Numeracy and basic maths are key foundations for further learning and are a gateway to employment and social inclusion. Nevertheless, across the EU, 22 % of 15-year-olds underachieve in mathematics. Among pupils with low socioeconomic status, this is a worrying 36.6 %. There is evidence that early exposure to math education concepts, activities, ideas, and ‘math talk’ positively impacts later school achievement. Nevertheless, low-income students are more likely to be exposed to weaker math content in schools. This school inequality is part of a larger socioeconomic performance gap that also includes the students’ home background (OECD/2017)Families from the more disadvantaged social groups generally tend to collaborate less with schools. Specifically, those parents who live in urban environments, with low incomes and are immigrants or ethnic minorities are those who face greater barriers to collaboration. Achieving effective collaboration with the school is a particularly important issue for disadvantaged families, as it can be decisive in this group achieving academic success (EC, 2016).An insufficiently explored approach to overcome the difficulties to involve parents from disadvantaged families in the education of their children is the Family learning pedagogical approach. Family learning is an effective way of providing adults with the skills and knowledge to support their children’s education. NGOs and other social partners supporting disadvantage families can play also a key role facilitating the work with these families through Family Learning methods, strengthening their participation and engagement with the school system. Additionally, the influence of new technologies on children's mathematical competences should be explore, so as to ensure appropriate methods to exploit the potential of such teccnologies for new forms of learning (EC/2018)The aim of FAMILIES COUNT project is to promote the acquisition of skills and competences in Maths through innovative Family Learning teaching methods based on Digital Tools addressed to disadvantaged families. To do so, six organizations, including school authorities, entities supporting unprivileged families and experts in family learning and digital-based pedagogies from five countries (UK, Spain, Ireland, Turkey and Austria), will work together to equip family learning practitioners, tutors and headteacher with the necessary skills and innovative digital tools to support students and parents from disadvantaged families to acquire and improve their competencies in maths.The project partners will design and co-create the following outputs:- An Online Digital Database of good practices and resources on Family Learning of Maths (IO1), - A Training Curriculum on Family Learning of Maths (IO2)- The FAMILIES COUNT Pedagogical Handbook- The FAMILIES COUNT Digital Toolkit (IO4), a set of innovative tailor made digital apps and tools.Family learning practitioners, tutors and headteacher working at schools and entities supporting unprivileged families are the main target users of the project products and final beneficiaries are students and parents from disadvantaged families. During the life time of the FAMILIES COUNT project, the partnership will directly involve 79 family learning practitioners, tutors and headteacher (24 partners staff / 30 experts involved / 25 target users in pilots), 125 students and parents from disadvantaged families (in pilots) and 450 stakeholders. A wider audience, of a minimum of 1.000 recipients, will be reached at local, regional, national and European level through the planned dissemination activities.The project will use European frameworks and instruments, like EQF, Europass and SchoolEducationGateaway, to boost transparency and recognition of learning outcomes on Family Learning for Maths at School. FAMILIES COUNT will also strengthen the collaboration between schools, families and their surrounding communities, and will count with the support of a network of key stakeholders at local, regional, national and European level involved in the project. FAMILIES COUNT will have a direct impact on target beneficiaries, improving their competencies in maths and their participation and engagement in the school systems, and in the target groups of users, improving the pedagogical methods to teach maths to students and parents from disadvantaged families. The project will also improve the digital skills of both groups of users and beneficiaries thanks to the innovative digital tools created to facilitate the teaching leaning of maths. Schools and other social entities and external stakeholders will count with new methods and instruments to facilitate their collaboration for the benefit of disadvantaged families in their communities. The long-term impact envisaged is the strength of the School system in Europe with new forms of tackling early school leaving and disadvantage.

