eTwinning

E-twinning

eTwinning is a free online platform linking a community of more than 250,000 teachers across Europe. It supports schools from early childhood to post-primary level to find partners and work on joint projects in any curricular area, using Information and Communication Technology (ICT). On the dedicated website www.etwinning.net you can create a profile, search for partners, browse ongoing and completed projects, and develop your own project ideas. Once you have found a partner and agreed a project plan, you can register your project and access a specially created ‘Twinspace’. This is a private and secure online workspace that you and your partner(s) administer; students can be invited to participate as members.

If anyone is interested in developing or getting involved in an eTwinning project, please contact your National/ Post Primary eTwinning Ambassador R O’ Sullivan at rosullivan@daviscollege.ie

Short description

This is a project based on the alarming rapports about young people’s well being. We wanted to raise awareness about what makes them happy in their everyday lives and compare and inspire each other in finding happiness in small things.

Collaboration between partner schools

The main idea of the project started off at an nordic ambassador’s meeting between the ambassadors from Sweden and Finland. They then add a partner finding request on ESEP and several countries answered.

When the team was ready, we had a video call with all the partners and presented the main idea. We discussed the activities and decided together upon a timeline. During the project we kept contact on ESEP, email and whatsapp.

After the first introduction and the creation of the word clouds we had another meeting to decide how to make the questionnaire and to process data statistically. A final goodbye meeting was held to analyze the final product. Collaboration is still going on as this form itself is being written by all the members of the project.

Examples of project work

Project plan and International Groups

https://school-education.ec.europa.eu/en/etwinning/projects/what-makes-us-happy-1/twinspace/pages/project-plan

Word clouds:

https://school-education.ec.europa.eu/en/etwinning/projects/what-makes-us-happy-1/twinspace/pages/word-clouds

Other Projects

This project is a collaboration between four countries, Ireland, Germany, Spain and Norway.

Reasons:

We decided to choose this topic because of the current situation of conflict which is ongoing in Europe. I personally have four Ukrainian students in my eTwinning classroom. The current conflict causes a lot of fear in our students’ lives. Many students ask, “could a war like this be real in our own country some day?” What can we do to prevent this happening?

Logo:

Logo Competition

Collaboration:

All the activities on this project were very collaborative and exciting. From the original introducing yourself to the working in international groups. Students got a feel for what it is like to work and collaborate with their European peers. We started with e-safety and netiquette which is always important. Then we got to know each other using the Padlet tool.

Introducing yourself

Other examples included interviews and some of the students made raps. Here is an example of some Spanish interviews;

Spanish interviews

Impacts:

The major impact was the fact that students got to immerse themselves in the reasons and need for peace. Through discussion, interviews and activities, they got a deep understanding of why peace is more desirable than conflict. Furthermore through the collaborative methods they saw first hand how easy it is to work together. Overall this was a wonderful project to be a part of. I believe the students made good friends and worked on a very worthwhile topic.

Ronan O’ Sullivan

eTwinning and Erasmus+ Coordinator

Davis College, Mallow

Ireland.

21/06/2023

Previous Projects

Lifelong Mindfulness

Lifelong Mindfulness is an Erasmus+ Programme involving four schools across Europe. Students in these schools have been working on projects and in March 2019 all four schools came together in Davis College Mallow. Students from Norway, Greece and France got the opportunity to meet and collaborate with Irish students on topics associated with Mindfulness. This project helps to create links between different school and bonds between students are forged. There is also a cultural dimension to the project with students learning about song and dance from each of the participating countries. In 2019-20 there are two return visits, one to Norway and one to France

Previous projects

This project aimed at improving delivery of subject material in Maths and Science through a combination of improving methodologies and analysis of assessment and learning. This project involved the sharing of ideas and pedagogical approaches to teaching and learning from different cultures as well as the development and testing of new teaching methodologies and pedagogical strategies for use in the classroom. Through this project, we saw that when used effectively ICT in the school environment, has a positive effect on both student, teacher and the wider school environment.

About the project

The project "Teaching Methods on the Move" was a cooperation of 5 secondary schools in 5 different countries. The project involved more then 250 pupils aged between 14 and 19, and approximately 50 teachers. "Teaching Methods on the Move" focused on the use of ICT in all areas of school life, varying from actual teaching methods to how the administration of the school can be improved through the use of ICT. The project aimed at using the pupils prior knowledge of modern technology and looking at how this can impact on the classroom environment. The motivation for this project was for schools to share their teaching and learning models with other schools, finding common ground as well as differences, and ultimately see schools collaborate to develop, implement and test new teaching methodologies and strategies for use in the classrooms of all participating schools.