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Description
Based on knowledge gathered in 2019 within our previous project in the Ełk district (Warmińsko-Mazurskie province), we know that schools there (except one) do not run any voluntary work based on pupils’ creative ideas or active lessons based on games and fun activities. We can observe the same problem in the Olecki district, where only 2-3 initiatives are organised per year. Teachers that we have talked to suggest it results from the lack of ideas among adults and from the lack of funds. Pupils are often encouraged to join School Volunteer Clubs, but then get little support. Moreover, if anything is organised, it hardly ever goes outside the school. To address the challenge, we will run two cycles of educational classes for primary school pupils from 4 schools in the Olecki district and 6 schools from the Ełcki district per year. They will be devoted to volunteering, cooperation, planning and organisation of activities, empathetic communication, ecology, or the art of debating. Apart from educational classes, participants will invent and run two social initiatives in each school (20 in total), engaging local community. Furthermore, they will shoot films on civic topics presenting voluntary work from their perspective. They will be presented in a film festival wrapping each cycle up. We will also run workshops for the teaching staff to present methods and tools that can be used to teach youths volunteering. Furthermore, youths will prepare local debates on civic topics of their choice. We will invite councillors, representatives of NGOs and local authorities to join in.
Summary of project results
The project was the response to the low level of civic education in rural schools in Masuria. In this part of Poland, small communities were not rather passive and had little knowledge of civic activities and benefits of engaging into voluntary initiatives. Although volunteering is a mandatory subject in Polish schools, it was often reduced to establishing of School Caritas Circles run by school catechists. Teachers responsible for volunteering rarely created suitable space for the real participation of young people, where they could experience and learn the social competences necessary for being active citizen. The level of competence of young people was also low in other areas, as reflected in the PISA results.
The aim of the project was to tackle these issues by reaching out to local schools - the project ultimately recruited 10 primary schools - with well-prepared and attractively delivered citizenship lessons. We used school volunteering as an opportunity to foster students’ participation, teach them necessary social competences, give those young people a sense of belonging to and having influence on their communities. We also wanted to provide an opportunity to learn about the local environment and simply have fun. We worked with students in grades 6-8 and their teachers - the volunteer mentors.
We recruited 175 young volunteers and 14 teachers. We engaged them using creative and stimulating methods, using board games, educational games, the Invisible Exhibition and quizzes. We covered topics such as volunteering, social competences, cooperation, empathy and assertiveness, communication, planning and responding to difficult situations. We also supported young people in planning and implementing their own initiatives – there were 20 such initiatives carried out by schoolchildren themselves. In addition, we conducted a series of workshops preparing children for participation in Oxford debates and organised 10 such debates in their schools.
The project was a great success and the results are likely to be sustainable. We managed to increase participants’ awareness of democracy and freedom, a well as their rights as citizens. They had the opportunity to learn more about their local environment and understand how they can influence it and how they can cooperate with local institutions.
Young participants learnt how they can use digital tools in their activities and practiced storytelling using images and videos to better promote their activities. Through educational cycles and by demonstrating the independence of young people in their activities, we have provided teachers (14 educators and 7 headmasters) with models of active teaching methods and ways to develop voluntary clubs based on young people''s activities and ideas.
As an additional activity, we have developed a complete resource for disseminating the results of our activities with young people.
We prepared an offer presenting 3 programmes for the benefit of young people: the poMOCNI programme, the Mazurian League of Oxford Debates, School Participation Budgets, which shows the way of action, benefits and approximate duration.
The offer was sent to 50 entities (schools and self-governments) from 5 counties, and finally we held 3 face-to-face meetings with self-governments to discuss the possibilities of implementing the programmes described in the offer in the schools under the authority of a given local authority.
We also held 3 on-site meetings with organisations from Śląskie, Świętokrzyskie and Lubelskie voivodeships in order to introduce them to the ways we work and inspire them to carry out similar activities.
There are already first effects of our promotion - Czajnia Association will develop oxford debates based on our method.