"Project ""Educating hearts"" aims to highten social inclusion in participating schools and their local communities. To achieve project objectives, we've build a partnership on the eTwinning platform, with a goal of resolving the issues that we've faced in our regular work, that we've found ourself insuficiently equipped to deal with. With this project we will be able to bring the subject of social inclusion to our students and classrooms, and we'll also do it by showcasing how the transnational cooperation looks like in practice, by setting up multiple short-term pupils exchages. Our main goal in the project is to teach participants about gender equality, social, racial, cultural and religious tolerance, as well as various other forms of social inclusion, like inclusion of people with disabilities or people of old age. We want our participants to understand our shared values, which will also allow us to teach them more about the importance of cherishing our shared European heritage. While doing that, our participants will also improve their more tangible skills: english language and ICT. With that in mind, our methodology for the project is simple: we want our participants to learn various aspects of tolerance in the process known as ""learning by doing"". That's why mobilities and their workshops are so crucial to the project: they are the only option we have for showing our students how true multinational cooperation looks like. Project mobilities include 5 short-term mobilities of pupils and 1 mobility for joint staff. Staff mobility revolves around preparation for project activities and aims to boost both creative methods fo participating staff and their evaluation methods regarding informal education, in essence equipping them with more educational methods for both project use and regular school work. Pupils mobilities will be proceeded by preparation by all participating organiations: sending organisations will create extracurricular classes for the pupils participating in the mobility (boosting their language skills), while hosting organisation will involve their local participants in creation of activity program. Main criteria of participating in short term mobilities as a pupil will depend on three factors: 1. Fluency in english language; 2. Emotional development (judged by school staff: teachers, councelors and psychologists); 3. Level of engagement in the activities taking place on the eTwinning platform. With those criteria in mind, we plan our participants to be between 10 to 14 years old, with englishlanguage fluency ranging from levels A1 to A2. Of course pupils that won't be able to participate in short term mobilities won't be excluded from the project, quite the opposite: they will be more heavily involved in project activities taking place at their local schools. During mobilities, every participating school will present slightly different set of activities, every one revolving around subject matter. However, all participants are bound by the General Policy - set of mandatory activities, that they have to include in their program. General Policy consists of 4 sections: 1. ""Life where I'm from"" Opens the context of cultural differences and similarities 2. What we share > what makes us different. Understanding that we all share common goals and dreams, and have the same daily and social needs. 3. What makes us equal? Learning importance of seing ""another"" as different form of ""self"". 4. Shared European values: cornerstone of our future. Deepening understanding of European values, benefits of extended dialogue, importance of shared ideas and multinational communities.With that in mind, every participating organisation took upon itself expanding upon subject matter by embracing different topics and methods: Portugal - Social Inclusion Turkey - Gender equality Lithuania - Inclusion of people with disabilities Croatia - Cultural tolerance Poland - European values Thanks to this and General Policy, we can ensure that all mobilities can stay equally educative, while beoing slightly different in execution.As a result of our project, we expect to: - increase social skills, language skills and ICT skills of our pupils; - deepen the understanding of different points of view among pupils and those that surround them; - strengthen the sense of shared, common purpose of peaceful coexistence; - improve understanding of goals that drive modern European thought; - stimulate creativity of our pupils; - increase competences (skills and knowledge) of participating school staff (teachers, school councelors and school psychologists) in regards to informal education, incentivising creativity and laying foundation for more active and well-informed participation in Erasmus+ projects in the future; - decrease"

The term 21st Century (called technological era)skills,has brought many requirements in terms of education.It makes essential different constructions,innovations and reforms including meaningful and lifelong learning.In this aspect,TPACK(Technological Pedagogical and Content Knowledge)has come into prominence expeditiously.TPACK is a framework for teacher knowledge for technology integration.Knowledge that teachers need to effectively integrates technology into teaching subjectspecific curriculum within specific contexts.Briefly,technology changes not only what the teachers teach but also how the teachers teach.Role of the technology to better impact on students learning gains importance day by day.In current project each partner use technology in their classes in a way but the essential thing is the knowledge of the correct usage of technology by means of TPACK.With this project each partner ll have opportunity to learn not only TPACK but also the effective usage of Web 2 tools in classes and interdisciplinary CODING;the alphabet of new era,in intended context by attending the lectures and exchanging of good practices among the partners from Germany as a coordinator country, England, Turkey, Lithuania, Italy and Spain. In the scope of the current project apart from observing the good implementations of partners and making inferences, our objectives on teachers and students are to:-raise communication and social skills, gain them self improvementi,improve their technological, pedagogical and content competences-supply an opportunity to algorithmic and analytical thinking, enhance their productivity-develop their teaching proficiencies with the implementations used in EU countries-to improve digital competences-strengthen pupils’ motivation towards the school subjects by using the technological methods-supply an opportunity to algorithmic and analytical thinking-gain problem solving ability and expressing themselves independently and creative thinking-teach them the importance of obeying the rules and the results of them-gain them the knowledge of responsibility, raise environmental awareness, the importance of recycling,-gain them the emotions of success and self-confidence-improve their competences, gain lifelong maintained experience-gain them sense of entrepreneurship to adapt to developing world-gain them the knowledge of the correct usage of technology and improve digital competences-gain them permanent learning by concretizing of abstract conceptIn current project, in order to reach our goals there will be six learning teaching training activities in each partner country. Two of these activities are for the educators and the others are short term exchange of group pupils. At first, each partner will build a project management team under the guidance of contact person of the country. All activities have been planned for the students who are between 10 and 18 and their teachers. The project team of each partner will decide the students and teachers according to the criterions.In the activities, the effective usage of TPACK is aimed and during the project, Coding and Web 2.0 tools will take place to support our students and teachers in the digital era that we live in. At the end of the project the educators will be able to improve their digital competences by attending the meetings and applying the activities;raise their skills and competences. They will be able to adapt themselves and their classes to the changing world. In terms of the students, they will be able to improve their sequential, analytical and algoritmic thinking, improve digital competences by using technology in classes including integrating CODING.

