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Description
The aim of Supporting Active Citizenship project is to modernize the school curricula by implementing systematic support of democratic values and active citizenship. Elementary school and kindergarten ANGEL in Prague 12, Czech Republic, and Rosvik Skole, Norway, are going to cooperate on the development of the curricula. Focusing on active citizenship and democratic values is essential in the rapidly changing world where the liberal democracy values are relativized.
Summary of project results
Our project Supporting Active Citizenship tackled an essential topic – students’ involvement in community life. Schools often struggle to adapt their curricula in order to reflect the democratic values of society and the new roles posed on citizens. In the project the partner schools therefore adapted their own curricula and published a wide range of activities for other schools to use with various age groups at elementary school level. First, Røsvik Skole from Norway and Elementary School and Kindergarten ANGEL in Prague 12 collected best practice examples, i.e.. already existent and successful activities which allow students to engage in their local communities. The intellectual output consists of sixteen activities for different age levels which can be easily adopted by other schools. Subsequently, both partner organizations analysed their current curricula with the aim of finding suitable subjects and topics for the implementation of new active citizenship activities. The partnership created twelve projects for students aged 6 – 16. These innovative projects not only enriched the curricula of both partner schools but also became available for other schools as well. At the end of the project the outputs were successfully presented to the public at dissemination events to ensure their accessibility. Both schools use a modernized curriculum – during their school attendance students gradually increase the level of their involvement in the life of their community. Moreover, other schools have access to projects focusing on the development of skills required for active citizenship. The projects range from self-organization to helping within the family, improving the school environment, volunteering, undertaking surveys and protecting the environment. Thanks to the project, students have become active participants in their own learning process and as adults they will be ready to contribute to community life. Active involvement enables young people to face the challenges of the ever-changing world and define their roles within it.
Summary of bilateral results
The Norwegian partner, Røsvik Skole, contributed substantially to the quality of all three intellectual outputs. Their precious know-how of coming from a rural, community school located in beautiful Norwegian nature added a new dimension to the assembled best-practice examples, as well as projects aimed at active citizenship. Thanks to their input the activities implement aspects of harmony with nature, survival skills, development of students’ self-organization, etc. The collaboration with the coordinating institution, a large elementary school from Prague, has ensured varied and universal outcomes. Both partners collaborated on all three intellectual outputs. In the first outcome – Modernized Curriculum ANGEL – the Czech school proposed projects to enrich their curriculum and the Norwegian partner provided feedback notes and consultations to achieve the best result possible. During the work on the second outcome, Modernized Curriculum Røsvik Skole, the Norwegian partner created projects to enrich their curriculum and ANGEL school provided feedback which was then used to finalize the output. The third intellectual output, Best Practice Examples, is the result of shared collaboration where each of the partners contributed with eight activities which they had already been using to support students’ active citizenship. As a result, the whole outcome includes sixteen best practice examples. Currently there are no specific plans to continue the bilateral collaboration.