"<< Background >>We applied for this project because it is very important to us to be able to carry out international youth exchanges in a new normal and with high quality standards. Due to the corona pandemic, many european youth encounters could not take place. Many organizations with years of experience in youth exchanges as well as organizations with less experience are currently still unsettled and need support. They need new, nnovative methods of high quality as well as quality standards for reconstruction and new possiblities for networking of European partnerships.We would like to bundle the potential of very experienced organizations and less experienced organizations in order to create new quality standards that are adapted to a new ""post-COVID normality"" and the acceptance of non-formal education by expanding the cooperation between formal and non-formal educational institutions.Within the cooperation partnership, new quality standards are to be created that aim to plan, organize and carry out transnational youth encounters with high quality, with the aim of supporting young people in their development of social, intercultural and media skills and also of critical thinking. These competencies, developed through non-formal learning processes, are intended to enable young people to become mature Europeans, for whom social and political commitment for a diverse and sustainable Europe are important. Up-to-date digital tools as well as digital and hybrid meetings should be included in the planning and will be tested and evaluated during the project.<< Objectives >>The primary goal will be to encourage and strengthen European organizations in the field of youth education in order to plan new youth exchange projects, to reactivate existing partnerships and to establish new partnerships on a European level. Concepts will be developed to enable exchange projects to be carried out safely and with valuable content, even in pandemic situations, in order to strengthen the feeling of security of all participants in intercultural and transnational projects. With the help of these concepts for the implementation of international youth encounters in a new post-COVID normality, young people in Europe will be able again to participate in international projects for the promotion and development of social, democratic and intercultural skills on a long term base.<< Implementation >>In addition to the transnational project meetings, there will be training and learning activities. We are also planning to set up a website on which the project results will be available in various formats for downloading or streaming. These results will be guides on intercultural work with young people in the post-Covid period, as well as videos and guides on new (digital) methods and tools. The contents of the website are translated into the various languages ​​of the partner countries so that they can then also be used after the project time has expired by youth work professionals in all partner countries and more. Via the organizations' social networks and the local press it will be drawn attention to the website and the project results.<< Results >>As a result of our cooperation project, we expect that the cooperation with our partner organizations will be strengthened and that they will expand their connections with one another. This will create many new transnational project opportunities under Key Action 1 or 2. The project results are intended to contribute to a good and stable network of European partner organizations with innovative quality standards. The project results with newly developed quality standards and practical methods for intercultural youth work will be available to other organizations in the long term on a website with all information about the project as well as downloads of methods, checklists and guidelines for action. This promotes a long-term revitalization and quality improvement of European youth exchanges, which is based on the current needs of partner organizations and potential participants in international exchange projects."

"The main objective of the Project ‘’Improvement of teacher`s planning skills in competency based education’’ is to strenghten, improve, develop teachers planning skills in competency based education in 21st century. Now in reform period of education in Latvia when accents go from traditional knowledge based education to competency based education, it is essentially important to support and strenghten teachers skills, professionality, to give safety by helping to teachers. It is a teacher who is moving forward the education process in everyday life. Reform success will be depending on how competent, sure, confident and creative will be teacher in his work. The target group of the project - teachers who work in the school on a daily basis - in the classroom with students. The project was implemented by Valmiera Pargauja State Gymnasium (Latvia) with its partner schools - Bjørnegård School in Norway and ICS Pian del Bruscolo in Italy. Number of participants actively involved in the project - 15. The main tasks of the Project were summed up in two blocks. Block A: partners choose one of the three themes and will be responsible for and work more with it (planning of the lesson / Italy, short-and long-term planning/ Latvia, feedback and self-evaluation/ Norway. Block B (mandatory for each partner): participants collected and tested methodological material for a tool book for teachers ’- Handbook for teachers in developing of planning skills which was handed out by the end of the Project. Project activities were a combination from training activities in each partner country with observation of colleagues work, workshops of respective themes, and homeworks where partners have to work with above mentioned tasks. There were three Training meetings - one in each country.By the end of the Project the Handbook ‘’Improvement of teacher`s planning skills in competency based education’’ was ready created in electronic form in Latvian and English and available for all the interested parts, published in websites of partner countries.Each partner country arranged its dissemination activities for Project results. In Latvia/Valmiera Handbook and other results of the Project were presented in The Final Conference with target audience - teachers, leaders of methodological groups, education decision makers from our region. Due to Covid-19 foreign partners could not participate in the Final Conference. Project results and impact. Project materials will help practically in teachers daily work – tangiable material - Handbook for teachers ""Improvement of teacher`s planning skills in competency based education’’. Untangiable results (as observations, reflectations, experience, discussions, work in focus groups) will improve teachers planning skills, will give possibility to have a more safe and sure look on changes in education system, will help to structure own work and create more effective lesson. Pedagogues are now more confident to share their experience , and with this will help to improve the work for other collegues; they will be more confident to talk to parents and to explain changes in education system. We hope that Project results will provide multistep effect on included persons- from pedagogues, to parents, society in general, but most important – to students in daily work in lessons. The lesson will become more effective, meaningful, professional, up-to-date..."