Our partnership was established with the purpose of contributing to the promotion of the tourist attractions of the partner countries by adding the presentation of the places where they live by using web2.0 tools on the maps as audio, video, e-book and a digital 3D museum. All these activities were be done by 10-16 aged students. While developing these materials the students did profit of the knowledge that they gained in social studies, geography and history subjects. The Digital Tourist Guide that the participants prepared in accordance with the tourist promotion criteria of the countries are being made accessible to the whole of Europe and the world. Beside that, we created a Google map with all project internal points of interest and their description implemented on it. We huddled together an unlimited number of free Web 2.0 tools on the internet for our Moodle platform. Our project members created a distance learning platform to teach our students how to use which tool for which course. The teachers selected the web2.0 tools that can be used in their lessons and prepared materials for digital teaching. We wanted to provide effective use of the technological possibilities that our students and teachers have both- education and contribution to touristic promotion of the project countries. Another major goal was to raise awareness of digital citizenship and democracy of our partners' students in the correct use of rapidly evolving and changing technologies. In the context of transnational meetings, our students created digital content for the tourist promotion of the host countries by adding the spots of the project activities on the map. The exchange students from different countries always worked together in mixed groups to learn how to cooperate, communicate and gain as much new information as possible.The provision of students with digital qualifications is a very important project result for the development of the project schools. There were project teams established in each partner school consisting of students and teachers so that the project can be carried out efficiently and in a quality manner. The work of these expert groups could constantly be updated during the project duration of 2 1/2 years. Cultural and promotion associations, local education authorities supported us and were our stakeholders to develop the project. The key staff of the project partners documneted on these meetings to provide evaluation of project outputs and activities, budget management and they prepared surveys for the evaluation of the project results.

Our project TAG is based on teaching and learning basic skills (literacy , maths and science) and cross skills (foreign langauge acquisiton, gaining healthy lifestyle, taking action for environment and climate change) using game based learning as a method. Pupils will apply what they learn throughout the project to their virtual towns. Virtual towns will play a great role in the project to give the chance to pupils to absorb new acquisitons via applying what they learn into a virtual town. This way pupils will gain how to integrate what they learn from the project's implementation activities into life and how to use new acquisitons in practice as the population of the virtual towns will be themselves. The background of our project is;European commission's aim for 2020 is fewer than 15% of 15-year-olds should be under-skilled in reading, mathematics and science.According to the World Health Organization WHO ,1 in 3 eleven year olds is overweight or obese. Only 19% of 11-year-old girls report engaging in moderate-to-vigorous physical activity for at least 60 minutes per day. For boys, the figure is 28%.According to the Attitudes of 'European citizens towards the environment' research most Europeans are aware of environmental problems and climate change but most of the Europeans refrain from taking action to behave more environmentally friendly. Peer-bullying in schools is an increasing problem in European countries and we need to take action and find ways to hinder peer bullying. Our project team believe that games increase pupils' motivation to learn and pupils can transfer what they learn to their real lives with games better. We believe we can teach basic skills, health issues , environmental awareness- climate change issues, foreign languages, democracy , ethics and also awareness of our European cultural heritages through different kinds of games and game based active learning activities.The long-term objectives, the impact of our project are ; - good practices, new methods and innovative techniques to teach literacy, maths and science will be shared among European teachers,- disadvantaged pupils and SEN pupils will be given more chance to learn basic skills using gamebased learning strategies,- low achievers in basic skills will be given more chance to acquire basic skills with the help of good practices around Europe,- all participant schools' curricula will be renovated and adapted as a result of acquired good practices and skills,- the rate of early leavers from education will be reduced at participants schools ,- participant schools will have school staff who is competent in how to teach basic skills using gamebased strategies,- participant schools will have renovated curricula that gives more emphasis on the low achievers and disadvantaged pupils through games and innovative methods- each participant will have portfolios of gamebased activities as a compilation of all games and good practices to help them teach all skills in primary and secondary level, - each participant school will have new strategies to teach foreign languages better , - each participant will have a new action plan for tackling peer bullying with the help of games,- each participant school will be healthy school with the help of games and active learning strategies,- each participant school will be environmentally friendly school and all pupils will be aware of environmental problems and climate change through the activities,- each participant school will have strategies to teach ethics,democracy and good behaviours to their pupils with the help of games,Participants