According to the UNITED NATIONS DEPARTMENT OF ECONOMIC AND SOCIAL AFFAIRS POPULATION DIVISION, there were 965,006 MIGRANT CHILDREN aged between 0 and 4 registered in Europe in 2019 and a further 1,629,426 aged between 5 and 8 and these figures INCREASE DAILY. These CHILDREN will be UNAVOIDABLY TRAUMATISED TO SOME DEGREE from MIGRATION. This FACT needs to be ACKNOWLEDGED and RESPONDED TO in a manner which EMPOWERS SCHOOLS, TEACHERS, YOUTH and COMMUNITY WORKERS, EDUCATIONAL PSYCHOLOGISTS, PARENTS and CHILDREN with INFORMATION and TECHNIQUES to UNDERSTAND EARLY LIFE TRAUMA and its CONSEQUENCES. The MI WINDOW PROJECT will SUPPORT TEACHERS IN IDENTIFYING, RESPONDING AND ADDRESSING BEHAVIOURAL PROBLEMS IN THE CLASSROOM caused by EARLY LIFE TRAUMA / TRAUMA UNDER 5 and to RESPOND ACCORDING TO CURRENT PSYCHOLOGICAL and NEUROSCIENTIFIC RESEARCH. EARLY CHILDHOOD TRAUMA / TRAUMA UNDER 5 is an AUTONOMICALLY STORED DEVELOPMENTAL RESPONSE TO PAST EXPERIENCE and it is TRIGGERED BY STIMULI UNKNOWN to the SUFFERER. SCHOOL MANAGEMENT, TEACHERS, PARENTS, YOUTH WORKERS, and EDUCATIONAL PSYCHOLOGISTS must learn to be EARLY CHILDHOOD TRAUMA INFORMED to SUPPORT TRAUMA SUFFERERS to IDENTIFY the UNKNOWN STIMULI, CONSIDER THE STIMULI in accordance with their UNIQUE PERCEPTUAL MAP so they might GAIN AWARENESS of their BEHAVIOURAL PATTERNS and REMAIN in their PARASYMPATHETIC NERVOUS SYSTEM ABLE TO LEARN. The 7 MI WINDOW PROJECT PARTNERS ASPIRE (UK), The GOVERNORSHIP OF ISTANBUL (TK), IASIS (GR), KIST CONSULT (AUS), INFODEF and LA BIEN PAGA (SP) and INQS (IRE) cover a WIDE SCOPE of INSTITUTIONS which address SCHOOL CHILDREN and YOUNG PEOPLE from DIRECTORATES OF EDUCATION (TK), CENTRES for PSYCHOLOGICAL and EMOTIONAL DEVELOPMENT for YOUTH and DISADVANTAGED ADULTS LBP (SP) and IASIS (GR). And RESEARCH INSTITUTES (INFODEF) and PRIVATE COMPANIES (Kist Consult and INQS) WORKING IN EDUCATIONAL ADVANCEMENT and POLICY CREATION. All of the MI WINDOW PARTNERS are and have been ENGAGED in a RANGE OF PROJECTS which ADDRESS the NEEDS of MIGRANTS, REFUGEES and ASYLUM SEEKERS.MI WINDOW will create a set of 5 HIGHLY INNOVATIVE PRODUCTS to TRAUMA INFORM COMMUNITIES with OUTPUTS for ALL LEVELS of ENGAGEMENT and AGES to PROVOKE SELF REFLECTION and even CERTIFY INDIVIDUALS as TRAUMA INFORMED. They are; O1 ONLINE DIGITAL DATABASE FOR TRAUMA AWARENESS AND PARASYMPATHETIC ACTIVITIES FOR LEARNING ENVIRONMENTSO2TRAUMA UNDER 5 THEORETICAL and PEDAGOGICAL BASIS and TRAINING CURRICULUMO3TRAUMA UNDER 5 E-LEARNING COURSE WITH TRAUMA INFORMED CERTIFICATIONO4GUIDE TO TRAUMA UNDER 5 FOR SCHOOLS, TEACHERS AND PARENTSO5MY MAP CHILDREN'S ANIMATION AND WORKSHEETSThe MI WINDOW PROJECT dares to dream of a world where TRAUMATISED BEHAVIOUR is met with COMPASSION and UNDERSTANDING by those the TRAUMATISED INTERACT with IN PARTICULAR EDUCATORS. It will create TRAUMA INFORMED COMMUNITIES, SCHOOLS, COMMUNITY and YOUTH CENTRE and HOUSEHOLDS which can identify the effects of TRAUMA and EARLY LIFE TRAUMA / TRAUMA UNDER 5 induced behaviour, respond to it correctly with PARASYMPATHETHIC ACTIVITIES and see it for what it is as a DEVELOPMENTAL RESPONSE TO PAST EXPERIENCE and consider what the PROVOCATION might have been rather than PUNISH the REACTION. EARLY LIFE TRAUMA / TRAUMA UNDER 5 has been linked via STUDIES such as the CDC-Kaiser Permanente Adverse Childhood Experiences (ACE) Study to a range of DISADVANTAGOUS FUTURE OUTCOMES such as POOR ACADEMIC PERFORMANCE, ATTACHMENT DISORDER which EFFECTS TEACHER STUDENT TRUST, POOR PEER RELATIONSHIPS, EARLY SCHOOL LEAVING, LACK OF READINESS FOR THE LABOUR MARKET, SOCIAL EXCLUSION, SELF MEDICATION THROUGH SUBSTANCE ABUSE, ADDICTION, POOR HEALTH, POVERTY, TRANSGENERATIONAL TRAUMA IN OFFSPRING and even EARLY DEATH. The PRODUCTS of the MI WINDOW PROJECT will be HIGHLY TRANSFERABLE to the aforementioned SYMPTOMS OF TRAUMA. Unaddressed A LACK OF AWARENESS to TRAUMA CREATES FRICTION in SCHOOL, THE CLASSROOM, THE HOME and the COMMUNITY. Being TRAUMA INFORMED is a BASIC KEY COMPETENCE for UNDERSTANDING HUMAN BEHAVIOUR, MANAGING SCHOOLS, CLASSROOMS, YOUTH PROGRAMMES and HOMES.The MI WINDOW PROJECT is DESIGNED TO PSYCHOLOGICALLY SUPPORT and INTEGRATE MIGRANT CHILDREN VIA SCHOOL but it will also SUPPORT ANY SCHOOL CHILD or INDIVIDUAL with EARLY LIFE TRAUMA for whatever reason. TRAUMA is an unavoidable part of the HUMAN CONDITION it knows NO BORDERS and its consequences ARE EXTREMELY COSTLY TO SOCIETY and to HUMAN LIFE. BEING TRAUMA INFORMED should NEVER BE OVERLOOKED as it is INTEGRAL to SOCIETAL STABILITY and HEALTH.

