If you look around, you will notice that there are
many letters hiding in the nature. Maybe, standing on the brink of extinction,
nature is sending us letters asking for help. While looking for letters in
nature, children will unveil the dormant beauty in the nature and will
encourage people to think about the fate of the earth using their pictures.
Educational innovation and
creativity
In the beginning, students (Press Club members)
observed only the trees and flowers growing in the schoolyard, while searching
for letters in the nature. Soon they desired to go outside of the city and look
at their country from the perspective of the guvnor – citizen of Lithuania. The
results disappointed them, because they found hills of rubbish near a blossoming
flower, a broken branch laying near the soughing birch, scorched spaces of
verdure frightened them, it was uncomfortable to look at the dead fish on the
beach… Therefore, it is no surprise, that the participants of the action
„Lets do it 2011“ not only brought their little brothers and sisters along, but
also suggested the Project partners to organize same actions in their hometowns
in April. Walking in nature, cleaning, recording beautiful sights changed the
childrens’ view towards the pointless devastation of nature. Letter collecting
developed their skills to creatively compose pictures. Creation of calendars
with their country names stimulated them to evaluate the opinion of every team
member. Group work strengthened the already strong friendship of the press club.
Integration of educational content
When the project idea was proposed in the eTwinning
portal, the project was incorporated in the curriculums of English language, Geography,
and IT.
The Polish team’s proposed „Vocabulary game“ enriched
the English language lessons, it helped to develop the vocabulary, stimulated
communication between peers, discussions in the students‘ corner.
During geography lessons students created questionnaires
about their country and exchanged them with partners. Partners’ questionnaires
where interesting, but difficult, therefore, atlas of geography, internet
search engine Google and teachers‘ help was needed. Lithuanian team will upload
a large questionnaire about the 5 participant countries in autumn in the
project website.
During IT lessons, using Microsoft Word, PowerPoint,
Autocollage, Windows Live Movie Maker, Paint, Hotpotatoes, Jigsaw Planet students
created PowerPoint presentations, mastered to format letters found in the
nature, modelled calendars – final thesis of the project.
Collaboration
of school’s partners
Project partners communicated using E-mail, Twinspace
chatroom, pupils’ corner, posted the most important information in the project
blog or project Mailbox, participated in the virtual letter auction.
The main idea of the Project was to find letters in
nature and compose the names of participant countries from them. However, as
soon as the project started, Polish delegation suggested a „vocabulary game“
which helped pupils to master new English words, Turkey had an idea to prepare
presentations of the teams, therefore,
pupils were trained how to use Microsoft PowerPoint, Autocollage and
Windows Live Movie Maker software during IT lessons. Hearing that not everyone
is able to format their pictures, Lithuanian team prepared a tutorial for using
Photo Manager. Seeing the indifferent view of nature preservation of people,
they also invited the partners to join the cleaning action which took place in
April. The Project offered the ability for all the countries to show their initiative
and free will in choosing the activities that interest them.
Creative application of ICT
Work with PowerPoint, Microsoft Word, Autocollage,
Windows Live Movie Maker, Paint, Hotpotatoes, Jigsaw Planet and Photoshop
software allowed the creativity of every member to unfold, developed artistic
competence. Not everyone can spot a letter in the nature, therefore, the
contribution of pupils and teachers in this project was incredibly big,
creative and valuable. The Lithuanian team is happy that the promise of the school’s
director to publish the calendars, representing the school and the country became
a reality, because the children felt the value of their work and people, we
hope, would look at the nature from a different perspective.
Cohesive development and
continuation
Project integration into English language, geography
and IT curriculum, crossed the boundaries of informal curriculum (Press Club)
and integrated itself into the formal curriculum at the Klaipeda deaf and
hearing impaired school, including the pupils from upper classes and their
educators. The long-term 2012-01 8th grade Lithuanian language curriculum
foresees reading and analysis of a poem of A. Baranauskas „Anykščių šilelis“
using the gathered material and pictures during the Project.
When the opportunity was found, the calendars were
presented to the members of the government and environmental movement with the
invitation to join in preserving the nature.
Project partners from Turkey suggested to move the
project into Comenius programme in order to spread the environmental idea to as
many countries as possible.
Results and benefits
·
The
developed skills to communicate, create and work with ICT allowed children with
hearing disability to integrate into the hearing society. eTwinning software
allowed children, who cannot express themselves in words, to communicate in
written.
·
The
ability to communicate with partners from Europe stimulated the will to develop
English language knowledge.
·
Walks
in nature with photo, video cameras and smartphones unveiled the indifference
of grownups towards the disappearing nature to the children and encouraged them
to organize various actions of nature preservation.
·
This
project will be presented at the annual contest “Virtuali kelionė klasėje“,
hoping, that educators from the country will take an interest in the Project.
Gathered material and prepared methodical tools will help in organizing similar
environmental actions in our cities. This would be the biggest success of the
project!