to the LTT Activities will be 90 primary and middle school teachers and the pupils that will get benefit of the project and join in local project implementation activities will be 3800 primary and middle school pupils.The concrete activities and results will be ;- 6 Learning ,teaching,training activities of all teachers of participant schools on Game Based Learning and Active Learning Strategies namely on the topics of ; 1- Maths 2- Language Teaching and Learning 3-Environment and Climate Change 4-Science and Technology Use 5- for Health,Ethics and Democracy 6- Reading Literacy and Cultural Heritages - Compilation of the game-based activities in portfolios, 6 festivals to practise all acquisitons in LTT Activities with pupils, virtual towns of pupils in schools to apply what they learn to their towns , creation of a New European Maths Boardgame,a New EU Language learning Cards Game, New EU Digital Application for Environment and Climate Change issues, STEM exhibitions, a New EU Sports ,a New EU Health Action Game , a New EU Healthy Food , A New EU Healthy Diet, a new EU Puppet Show , games with families videos, short films of the project festivals, an E-twinning webinar, E-twinning projects of pupils, an E-book of the project and a Youtube channel of game based activities

“ACQUISITION OF BASIC COMPETENCES” (ABC) is a project that reflects the philosophy and attitude of teachers and educational communities from all partner institutions of the project.This project was developed due to the need for the candidate institution to address some challenges:- insufficient skills of teachers to teach basic and horizontal skills;- weak motivation for development and improvement of communication skills in a foreign language of the staff and the children;- full inclusion of children with SEN, children - migrants and children - refugees.The other partners also faced the problems of social exclusion. They also had problems similar to those identified by the institution - candidate.All partners together chose to use on game-based learning as the main methodology. Various additional methodologies were applied, which are relevant to the main methodology - gamification, active learning, joint learning, project-based learning, cooperative and partner learning, educational drama as method of learning, action learning methodology and functional learning.The following goals were set and achieved in ABC:-The competence of all teachers in teaching basic skills has been increased;-Good practices, new methods and innovative techniques for teaching literacy, mathematics and science are shared among European teachers;-More chances and more opportunities are given to disadvantaged children and students and children and students with SEN to acquire basic skills, using attractive methods such as joint learning, actions and games;-Shared good practice across Europe has enabled people with low basic skills to acquire basic competencies;-The curricula of all partners have been renewed and adapted as a result of the acquired better practices and skills;-Greater importance is attached to cultural diversity, social inclusion and European citizenship issues in the institutions;-The European dimension of the institutions has improved and they are internationally recognizable;-Respect and knowledge of the culture of both one's own countries and Europe has increased;-Innovative methods in teaching basic skills have been learned and shared;-Although slightly, the percentage of early school leavers in partner institutions has decreased;-Teachers learned on how to teach basic skills using traditional, digital, board, creative and handmade games, educational drama techniques, cooperative learning, WEB2 tools, applications, technologies;-The basic skills of children and students are developed and they are prepared for their future;-The basic skills of disadvantaged children and students and those with low grades have been improved;-Teachers learned more about the education system of countries that are successful in PISA;-Parents and students acquired reading habits in this way as well-They improved their communication skills in their mother tongue and in English as the project language.Within the project, 6 LTTA were carried out for teaching basic skills to children and students, based on 1. Drama; 2. Games; 3. Digital tools; 4. Art / Digital Art; 5. Methods for working together / Friendly activities and 6. Indoor and outdoor activities.With the help of the open-door trainings the pedagogical teams of the participating institutions, representatives from other schools and kindergartens, students, the educational authorities were trained and informed about the good practices of the project.Just over 4,400 children and students, 1,231 of them disadvantaged and low-achieving, and about 540 teachers participated in the project activities.The desire to teach more effectively the basic skills of children and students with SEN and those with disabilities has been crowned with great success.One of the achievements bring an especially proud - the development of reading literacy in children and students and their parents, as well as the development of their interest in reading and love for books.An additional final product of the project has been created - HANDBOOK, which describes 36 of the games and theory with specifics on each of its topics.144 different games, digital books, exhibitions, various campaigns, performances, concerts have been created and published on YouTube ABC Channel and many activities have been carried out to disseminate the results of the project.In the long run, disadvantaged children and students are expected to continue to acquire basic skills much more effectively in a fun way. The games and the various methods described will provide an opportunity to develop the basic skills of all children and students in Europe in whom they are applied. The international educational community will upgrade its skills to teach and develop basic competencies by developing its own versions of the created games.ABC has been awarded for OVERALL QUALITY PERFORMANCE by HRDC - Bulgarian National Agency for the Erasmus+ Program.