There are large persistent gender gaps between women and men in Europe. On average, the gender employment gap in the EU is 11.6%. And 32.1% of women working part-time are at risk of poverty or social exclusion, in contrast to 8.9% of men (EC,2019). Higher gender equality would lead to up to 10.5 million additional jobs in 2050 due to improvements in gender equality (European Institute for Gender Equality.2019) and gender equality in education has spill over effects also in other domains, such as employmentMainstreaming gender equality in education and training policy remains crucial in countries where equal access to education is taken as a given, which is the case in the majority of EU Member States. Challenging gender prejudices and stereotypes throughout the education cycle can reduce gender imbalances in other spheres of life. Therefore, it is essential that gender based stereotypes are deconstructed and challenged in all the areas of education and training.To this purpose, WE MEN project gathers six entities from UK, Ireland, Spain, Estonia, Greece and Lithuania, experts in Adult Education and Gender Equality Training. They have worked together in collaboration with national and European stakeholders, identifying the following KEY AREAS OF INTERVENTION to strengthen the role of Adult Education to address gender inequality.1. Men should take part in the gender training area more actively than at present, as we cannot address gender inequality without also addressing men.2. Male gender trainers have a strategic role to transform attitudes of other men resistant to gender issue.3. Gender trainings should focus not only on analytical and conceptual skills but on personal context and transformative approach.4. The use of gender lenses to deconstruct gender stereotypes learned norms should be included in the field of adult education as a way of promoting (social) subjectivity of contemporary adult learners.5. There is growing evidence that EMOTIONAL INTELLIGENCE (EI) contribute towards increasing the performance not only of learners but also of teachers. Using training programmes in EI as a path to address also GENDER EQUITY TRAINING (GET) could have multiple benefits, contributing to: (i) break male resistance to gender training; (ii) improve motivation, learning engagement and results; (iii) upskill both adult teachers and adult learners in a soft skill, the EI, increasingly required by a large majority of jobs.6. New approaches to GET should take full advantage of innovative teaching methods based on digital solutions. Blended learning, that uses apps, games or measurable programs to teach concepts, can promote deeper learning, reduce stress, and increase student satisfaction. Teachers can become also more engaged with their students.The AIM of WE MEN project is to address the above identified needs and challenges improving teaching methods in EMOTIONAL INTELLIGENCE and GENDER EQUALITY TRAINING for adult educators through digital solutions.To achieve these goals, the project will carry out the following intellectual ACTIVITIES and OUTPUTS:- Design, test and implement innovative approaches and teaching methods in GET by using training in EI as a vehicle to engage, both male and female, adult educators and adult learners in training programmes addressing gender equality.- ECVET Educational Program on EI and GET (IO1), focus on personal context and transformative approach.- Online Open B-Learning Platform (IO2) with high-quality digital tools to upskill adult educators on EI and GET.- Methodological Framework for the implementation of Adult Education training programmes in EI and GET (IO3).WE MEN will involve 89 adult educators, target users of the project (28 from partners’ staff /36 experts involved / 25 participants in pilots). The project will also directly involve and benefit 125 adult learners, project beneficiaries that will participate in the pilots. 500 stakeholders will be directly involved at local, regional, national and European level and the project will reach a minimum audience of 1000 recipients through the dissemination activities.The project will have a positive impact in: (i) partners and other adult education organizations in Europe, developing innovative approaches and teaching methods in GET by using training in Emotional Intelligence; (ii) adult educators, improving their competences in Emotional Intelligence and GET, (iii) adult learners, accessing to training programmes addressing gender equality; (iv) stakeholders, accessing to innovative solutions to implement Adult Education training programmes in EI and GET.The project will apply EU frameworks and instruments (ECVET, EQAVET, Europass and EPALE) to promote and boost transparency, recognition, transnational mobility and transferability to other Adult Educators and intermediary bodies in Europe, with the active support and cooperation of a network of key associated partners and relevant stakeholders.

