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Short-term students exchange and accompanying staff in Anderlecht 

The Short-term students exchange, part of BLEND-IT, Erasmus+ project was held in Anderlecht, from 12-16 October 2015. This event brought together representative participants: students, teachers and staff from all partner institutions involved in this strategic partnership. 

This meeting of BLEND-IT, Erasmus+ project took place over five working days, with all participants arriving on Sunday and leaving on Saturday.

It started with an official opening speech by the Belgium headmistress and some speed-dating game helping the students know something about their peers countries. Lessons using the Blended methods followed the entire week, with all participating teachers having to teach to the classroom formed of Belgium students and guest students. Lessons were taught in English, using the Moodle platform materials and lessons prepared in advance. 

The last day was used for the teachers to discuss the project progress, the intellectual output, impact, evaluation, etc.

The Workshop practical tips and use about powerful parenting style at home, at school and in society, providing group reflection about their practices.

1st Day 

The official opening of the Meeting of Blend IT, Erasmus+ project was held in Sint-Guido-Instituut: Mrs. Candide Behets, Belgian headmistress has welcomed all partners. Following that, the main items in the agenda were covered:

1. Opening by students of OPR (Reception & public relations)

The Belgian OPR students presented the Sint-Guido-Instituut, the courses they have and what they will be able to do in a future job. After that they introduce some simple rules of the school that must be followed. They finished their presentation with a quiz contest played by all students.

2. Speed-dating of all Partner Organizations

The Belgian teachers prepared different questions for the whole group of exchange and Belgian students. Each Belgian student took place in front of an exchange student and they started to speeddate. After two minutes they switched partners. The speeddate was ended when each Belgian student had a conversation with each of the exchange students.

3. Spanish lesson by Spanish teachers

Mrs. Marian Lopez and Mr Jose Pedro Martinez presented the objectives of their lesson and they allowed everyone to learn history about Beatles and their contemporary society.

This didactic unit deals with the music of The Beatles, maybe the most important band ever. Through their songs and history, we will try to motivate our students to develop their cultural knowlegde and English language skills. It is almost sure that our students know about them – almost everyone in Western societies have heard “She loves you” or “Help” - but The Beatles transcended pop music and became a part of cultural history of the world. We will look into their records, evolution and influence on our culture.

Before class student had to make some research work, using the Moodle platform, and that was used during the lesson where students had to answer some questions and do group work about history and society under Beatles songs context.

4. Guided tour in Anderlecht and to other buildings of the school

The OPR students gave a guided tour explaining all historical context of Anderlecht, visiting the most important spots surrounding school. It was an opportunity to understand the multicultural integration.

2nd Day

This day was spent outside the school. Different activities were planned for teachers and students.

1. History lesson in the center of Brussels prepared by the Belgium OPR Students and the Belgian teacher of tourism (A. De Ridder)

Belgian and exchange students discovered different historical parts of Brussels.
In the "Classic Walk" they learned about the Grand Place, the city hall, the cathedrale of Saint-Gudule & Saint-Michael. The OPR students explained in the "Mont des Arts walk" everything about the important museums of Brussels: Oldmastermuseum, BOZAR, Musical Instruments Museum, Magritte Museum, Belvue Museum and Royal Palace. Afterwards we went to the "Sablon" and "Marolles" and we visited the law courts, the "rue haute", the "place du jeu de balles" and we saw the differents "comic walls" of Brussels.

2. Geology lesson prepared  in the museum of Natural History by Franka Bytebier

For the lesson about “fossilisation” the student were asked to look at a video on the Moodle platform and answer some questions in order to better understand the concept of “fossilisation” before visiting the museum of Natural History.

During their visit of the museum on Tuesday, the students had to work in groups of 5 and answer several questions about fossilisation. They could find the answers to these questions in the museum.

 

3rd Day

The entire day was spent in the school, and by rotation, teachers from partner countries have had the chance to teach the mixed class of students, using Blended Learning:

1. English Lesson about If Clauses by Cristina Maia and José Cruz

The two Portuguese teachers prepared a lesson about If Clauses.

Before the lesson students had to watch a video about the subject that was in moodle platform.

At the beginning of the lesson, students answered a questionnaire about the correct using of the conditionals. After they answered the questionnaire, they clarified their doubts with the correct answers given by automatic correction from the moodle tool.

