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Description
The project respond to the country''s growing support for right-wing political groups and fascism among young people in Slovakia. Currently, primary and secondary school students have an insufficient number of history lessons in the school curriculum. The teaching of history is based primarily on memorisation of facts.
The project will bring experiential learning to schools, the advantage of which is that the participants of the workshops will not only remember the information, but also understand its meaning and context. The workshops are based on the stories of real people who courageously faced totalitarian regimes in Slovakia in the past and gave testimonies about them.
The project will include 6 types of one-day workshops - 3 for primary schools ("Decision-making" - the topic of forced migration, anti-Semitism and xenophobia, "The day when we were silent" - the topic of collectivisation, "Year 89" - the topic of the advent of democracy) and 3 for secondary schools ("This will not pass!" the theme of freedom of speech and censorship, "We were only born" - the theme of Slovak society in the interwar period and during the Second World War, "Year 89" - the theme of the advent of democracy).
Approximately 6,000 participants will take part in 240 experiential learning workshops in primary and secondary schools across Slovakia.
The objectives of the workshops are in particular:
- to get acquainted with historical realities and human rights issues in an attractive and interactive way;
- developing social and emotional intelligence of participants (by empathising with the motivations of the workshop characters);
- education for tolerance, understanding and human rights;
- developing participants'' communication and argumentation skills and their ability to think critically;
- prevention of socio-pathological phenomena (xenophobic and racist attitudes);
- prevention of bullying in the collective;
- contributing to the overall improvement of the classroom climate.
Summary of project results
The grantee was motivated to develop and implement workshops mainly by the growing support of the far-right political parties and fascism among young people, as well as by the disinformation war that dominated Slovak media and affected public opinion. Furthermore, there was an insufficient number of history lessons in the school curriculum, the teaching of history was based on memorizing facts without understanding context. Through the implementation of experiential learning, they tried to ensure that the participants of workshops understand the meaning and context of information about Slovak history – in order to gain a comprehensive view of the world, contribute to building historical memory, strengthen human rights awareness and critical thinking and with the aim of challenging stereotypes and prejudices. In the period from April 2019 to January 2021, they held 240 experiential educational workshops in primary and secondary schools in Slovakia, which were attended by 5366 pupils from primary schools, secondary schools, grammar schools and conservatories. The COVID-19 pandemic unexpectedly affected the course of the project and changed the form of the workshops. These were gradually moved to online space and held via ZOOM platform. They reshaped the methodologies of experiential workshops for primary schools "Decision Making", "School celebration 89/90" and for secondary schools "We were just born" and "Gentle change" to be able to provide workshops online.
Workshops significantly contributed to the development of social and emotional intelligence by empathizing with the characters, educating towards tolerance, understanding and human rights, developing communication and argumentation skills and building a good climate in the classroom, and thus preventing negative societal phenomena.