Children in migrant families are key actors in the process of integration, as they are frequently called upon to bridge language and cultural gaps in understanding between members of the host community and their own families. Both teachers and migrant families are deeply concerned by migrant students ́ success at school. The more their parents understand the school system in the host country, the better they are equipped to support their children at school as underlined by PISA studies.Even though migrant parents have high expectations for their children, they are faced with many obstacles – mainly language and social barriers or low understanding of the host country’s system of schooling. Lack of time or money to invest in their child's education may be a major issue in disadvantaged areas even though alternative solutions, based on voluntary initiatives (e.g. supplementary schools) are offered by many associations, with community volunteers who endeavor to support children.In addition, there are various degrees of public support within school- many EU projects have underlined this point especially in the School education field. The MiFamily approach presents a win-win situation:1- for professionals – an opportunity to involve migrant parents in the ‘formal’ education of their children;2- for migrant families – a means of becoming better equipped to support their children’s progress through the host country’s education system, thanks to the innovative approach of the family learning processThe Mifamily programme is designed to provide educators/parent ambassadors/ESOL teachers with the skills, knowledge and competences needed to be able to apply Family Learning methods within a programme of additional language skills for adults and children newly-arrived in EU states The programme is designed for teachers/educators and is mainly focused on developing own knowledge and skills.The complete Blended Learning course corresponds to 5 ECVET points (125 hours of learning) and is set at EQF Level 4 (corresponding to RQF/NVQ L3 in UK). It is available online through the https://MiFamilyProject.com website via the ELearning tab and is best delivered, as detailed in the curriculum guide, through a series of five practical group train-the-trainer sessions accompanied by 61 hours of self-study using the research resource online. As part of the course trainers are expected to complete up to 14 x 3hr sessions with migrant families, these can be offered as seven full or 14 half days. The training programme prepares teachers/educators for working with newly-arrived migrant families through carefully planned sessions on cultural sensitivity and interculturality, assessment of language proficiency and integration needs in the country using the MiFamily Project tools and a practical, interactive session on values. Family Learning methods including: learning through play; the importance of communication skills (speaking, listening and positive praise); story-telling including making props, games and activities; sharing books, rhymes and songs; making books and reading with children, are introduced. The innovative use of Family Learning techniques to strengthen and accelerate language acquisition is presented and the online database provides a comprehensive catalogue of research to enable each person taking the course to deepen their learning as required. The MiFamily project outlines possible additional Family Learning sessions on understanding secondary school and becoming more involved in our child’s education; organising a school-based celebration, these are to be further developed by the teachers/educators in response to the practical needs in their own countries and settings.The multi-national dimension of the MiFamily Project has proved key in highlighting with participants across all partner countries the tremendous value of involving migrant family members in their children’s education. The methodologies of Family Learning were new to some partners while well-established within the British education system. The use of Family Learning methods to facilitate integration, acquisition of host country language as well as to support the engagement of parents in their children’s educational journey is new. This became increasingly evident throughout the project and is highlighted in the National Advisory Groups’ reports, the qualitative feedback forms from pilot sessions and the evaluation forms from each of the multiplier events.

