Ľudstvo funguje neudržateľným spôsobom. Malo by sa učiť od prírody, ktorá je vo svojej podstate udržateľná - recykluje odpad, ktorý v nej vzniká, využíva Slnko ako obnoviteľný zdroj energie, dokáže sa prispôsobiť novým podmienkam a má funkčnú samoreguláciu (ktorá ľuďom chýba). Základným východiskom prerodu spoločnosti k udržateľnému spôsobu života je výchova a vzdelávanie na školách.Výsledky zrealizovaných prieskumov hovoria, že environmentálne vzdelávanie je zamerané na všeobecné informácie, realizované je v teoretickej rovine, pričom žiakom chýba pochopenie vlastnej zodpovednosti voči životnému prostrediu a častokrát ani nepoznajú možnosti, ako môžu aktívne prispieť k ochrane životného prostredia na lokálnej úrovni.Projekt Envi – Mobile si dal za cieľ vytvoriť inovatívne výučbové materiály, ktoré nielenže poskytnú žiakom informácie o životnom prostredí, ale zároveň podporia zmenu ich prístupu k ochrane životného prostredia na lokálnej úrovni a inšpirujú ich k aktívnej participácii na zlepšovaní prostredia, v ktorom žijú. Výstupy zároveň podporujú integráciu environmentálnej výchovy v rámci školských vzdelávacích programov na základných a stredných školách, využívajú medzipredmetové vzťahy a podporujú výučbu odborného obsahu v cudzom jazyku.Do projektu bolo zapojených 5 partnerov zo 4 krajín - SK/Strom zivota (OZ aktívne v oblasti environmentálneho vzdelávania a ochrany kultúrneho dedičstva), SK/INAK (OZ zaoberajúce sa tvorbou metodík a realizáciou vzdelávacích podujatí), IT/IBIMET-CNR (vedecký inštitút venujúci sa rôznym oblastiam v rámci rozvoja mestských sídiel a ochrany životného prostredia), ES/VITA XXI SLP (platforma poskytujúca expertné konzultačné služby v oblasti životného prostredia) a CZ/HB Modrý Kámen (nezisková organizácia, ktorá sa zameriava na podporu udržateľného spôsobu života).Pre podporu stanovených cieľov boli v rámci projektu vytvorené nasledovné výstupy:- Analýza potrieb - medzinárodná štúdia, na základe ktorej boli zadefinované oblasti a témy vzdelávacích materiálov.- Vzdelávacie materiály, ktoré sú voľne k dispozícii - databáza 575 environmentálnych cvičení a to v každom jazyku partnera a v angličtine, stiahnuteľná cez mobilnú aplikáciu, podporujúca výučbu odborného obsahu v cudzom jazyku a 305 metodík, ktoré sú určené pre výučbu environmentálnej výchovy v rámci medzipredmetových vzťahov.- Leták, prezentujúci projekt a jeho výstupy.- Webová stránka projektu, na ktorej sú umiestnené všetky výstupy na stiahnutie.V rámci projektu boli zorganizované aj nasledovné aktivity:- 2 nadnárodné stretnutia projektových partnerov, na úvod a v závere projektu, - 4 konferencie, na ktorých boli diseminované výstupy projektu,- 3 vzdelávacie podujatia, určené učiteľom a pracovníkom s mládežou, ktorých cieľom bolo zaškoliť účastníkov do metodológie EUR a metodiky tvorby vzdelávacích materiálov.Realizácia projektu navyše pomohla pri:- zvyšovaní povedomia študentov o životnom prostredí a zlepšovaní ich jazykových a IKT zručností, dôležitých pre ich budúcu kariéru,- pochopení dopadov našich činov na krajinu v rámci lokálneho prostredia,- podpore inovatívnych prístupov v rámci aktívneho prístupu pri zlepšovaní prostredia, v ktorom ľudia žijú,- podpore sebavzdelávania študentov v oblasti problematiky životného prostredia a cudzích jazykov,- k zdieľaniu príkladov dobrej praxe na medzinárodnej úrovni,- podpore mobility a spolupráce medzi krajinami a cieleného budovania kapacít v oblasti environmentálnej výchovy.