STEM skilled labour force has been in high demand in Europe and this trend is expected to raise due to current and future consolidation and expansion to the physical world of more automation and digital technologies. EU will have up to 825.000 ICT job vacancies by 2020 difficult to fill due to the shortage of skilled labour force. Basic coding skills are also needed, as more than 90% of today’s professional occupations do require digital competences, including programming. On top of this women account for just 24 % of science and engineering professionals. ICT-based curricula need to be much stronger, even at primary school levels, to ensure that ICT skills needs are met in the future The command of digital tools and programming skills/concepts, as well as critical reasoning skills, should be considered an “universal language”, as they will be part of the XXI century literacy skills. TangIn delivers educational resources and guidance materials for teachers to promote and support the effective use of tangible programming concepts in daily classrooms (at primary school level) while teaching STEM-based subjects. These resources enable teachers of introducing tangible programming concepts and STEM-based subjects, to young students, in a fun, engaging, pedagogical and inclusive way, while promoting classrooms as inclusive environments through the development of students digital, problem-solving and reasoning skills. The consortium gathered partners from 4 countries bringing together researchers and schools to engage in a process of co-development of products, which resulted in: -A comprehensive report on using programming concepts to stimulate learning of STEM subjects at primary school levels, providing guidance to schools and researchers on how can tangible programming concepts be used in the classrooms fostering their motivation for STEM-based subjects and to promoting students’ inclusion. -TangIn toolbox of resources composed of 21 + 4 lesson plans to be implemented in daily classes and a teachers’ guide manual, supporting teachers in implementing those activities and to assess their impact on students learning and motivation. -TangIn Teachers training package to train teachers on how to use the resources developed with tangible programming and on how can they further develop new activities or lessors in other topics as well.The composition of the consortium was fundamental for reaching the above-mentioned results as one of the innovative aspects of TangIn approach was the co-development process between the researchers, teachers and students, which allowed a constant dialogue that enabled researchers to get insight information of the main features/requirements of the educational resources and the teachers and students validated them in the classroom. Complementarily, the consortium promoted several events, including a European workshop for teachers, local peer-training activities in schools, pilot actions with the participation of 32 teachers and around 800 students, 4 multiplier events in schools partners. At the end, the consortium reached the following key-impacts: - Better prepared schools and teachers to respond to XXI century skills demand by improving their practices to develop students STEM, digital, problem solving and reasoning skills -More motivated students (and engaged) with school as a whole, through the increase of their feeling of belonging, increase opportunities for peer activities and increase motivation to learn STEM and digital topics -Cooperation between the research community and teachers for the development of innovative approaches to teaching and innovative educational resources and for the creation of more inclusive classrooms environments -Endowing capacity of schools and teachers to better prevent the intolerance and discrimination between young students -Empowered partners with the ability to answer to the challenges that the educational and training professionals and organisations are facing, in terms of: diversity and multiculturalism in schools, students motivation, etc.

Science, technology and engineering are key competences recognised by the European Commission essential respond to the personal fulfilment, health, employability and social inclusion requirements felt today. The low indicators on science on young students, resulting from the OECD PISA 2015 survey, highlight the need to develop knowledge and competences in science. To improve these competences in young students and foment their engagement, the role of the educational staff is essential. Thus, teachers should be provided with new and innovative teaching methodologies and learning forms to respond to the changes in the school context and prepare the students for the future. The InNature project is linked to biomimicry, an approach that defends that sustainable answers to many problems faced today were already developed by the nature. This approach defines that many problems solutions could be found through the emulation of the nature patterns. Hence, this project aims to enhance competences and awareness on biomimicry in the School Community, including students, parents, teachers and directors and Informal Science Education Providers through the development and implementation in classroom of a set activities related to this approach and events, such as a fair about this thematic in schools. There are some concrete goals behind the project, based on the need to increase the interest and knowledge in the school community: i) reinforce the sustainability principle in schools for the whole school community; ii) develop new teaching resources to be used inside the classroom and outside and iii) reinforce STEAM competences in the school community. In order to achieve them, InNature foresees the development of the following results: - IO1 Strategic Plan for biomimicry in schools in Europe: report on the current good practices in the European countries regarding biomimicry in different contexts, as well as the assessment of possibility to adapt and/or transfer those practices to primary and lower secondary schools. To develop the plan, 8 interviews will be performed with the representatives of the good practices chosen, as well as 5 focus groups with 8 participants each, one in each partner country with schools, to discuss the good practices with transferability capacity to the primary and lower secondary school.;- IO2 InNature Toolkit – a set of educational activities for teachers to use in classes, will be developed and tested in schools, and complemented by a teacher’s handbook, a guide to allow the independent use of activities in the classroom. Since teachers will test the toolkit in their classes, a short term staff joint event to train the teachers that will implement the educational resources in the first place will be organized with the participation of 13 staff members. Also, one pilot test will occur as the final activity, in the partner schools, for an average of 250 students;- IO3 InNature Fair –programme to organize the “InNature Fair”, a 3 days event in schools with activities and presentations to enhance the school community and Informal Science Education Providers curiosity on the theme. The five partner schools will pilot test the programme developed for, at least, 100 persons in each test, bringing a total of 500 participants in the five fairs. To reach the project target groups, i) the school community, namely primary and lower secondary school students – between 10 and 16 years old – and their parents, primary and lower secondary school teachers and directors and ii) Informal Science Education Providers, including biomimicry experts, several activities will be organized and performed, besides the ones explained above, such as the InNature local event, five multiplier events organized and hosted by the partner schools, aiming to share the results of the project, namely the IO1, IO2 and IO3. Around 20 participants from all target groups will be part of each, giving a total of 100. More, it is also expected to reach around 2500 persons through the social media networks, events, platform, e-mail and other dissemination channels used in the project. With the results of the project and the engagement of the external stakeholders, the primary and lower secondary students and parents will improve their competences in STEM as well as learn more about sustainability, though the new activities implemented in classroom for students and in the fair for the whole school community. More, the teachers will have access to new and innovative teaching methodologies to apply in schools, as well as to scale up their knowledge on nature-based solutions. The informal science education providers and biomimicry experts, similar to the primary and lower secondary school teachers, will have available teaching resources that can be adapted to other contexts.