In the second part of the lesson students were given a task using tablets. They recorded a movie of themselves using imovie app, preinstalled on the ipad, and upload it at moodle as a collaborative work that was evaluated by teachers. At the end of the lesson, students were asked to construct a collaborative mind map giving feedback about the lesson tasks. 

After the lesson, teachers published a final movie in platform with comments about the students work.

2. Lesson about The Law of sines by Iohana Udrescu

The Romanian teacher, Iohana Udrescu has prepared a lesson about The Law of Sines. The lesson has began with a short brainstorming activity aimed to introducing the sines, later the teacher has explained the students more about this new notion. The methods used in this lesson were peer working combined with investigations, Geogebra and some applets were used to help the students understand and visualize the Law of Sines. They have used some examples and practiced applying the results from the Theorem. Different groups of 4 students from different countries were formed and each group had some tasks, based on applying the theorem in order to solve a real life application. Each group presented their discoveries at the end of the lesson.

3. Lesson about the fundamental law of dynamics by Luciano Zazzetti

The Italian teacher has proposed an activity which had the aim of investigating which variables influence the motion of a body subjected to an unbalanced force. Using an applet and working in groups on a tablet, has been introduced and clarified the concept of force and acceleration. During the simulation it was seen that a constant force does not correspond to a constant speed, a common misconception.

The students have made a series of guided simulations and were invited to write a relationship between the variables that affect the acceleration of a body.

 

4th Day

The day was spent outside the school. The Belgian students of OPR and their teacher of tourims prepared a history lesson about the beautiful city of Bruges.

Guided tour in Bruges

After an introduction about the historical importance of the city of Bruges, we had a tour around many historical sites, museums, places of interest, monuments, religious heritage and parks:

  • Ammunition Dump, Bruges city ramparts, Minnewater park – Square Wijngaert, Beguinage

  • Square “walls”, “Stoof street”, Saint John’ s hospital, Church of Our Lady , Square Guido Gezelle

  • Gruuthuse museum, Bonifaciusbridge, Arentshuis, Dijver, College of Europe

  • “Wollestreet”, Rozenhoedkaai, Tanners square, Fish Market, “Blind Donkeystreet”

  • City Hall, Burg

  • Market, Belfry (Jan Breydel en Pieter De Coninck)

  • “Steen street”, Square Simon Stevin, Saint Saviour’s cathedral, Concert Hall, Train station

5th Day

The morning was spent with the students in school (lesson + gym) and in the European centre of Brussels. The afternoon in the school, where the teachers started discussions.

1. Lesson about Wikis, by Georg Blaha

The Austrian teacher, Georg Blaha, told the students to reflect the days they spent together and to write down this reflection in a discussion forum of the moodle course. They also should look at the contributions of the others and answer some of them.
The second task was to use a so called WIKI, that means a text field, where every user of the cause is allowed to write, change, delete. Together the students of all partners should write a message to the teachers.

2. Gym lesson

The exchange students participated in a gym lesson. The gym lesson was prepared by a Belgian teacher of Sint-Guido-instituut. He putted the focus on teambuilding and fairplay. First, the students learned some techniques of handball; afterwards they participated in an improvised "European Championship" hockey. It was important to work together and to have an open mind towards each other.

3. Lesson about Europe in the European Centre of Brussels

Teachers, exchange and Belgian students discovered "how Europe works" in the "Europarlementarium". The students took pictures of different "European meals". They had to prepare a typical meal in their country at home and take a picture. Those pictures had to be uploaded in Moodle.

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Evaluation and teachers meeting

4. Evaluation for the guest and host students on Moodle

A survey was created on the Moodle platform in order to gather feedback from all guest students. 

Another one was prepared for the host students and their famillies. And also a survey  was created for the teachers that have attended the meeting. 

5. Certification for students

At the end of the meeting all students and teachers received their certificates of attendance and the students their Europass certificates.

6. Teachers meeting

The afternoon was spent in the school, where the teachers started discussions about some managerial issues.

We have discussed about the next activities and a to do list was created:

  • Finish the evaluation report after meeting in Belgium

  • Translate the booklets about motivation and absenteeism

  • Translate the booklets about parenting

  • Send proofs of disseminating the meeting in Belgium

  • Start the course on groups of 15 participants in each country

7. Evaluation of the meeting

The formal evaluation of the meeting was done online after the meeting, with the help of  evaluation forms. The participant teachers were given the link to the evaluation form and asked to fill them in. 

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