1. Six schools from Belgium, Italy, Lithuania, Portugal and Slovenia have joined in the project which aims at improving digital skills and literacy with the means of producing short films. With the rapid development of digital technology and their societal implications, we observe the falling behind of the schools and the teachers. Schools are being equipped with new digital devices, but they need time and knowledge to adapt. Through this project, we address technical, cultural and didactical issues in the area of film making in the lessons. 2. The main objective in this project is to strengthen the pupils’ ICT SKILLS FOR FILM-MAKING. This includes also making short films for lessons, for European idea and social issues, and to learn about prominent short films. The pupils will work on social and multicultural issues in their project films; they will raise their SOCIAL AND MULTICULTURAL AWARENESS. Parallel to both objectives above, we will pursue the objective of FOREIGN LANGUAGE COMPETENCE. The pupils and teachers will use English for the communication and in the products. Altogether, we will take some efforts to develop CREATIVITY & CRITICAL THINKING with our pupils while producing media contents. 3. Number and profile of participants: In the core activities, there will be 130 pupils, 14-18 years old, some of them with fewer opportunities; at least 24 teachers (4 from each school) will be involved in mobilities or working in project teams in the school with subjects English, ICT, social sciences and others. Indirectly affected by the project will be 1200 pupils, involved in the local activities or hosting, and at least 60 teachers, involved in local training courses, activities and hosting.4. Activities: Five countries in the project will hold 5 pupils’ exchanges and one initial teachers’ meeting. In the teachers meeting (C1) we will learn about media literacy and film making, technically and didactically; management of the project will be discussed. The first pupils’ exchange (C2) is about short film. The pupils will learn about the genre short film, about its production. They will develop scripts and put them into life. They will get known with some of the prominent short films of the country (as well as in other exchanges). In C3, the pupils, in international teams, will develop a short film, related to specific school subject. In C4, the pupils will reflect on the EU. In several workshops, they will learn about the European idea and try to include it into their existing knowledge and beliefs. In C5, the pupils will learn about producing cartoon with computer software. They will try to develop cartoons in the field of Citizenship Education, addressing social issues related to Europe. In the last exchange (C6), they will exchange the views on Europe, in the discussion in in some of their products, and will review their past work. They will discuss the problem of advertising and the visibility of the European idea.5. Methodology.Tasks should be equally distributed among the partners. Every school sets up one LTT activity. One is responsible for communication design, one for ICT, one for compilation and publishing, local events are in the responsibility of every single partner. There will be regular video conferences, regular activity checks every six months; the communication should be bundled up and be tracked in order to avoid overload and misunderstanding. 6. Results and impact:Pupils: better English level, skills regarding film making, critical thinking and creative techniques of producing media content; higher awareness of social issues and multiculturalism; better team abilities, negotiation skills and organisational skills. Teachers: knowledge on different school systems and schooling approaches; increased usage and deployment of digital tools in the classroom, better English knowledge and their multicultural skills. Some desired products are: TwinSpace of the project, with materials and didactical guidelines; short introduction to the history of short film in every country; technical and didactical guidelines on several topics of producing short films; a set of teaching/learning materials ‘Short films in the classroom'; at least 25 didactic short films and short animated films for a specific topic in one school subject; short film on Europe; filmed story about one social issue from every partner school; the project website; 6 fliers.7. Longer term benefits:Teachers will include and produce more films in the lessons. More eTwinnig or similar projects in the partner schools. Institutions will gain important insights into European schooling and become member of European community. Through internationalization, they will change their existing school culture, for being more open for 21st century skills.

"CONTEXT/BACKGROUND OF THE PROJECT:According to the generally accepted definition, sustainable development is defined as development that ""meets the needs of the present without compromising the ability of future generations to meet their own needs” According to the report published by the World Environment and Development Commission, sustainable development has been expressed as “the process of change where consumption of resources, investment decisions, technological development, and institutional change take place in harmony, and the potential of meeting human needs and desires now and in the future”.Sustainability and sustainable development concepts are among the most discussed topics of the last few decades in our world where environmental degradation is increasing. The issue of sustainability is at the very center of the energy, economy and environmental triangle, so it is discussed in a wide range from social scientists and naturalists to politicians, environmental organizations, as well as governments.Providing sustainability means creating a balance between nature and people. It is in our hands to create this balance. So how do we achieve this? There is only one answer to this; we will direct our choices correctly. We will get to know our technology, our climate, our environment, our energies, our natural resources, analyze them and make long-term plans and guide them in a planned way. In other words, we will perceive sustainability as a whole and will be aware of non-renewable energy sources, instead, we will focus on the use of renewable resources.OBJECTIVES OF THE PROJECT:In this project, we will focus on environmental sustainability, which is one of the branches of sustainable development goals that can be examined in a broad framework. Therefore, our main focus and objectives will be on combating climate change, conscious use of natural resources and preventing pollution. The main objective that we will try to acquire for our students throughout the process is to raise individuals who focus on the quality and quantity of the natural environment, which provides the necessary life support for the survival of human life, which is the precondition for the existence of an economy. Another objective is to create an environment that promotes multilingualism. Pupils will use English in a natural context outside the classroom and will improve their communication skills in general, along with their language skills. Throughout the project, activities will be organized to enable students to express themselves in English and they will be encouraged by their teachers to remove their psychological barriers to speaking the language. In addition, teachers will participate in activities that contribute to their teaching skills and improve themselves by examining the different practices of the teaching profession in Europe.NUMBER AND PROFILE OF PARTICIPANTS:All of the schools in our project consist of secondary schools with pupils of the same age level. The partnership formed by six different schools from six different countries includes Germany as the coordinator; Turkey, Italy, Croatia, Spain, and Belgium as the participating partners. 