Understanding and embracing of different cultures and traditions, can bring a positive effect and is vital for the future development as individuals. This process can start from an early age with a cultivation of a common culture, traditions, values and behavior of certain groups of people. Yet, cultures and customs vary from country to country and from region to region, and as such they represent the rich cultural heritage and diversity in Europe. The project aims to foster an early childhood approach to diversity and embrace the cultural awareness skills of participants. LEOC corresponds to the need to develop key competences and build basic skills in students to help their understanding and adaptation through raising their creativity and awareness of the different cultures in Europe. LEOC will explore local cultural heritage and traditions, the similarities and the differences between them, in five European countries: Bulgaria, Latvia, Spain, Portugal and Turkey. LEOC promotes creative teaching and learning, the exchange of good practices, the development of intercultural competences - basic, soft and cultural awareness skills. The main objective of LEOC is for students to become aware of different cultures, traditions and customs, to teach students how similar celebrations are held in different countries across Europe, to stimulate students to explore diversity and intercultural learning and encourage intercultural dialogue among partner schools. LEOC targets students from primary schools (8 – 11 years old) and their teachers. Through formal, non-formal and informal learning (NFIL) methods, participatory approaches and short-term exchanges (LTTA), the project will foster a greater understanding and responsiveness to social, ethnic, linguistic and cultural diversity across Europe. LEOC will integrate art and creativity sessions into the school curricula. Students will participate in five logo competitions, creation of a European Cultural Heritage Map, creation of a student’s project anthem “The Voices of Our Generation”, four Christmas concerts and one New Year’s Eve concert, ten plays “Our Diverse Traditions”, one collaborative play “Let’s Explore Our Cultures”, five musical concerts “My Friends from Europe”, one music album “The Songs of Our Continent”, a travel e-guide “The Flying Carpet”, miniature models for photo exhibition “My Small Europe” developing a dictionary “The European Languages” and ten story-tellings with parents. Teacher education resources will be developed and collected in an e-manual “Good Practices on Non-formal Educational Methods”. The manual will include NFIL methods for creative teaching of cultural awareness, diversity and intercultural dialogue. Students will display their skills through writing of plays, songs, creating posters and flyers. Teachers will learn new ways of creative teaching through workshops during the LTTAs and the exchange of good practices. The foreseen activities will stimulate participants to explore the particularities of the different cultures and customs of each participating country and in doing so the project will raise awareness of the importance of preserving Europe’s cultural heritage and foster the development of inclusive educational systems across Europe. LEOC will broaden student's understanding of their cultural similarities, linguistic and ethnic varieties in Europe. Students will learn about national holidays and heroes, create a dictionary in 6 languages - Bulgarian, Spanish, Portuguese, Latvian, Turkish and English. Six LTTAs will be held in partner countries. This will create a sense of cultural diversity and enhance the knowledge and quality of education and training in schools on European level. LTTAs with pupils will involve 5 students and 3 teachers and the short-term staff training will involve 4 teachers. Students from all partner schools will create ten plays related to diversity and perform them on stage in international teams. Students will learn traditional songs and dances and through performances present them before an audience. A final report with all project materials will be published on the project’s website, the Erasmus+ Project Results Platform and the eTwinning project platform. The implementation of LEOC aims at establishing new knowledge, competences and practical skills of the participants enhancing their awareness about European cultures and traditions. This is in compliance with the horizontal priorities for 2020 social inclusion and the educational value of European cultural heritage, as well as with supporting opportunities in acquiring and developing key competences. We reckon that this will be accomplished through LTTAs and direct participation in cultural events, which are needed for a successful personal development of students and professional development of teachers. The project will make use of the eTwinning project platform space in order to share the progress and sustainability of the project.