Globally there is a growing wealth of evidence in support of taking children’s learning outside the classroom. Every Experience Matters Karen Malone (2008) reviewed over 100 studies drawing on research from around the globe identifying the positive impact of learning outside the classroom on children’s whole development.Learning outdoors offers a wide range of benefits to all children and young people. It provides access to fresh air which encourages sustained pupil concentration levels and their alertness as well as supporting the development of a healthy immune system. Outdoor learning facilitates the opportunity to be physical and in turn develop physical literacy.Social interaction is enhanced when pupils and staff work together outdoors. Not only does it foster a more relaxed raport between teachers and learners but it is also a chance for different individuals to excel by supporting different learning styles. It can be particularly beneficial to those with additional support needs such as ADHD. So why not take children outside to the school ground, which offers suitable conditions for outdoor learning? In Slovakia, most of the lessons are taken indoor. Staying outside is more or less sporadically, not regular or systematic. But in survey Slovak teachers expressed their interest to implement the outdoor education at their schools. In contrast, in the UK, outdoor education is implemented in several schools and teachers are regularly trained to improve their skills. Germany is also partially successful, although it is mainly pilot projects not a national practice.The project objectives were set as a result of internal research and communication between project partners to support the overall aim of the project - to support the skills of teachers for transforming the spaces for outside learning and develop children through meaningful outdoor education implemented in improved school yards.The objectives were:- To transform their school grounds or nearby public places for better outside learning.- To motivate teachers to take their everyday learning outside.- To offer the ideas for outside learning activities.- To support teachers` confidence in application of new methods of outside teaching and learning.- To gain skills of project partners in specific field of complex planning the re-design of spaces for outside learning.- To provide guidance on how to ensure the sustainability of change through collaboration in the school community.- The last, but not least, foster quality improvements, and innovation excellence at the level of education and training institutions, in particular through enhanced transnational cooperation between education and training providers.To achieve the project goals, Slovak, German and British organizations shared their experiences and expertise, while each project partner adapted the project outputs to the needs of national target groups.Learning through Landscapes (www.ltl.org.uk) is a UK charity whose priority is to promote benefits of outdoor education. The partner's expertise is based on more than 20 years of experience in supporting kindergartens and elementary schools to implement sustainable outdoor education into daily practice.Tree of Life (www.stromzivota.sk) is a non-governmental, non-profit organization that has been dedicated to environmental education and cultural heritage protection for 40 years. The organization prepares and coordinates environmental education programs in which approximately 150 schools from all over Slovakia participate. The aim of the civic association INAK (www.trochuinak.sk) is to support and develop innovative approaches, to use creative methods in the educational process of children, youth and adults, to support lifelong learning and to improve the key competences of learners.The Unabhängigen Institut für Umweltfragen (www.ufu.de) is a public research institute active in the field of conservation of natural resources, emission reductions, and promotion of participation, social justice and sustainable economics.In this project, we created a handbook (O1) - a comprehensive guide for primary and high school teachers who seek to improve teaching outside, either through inspiring activities or directly transforming the school ground. The aim of the handbook is to help schools make the most of their schoolyard's potential for regular and constantly improving outdoor education.The content of the handbook is supported by online modules (O2) and suggestions for outdoor activities or school ground changes (O4). Links to these additional resources are provided in the relevant sections of the handbook. All materials were created in 3 languages - Slovak, English and German.In addition to the handbook, we have also organized a pilot training course. The content of the course was implemented in training modules, and during the course we also introduced the outdoor activities available for download (output O4).