Throughout the last decade, disasters have become a serious problem both nationally and internationally because of the damages occurred. As the increasing frequency and complexity of disasters affecting communities has risen significantly over the past decade, the negative impacts of natural disasters like floods, fires, landslides, earthquakes, drought, extreme weather, pandemics and man-made hazards like school violence have increased in many parts of Europe. Thus, recent disasters have created the need to develop strategies and plans to diminish their negative impacts. Herewith, it is highlighted that there is a need to support the improvement of European capacities to assess risk, as the first step towards the development of disaster prevention and emergency plans, while allowing European countries to assess their levels of preparedness and capabilities to manage disasters. (EU Commission)As children are one of the most vulnerable groups when faced with a natural disaster, they should learn from early age about the risks in order to be better prepared for disasters, and this is equally entire society's duty to make effort for a safe life. Therefore, EU strategy supports disaster risk reduction through all-of-society view that promotes an integrated approach to disaster management with social and economic factors causing vulnerability. Many communities around the globe have brought into focus the role of education in preparing for and preventing disasters, as UNISDR (2007) stated that “knowledgeable and involved people are critical to building a safe society”. The need for creating a safer society reveals the importance of imparting necessary knowledge to people in order to develop disaster management skills, and to increase awareness about disaster-related issues. It is emphasized that schools can be models of participatory risk reduction and disaster management in their communities.Thus, disaster education in schools has lead roles in development of coping capacities of both individuals and societies to reduce any adverse impacts. Disaster management education is about building teachers from cross-curricular disciplines, students’, school authorities' and families' understanding of the causes, natural disasters and effects while also encouraging them to contribute proactively to the prevention, preparedness and response of the disasters. With this project, it is aimed to foster a “disaster management” culture in Europe and strength the resilience of communities against natural disasters; support teachers to teach in matters of risk reduction, emergency preparedness and in response to disaster situations; raise awareness of children in the field of natural disasters and disaster management cycle with the use of gamification based on authentic disaster scenarios; support school authorities to develop disaster management strategies at local/regional level; develop a set of innovative awareness materials to train the European population on the prevention, preparedness and response to disasters; to raise awareness of families and community-at-large about the disaster management cycle; support schools to be better prepared disasters for leading the community about disaster management.The target groups of the project are: teachers from cross-curricular disciplines, students aged 10-13, school authorities, families, local/national authorities and community-at-large.Also, following outputs will be developed to IO1 Methodological Teaching Framework for Teaching Disaster ManagementIO2 Disaster Management Training Content for TeachersIO4 Guide for Developing Disaster Management Strategies at SchoolsIO5 Awareness Materials on Disasters for Families and CommunityFor an effective disaster management in the respective countries, all outputs and activities will be centered on affective, holistic and inclusive approaches. Namely, all interested parties like students aged 10-13, teachers from cross-curricular disciplines, school authorities, families and community-at-large will be involved in the activities throughout the project timeline so that each interested party can get the best out of the project activities and results by engaging actively. The project will have a direct and positive impact on increasing the awareness level of disasters among the children aged 10-13, teachers, families and school authorities, increasing resilience to disasters, minimizing the vulnerability against the disasters, have them children better prepared for the disasters through gamification based on authentic scenarios, guiding schools to make and adapt their own disaster management strategies, supporting teachers from cross-curricular disciplines with innovative methodologies so that disaster training can be mainstreamed.The envisaged long term effect will be strengthening the profiles of teachers, school authorities, school support staff, and mainstreaming holistic and affective disaster management in Europe.