The project title is “E.A.R.T.H. to save our planet!” (Each Act Rises The Hope, to save our planet! (because small hands, small things can save the planet!) Nowadays most people agree that climate is changing. There are a lot of explanations for it but the most important thing to do now is to take action. With this project we will think about a more sustainable way of living to tackle climate change.
The first step for everyone is to be aware of the problem. Thereafter, people have to think of how they can help to counter this worldwide problem. Thinking of their behaviour and turning it into a direction of a more sustainability way of living will be another, important step. We do the project with young children, they are the future. We are convinced that by learning some values at a young age, children will implement this in their long life. Although they are young, we can learn them some behaviours about sustainability. No big issues, but knowledge, actions that this kids from 4 to 6 years old understand and really can pick up to take them home in their everyday life.
Therefore, we have to make them aware of some problems and change their behaviour. Some objectives are:
• To know that water is life. People have to care for water.
• To know and to feel that trees and forests are necessary. They are whole systems of biodiversity and cool down temperature. They also protect against erosion.
• To preserve their natural environment. Don’t harm nature.
• To avoid garbage by “the pyramid of garbage reduction”: prevention, reusing, recycling, removing.
• To know we can support to care for a healthier air: thinking about transport, traffic, renewable energy.
• To learn about the weather and the climate in other countries of Europe: in the North (Latvia), in the West (Belgium), in the East (Slovenia),
in the South (Cyprus)
• To learn about and to support the short chain of local, seasonal food.
• Being conscious of climate change and changing mind and actions in a more sustainable way.
• To open minds, to be aware of and be linked to children of other countries in Europe, to learn about their languages and their habits.
The project will run for two years and will be with four partner schools (Latvia, Slovenia, Cyprus, Belgium). We work with children of the preprimary school. We want to involve the chilrdren for this two years and hope they pick up many things to take them in their long life.
During the project, there will be four “Learning Teaching Training” activities where the partner schools are hosting each other. This activities will be for staff members. During the project, there will be a lot of actions with the children. There will be observations about the weather and the climate in all seasons, there will be actions around eating local (organic) food and producing it themselves by planting it and by starting a vegetable garden, actions concerning water (dissection, filtering), actions around air quality and thinking about traffic and transport, actions to prevent garbage, to avoid plastic (by making a wicker basket), to promote reusable materials. There will be shared good practices as living in the forest playground and practice their own home grown food, as running a self-care kindergarten, as the movement of Eco schools, as the
actions of an Environmental Center. This actions will be shared on eTwinning, Google Drive, schoolwebsite. There will be also a project website, where we will put a whole vocabulary, concerning the theme of climate change and sustainability. The vocabulary will be online in several languages and will be illustrated with a drawing and a movie clip with the pronuciation in the different partner languages. This website
will be open for everyone.
We will use different methodologies for the project. To prepare, to follow up and to evaluate, there will be monthly videocalls. Reports of this meetings and evaluations of the activities will be shared on a Google Drive. There will be lectures, discussing meetings, workshops, visits for staff, there will be concrete activities with children (practical and learning activities), there will be collaboration activities between the children
and the staff members of the visiting schools.
Results of the project will be presented on conferences, meetings of preschool teachers, meetings of the school group, pedagogic councils, internal learning events, on eTwinning, in media ( local TV stations, newspapers ) and it will have impact on preschool teachers who are motivated to improve their practice.
The project must be an appetizer, an eye catcher to open minds and hearts. With this project, we want to make the partner schools ambassadors of sustainability. We want to change minds for the long term, not only for children, but also for staff members. After the project, the project website will be updated for at least two years by the partner school of Latvia.It will be a start of a longer involvement of all partners to grow in ecologic issues.