to have the students meet physically and not only digitally to explore each others culture and country. The needs that we have adressed is that we have arranged two school exchanges, where the students have lived together in host families and had to use English to communicate. This was one of our main aims for the project; to practice English in a more authentic way. The other needs we have adressed are to work together on the UN's sustainable goals in addition to having seen and learned how to do small changes in their lifestyles to become more environmentally friendly. << Objectives >>By implementing the project, we wanted to see the benefits of cooperating with a transnational partner to experience and explore another country's diversity and culture first hand. The joy and excitement of getting to know other teenagers studying the same course and motivating the students to practice English was also something we wanted to achieve. Since the collaboration between the two schools started in 2019, a lot of changes has happened quickly, both in Europe and in the world. The pandemic has put everything concerning travels on hold, and when we were allowed to travel again without so many restrictions, the war in Ukraine broke out and made the travel expenses sky rocket for a time period, as well as being high risk as for travelling safe. That made our plans of Activity 1 too difficult to carry out, and we had to rethink if we could still reach our main objectives. After the National Agency had approved that we could go ahead with the project without Activity 1, we could go forward with Activity 2. << Implementation >>Activity 2 was a visit to the French students. In France the Norwegian students stayed in host families and throughout the week every student stayed in two different families. In that way the expenses of each host family were smaller, and the students got to experience more of the French culture. During the week, the students attended school for one day, the next day they had an activity-day outdoors, and the last full day they visited a nearby city to explore how this city was pervaded in sustainable thinking. In activity 3, the last activity, the French students came to Norway. They also lived in host families and experienced a very different culture than they were used to. On the first day they attended school classes. Here the students got to have Food and health-classes, which they do not have at their own school. They also experienced the Norwegian winter at its best, which also was very different to what they were used to. The following day the students went skiing in a resort. On the last full day, the two groups went to a place called ""Hell"", where they got to see how water during the Ice Age has made deep holes and caves that are covered in ice during the winter.<< Results >>Some of the students had never traveled abroad, and this project has helped including more students that would not have gotten the opportunity to travel otherwise. Vinstra ungdomsskole had the most students who have never traveled, which also included a student that was part of the project in March 2022, but started at a new school. Since the former student had been a part of the project, he had the option of coming with the new group if he wanted to. Arrangements were made and he was allowed to travel. We also had some students without Norwegian citizenship that had to have identification and documentation to travel out of the country, that got the opportunity to travel as well. The students from both countries improved their social skills and their English skills.As for the idea of implementing some of the actions Gustave Flaubert College do at their school in Vinstra Ungdomsskole, the students have seen what they can do at their school and written a report with suggestions of changes to be done at the school. Some changes they have done concerns work towards charity actions, recycling, and fight against food waste. Vinstra ungdomsskole also brought seeds to plant in Gustave Flauberts micro-forest project."