Colours of Europe

European Social Entrepreneurship and Innovative Studies Institute which represents Lithuania’s vocational rehabilitation and vocational training confederation implemented GRUNDTVIG learning partnership project COLOURS OF EUROPE (No. LLP-GRU-MP-2012-LT-00051).

The main aim of our partnership of Colours of Europe project was to teach similarities and differences between plenty of European countries’ participants and between European languages. Differences of culture and languages are the facts of life and our project was one of the best ways which educates people. It educates that cultural differences, national origins, and religious attitudes are the European legacy and all nations together give the opportunity to all project participants become united exactly for these differences. Participants worked in different spheres (geography and nature, history and traditions, tourism, behaviour and usage, intercultural and multicultural education) in represented colours. With this project we wanted to help learners, teachers, and local people to understand that differences can be a good source of education. The priority of our project was to strengthen learners and teachers for long term education in different spheres of life. While teaching a language, we wanted to strengthen assimilation skills and to prepare them to work effectively in European community. The project was organized as a part of organization’s training program and as every day practice, while learning in each institution.

The meaning of colours:

  • The examination of “racism and tolerance”
  • Geography and nature (green colour)
  • History and traditions (red colour)
  • Tourism (pink colour)
  • Behaviour and usage (purple colour)
  • Intercultural and multicultural education (blue colour)
  • The usage of technologies in life (yellow colour)

The aims of partnership:

·         To learn about the culture and traditions of partner’s country;

·         To identify and to compare European and national values;

·         To develop knowledge and perception between learning adults and education participants;

·         To improve motivation of learners while learning languages;

·         To strengthen study skills acquisition of learners;

·         To strengthen intercultural and multicultural education;

·         To make education more attractive;

·         To help learners to reach the success in their future life;

·         To adapt different methods of education and means of education;

·         To create an implication of students and staff into a team work;

·         To improve the usage of digital equipment of learners and staff (cameras, video projectors, etc.);

·         To share with the knowledge and exchange with the experience between older people;

The effect to learners

·         They were able to compare European and national values;

·         They increased their motivation to learn foreign languages;

·         They improved their learning skills;

·         They were able to participate actively in intercultural and multicultural education;

·         An ability to improve writing skills while increasing reading and understanding skills;

·         While every time learning, they was informed about their cultural values and national identity in European civic context was assessed.

The involvement of participants

Learners were involved into everyday work type, in every project active thinking part, which was associated with activity planning. For example: they had chosen the best material for the appearance, places which had to be be fixed, places that had to be seen, etc. Also they took part in the development of the project and in assessments while organizing surveys, systematizing results, and arranging texts for publications. They took part in every work which was related to the theme of our project.

Works of art, music, and drama were performed by learners, who were helped by employees. Also there were written emails in foreign languages, written articles for web page, developing ideas, such as tourism or healthy lifestyle, students were allowed to feel like team partners of the project. Learners had to decide about the last structure of DVD. They had arranged Power Point presentations about different parts of the project. Works were performed by students and introduced to other partners of the project and were presented to local press and to TV station.

Students had an opportunity to join in the activities of different projects, such as geography, history, art, and language learning. They were working with groups and they were able to present their work. They were invited to share their ideas with other students and staff, while presenting their work through web camera and live. Learners actively took part in assessment while preparing questionnaires, collecting answers, and working with results.