125 students will participate in the exchanges, and their age range is 14-17. DESCRIPTION OF ACTIVITIES:Throughout our project, there will be a mobility hosted by each participating partner. These mobilities will start with the Joint Staff Training activity to be held in Turkey. This activity will be a teacher training in which 12 teachers will attend, two teachers from each school. All remaining activities will be short term exchanges of groups of pupils, which will involve students, and will take place with the participation of 5 students and 2 teachers from each school.METHODOLOGY:Since the primary goal of our project is to create positive behavioral change in pupils, all activities planned throughout the process will be pupil-centered. Therefore, the basis of student activities will be on “learning by doing”. They will prepare the presentations and discussions with teachers’ guidance. They will work in transnational groups to create an environment to communicate and solve the problems. RESULTS AND IMPACT:The pupils will understand and appreciate the value of today, and take action to protect tomorrow and future generations. They will learn about their daily mistakes In terms of sustainability principles and correct them. They will be encouraged by their teachers, administrators, and counselors to be active in problem-solving. LONG TERM BENEFITS:The long term benefits can be examined under two main aspects: individuals and institutions. Individuals (pupils, parents, teachers, school staff, etc.) will reform their life according to sustainability principles. The participating institutions will also have a more visible profile both in their cities and in the European dimension. They will also add to their project management skills."

When schools tell students to put technology away, it's like asking a doctor to save a life with one hand tied behind his back. As it is mentioned in the saying of Matt Miller, today's world is full of technology and it plays an important role in education, too. We have to realize that students are not the students of our generation where they sit and listen. Things have changed now, they have new toys such as smartphones, laptops, tablets, etc. The methods and techniques in teaching need to keep up with the requirements of the modern world and find new, motivational strategies. The digital storytelling technique is one of the activities which has started to be used by innovative teachers nowadays. The researchers state that students can learn more easily by digital storytelling techniques. We have realized that many students and teachers are unfamiliar with this concept. As a result, we have decided to choose the digital storytelling technique as the main theme of the project. We aim to carry out this project to familiarize students and the staff with different and more enjoyable teaching and learning techniques, to create the most appropriate atmosphere at schools in order to improve academic results. We would like to reach these goals by exchanges of good practices of the participating schools to get inspired by their different and innovative methods through the cooperation of the teachers and students of the partner schools. We would like to create international groups of our staff organized on the basis of subjects taught by them and of course our students will take part in this project, too, as we want to see their ideas about how we can make our schools more attractive places. The teachers and the students are expected to use the digital storytelling technique in the school environment. At the end of the project, the teachers and the students will have learned to use this technique effectively. Participants will integrate ICT tools in their learning process and have the opportunity to develop their language and social skills. There will also be a cultural exchange among the participants. There will be six partner schools from Belgium, Estonia, Germany, Italy, Portugal and Turkey. The age of the students from participant countries ranges from 15 to 19. The subjects of the teachers from the participant countries are ICT, English language, Literature, and History. We want to support the professional development of our teachers in using new ICT methodologies in teaching. It is also essential for the teachers of our age to know and use English no matter what subjects they teach. By setting out with this idea, we think that two short term joint staff training courses about ICT web tools and digital storytelling will be appropriate for them. In this way, they will master the whole thing that project and the students may need.They will also work on using innovative student-centered pedagogical approaches, new kinds of tasks for students to solve which can make teaching and learning more effective. Students should complete these different sorts of tasks and activities focusing on project-based learning and share their tasks and works via the eTwinning platform, so they can realize their knowledge, skills, and awareness of their own capacities. There will be four short term students exchange meetings during the project. Thus and so, they will have a chance to work in an international group and this new learning environment can help them to develop a more positive attitude towards learning. It is a key point in this project which will be a motivating experience both for teachers and students. This project will enhance ICT based teaching, learning, assessment practices as well as multilingualism in the teaching-learning process. Hopefully, our project will have a great impact on our staff, students and last but not least on our institutions. First, working on the project our staff will improve the quality of teaching by gathering fresh teaching ideas and approaches. It will be possible to motivate students who are harder and harder to engage in traditional school activities and consequently their academic results will be better. The participating schools will carry out a European project which will help to attain a higher status to our schools. The results of this project will bring longer-term benefits to our schools as the teachers will get used to using innovative methods, they can share their experiences with their colleagues. In addition, we will be able to renew our curricula in line with the objectives and results of the project, so we will be able to use this technique widely for years. In the course of the project through cooperation, both students and teachers will learn how to teach, learn and live in multicultural Europe.