ARTS@CREATIVITY.EU

Our collaborative project consisted of 8 schools (England withdrew). Our partners included experienced international collaborators and first timers! All partners asserted that their students exhibited a tendency to lose interest in learning and schooling in general and that more innovative practices and methodologies had to be adopted. Our proposal focused on the systematic integration of Arts and the ICTs in our school programs with a view to promoting motivation, creativity, the European dimension and foreign language learning.The proposal entailed working on two levels: On the first level, students collaborated locally and transnationally to study different forms of Art and to create artifacts. There was peer tutoring and students from one country taught students of another through the methodology of the flipped classroom and the exchange of videos. On the second level teachers of each country were specialized in a specific field (using Arts to teach numeracy and literacy to children with special needs, to develop environmental awareness for students' peer and self evaluation, for self expression and development and for working across the curriculum and therefore for curricula and teacher development). When it was a school’s turn to host teachers from their 8 partner schools, interactive workshops took place to show the guest teachers how the researched methodology applied in practice in the host school. Communication and cooperation among the partner schools was achieved through e-mail, the e-twinning platform, the Erasmus noticeboards and the schools websites. The language of communication was English but the participants also learned some very basic vocabulary from the native languages of the participating schools. Three project meetings took place, each one in the beginning of each of the three years. During these meetings, the partners planned activities but also presented and evaluated the ones that had been carried out. Three joint stuff training events also took place, where the participating teachers exchanged ideas, practices and methodologies explored throughout the project. Last, three learning activities were organised for students, where there activities and events took place. In each one of the nine transnational meetings the hosted country organised Arts exhibitions, open to the public so that there could be dissemination. Some of the products that were created are: posters, power point presentations, brochures, a common project logo, paintings, paper sculptures, clay models, sculptures, engraved artifacts, collages, videos in the English language, a common Christmas calendar, glossaries etc. The results were: Effective cooperation between the partner schools, involvement of students in different forms and techniques of Art, developing creativity, foreign language learning, raising pupils’ motivation and confidence, skills improvement in Maths and in Physics through Arts and Music, developing 21st century skills and media literacy, European awareness, intercultural competence and motivation for life long learning. The participating schools prepared the project during two preparatory visits in Athens 2014 and Venice 2015, where the coordinators met and agreed the content and the technicalities of the proposed project. As regards budget control and time management, these there monitored and planned on a monthly basis by all school coordinators. The evaluation of the project was ongoing and it was based on quantitative and qualitative criteria. Questionnaires and interviews were the main tools that were used to collect data. Dissemination was a field we had paid special attention. The videos we produced for the flipped classroom and the Arts exhibitions were the main tools for disseminating knowledge and experiences. Furthermore, our products are available in twinspace and the school websites. Hard copies of the albums we produced and the glossaries were sent to our National Agencies and to other schools.To close this summary, a charity event was organized in Cyprus to provide help to people in need and to explain that one of our priorities was to direct our students’ attention to humanitarian education. As a last comment, let us repeat that our ultimate goal was to encourage our students to be involved in artistic exploration that would inspire their love for the human being and education.