Environmental education in Slovakia, and also in other EU countries, doesn`t comply with its elementary mission and it`s more symbolical or theoretical, than practical or real. Teachers in primary schools should implement environmental education into daily education of general subjects, though they might be missing relevant skills, knowledge or, more often, motivation for environmental education.One of the consequences of the absence of quality environmental education is that young people are not able to undertake the responsibility for their own impact on local environment, because they are missing the linkage between general information and knowledge presented at schools and real life in local community. Therefore one of the key roles of environmental education should be not only to deliver the knowledge but to change the attitude of young people and to increase their activities towards the sustainability of local communities.For this reason, within the project BIOPROFILES - Implementation of practical environmental education in schools, an educational program, teaching materials, worksheets and suggestions for teachers in practice were designed and developed, focused on practical environmental education with a link to the local environment and the impact of individual activities on the community, in order to strengthen their skills and competences and to help acquire knowledge of environmental issues and problems.Within the BIOPROFILES project, in which 6 partners active in the field of environmental education from 4 countries cooperated - from Slovakia (INAK, Tree of Life, CPU Nitra), Italy (CNR-IBE), Spain (VITA XXI) and the United Kingdom (LTL), innovative materials for practical environmental education have been developed for the target group of primary school teachers and pupils, with the aim of:- support professional development of teachers in environmental field,- support the skills of teachers in active use and implementation of environmental topics into daily teaching,- deliver high-quality teaching and adopt a new pupil-centred method of research-based learning,- increase the environmental awareness of teachers and pupils through monitoring of local environment,- provide teachers of primary schools in SK, IT, ES and UK with innovative teaching materials, nowadays missing on the educational markets of the above mentioned countries, combining general subjects, while integrating practical environmental concept into teaching process.These GENERAL OBJECTIVES of project and OVERALL PROJECT GOAL aimed at “Supporting the skills of teachers in primary schools in the implementation of practical environmental education into teaching of general subjects” was reached through development of 4 project outcomes:- TRAINING PROGRAMME “ENVIRONMENTAL MINIMUM” (O1) for teachers, divided into 4 days, aimed at acquiring the basic knowledge and skills needed to implement environmental education (EE) in practical teaching,- THE HANDBOOK “TEACHING GREEN” (O2), presenting in details 7 key themes of environmental education - water, biodiversity, natural and cultural heritage, air, energy, waste and the human environment, for the acquisition of basic knowledge of the teacher on the given topics,- INDICATORS BOOK (O3), representing 14 indicators for monitoring the quality of the local environment, in the form of inspirations for students` research-based activities, for the practical teaching of EE,- COLLECTION OF BIOPROFILES (O4), with 52 examples of research-based observation aimed at monitoring the quality of the local environment of selected cities in 4 countries - Slovakia, Italy, Spain and the United Kingdom.The target group of the BIOPROFILES project were project partners and teachers of pupils aged 10-15 (i.e. 2nd grade of primary schools in Slovakia and relevant schools in the partners` countries). These teachers should implement environmental education in everyday education, mainly as cross-subject, though they often lack these skills, knowledge or, more often, motivation for environmental education. 29 teachers and 15 project partners were involved in the project activities as follows:- testing of O1 / TRAINING PROGRAMME through active participation in educational activities in Italy, Spain and Slovakia,- testing of O2 / HANDBOOK while using materials in their teaching,- monitoring the quality of the local environment while using the O3 / INDICATORS BOOK,- practical monitoring and summarizing their findings in O4 / COLLECTION OF BIOPROFILES.Project outcomes have the potential to significantly contribute to filling the gap in the availability of relevant training programme and materials for gaining relevant knowledge and skills in the field of environmental education while complying with European priority in the national context of “Strengthening the profile of the teaching profession”.

STEP IN project reacts to current situation at secondary technical schools in Slovakia, Czech republic, Italy and Finland, and generally across Europe, caused by COVID - 19, that puts schools, teachers as well as students under the pressure of completely new, unexpected challenges, with the demand for the use of digital tools for teaching all the content online. The experience from spring 2020 brought several issues that teachers and students need to face, revealing problems, such as lack of ICT skills and experience on the side of education providers, lack of skills to exploit available online tools in greater extent, lack of teaching materials that would enhance online teaching, lack of cooperation among schools in sharing the teaching resources and methods and other issues. Also, one of the key problems, common across Europe (learnt about from the talks with project partners) is the unaccessibility of, and difficulties in providing vocational practical training that students from secondary technical schools, as well as from other vocational fields, could undertake during lockdown and online teaching, as there aren´t available teaching resources ready to use with this purpose. The difficulties caused by this fact, result in the lack of students´ skills and competences which they needed to acquire through practice, that would prepare them for their practical jobs and labour market needs. From these reasons, we would like to tackle this problem by focusing our attention on-15 teachers of 5 secondary technical schools, vocational subjects Machining, Hydraulics and pneumatics, and Logistics, including teachers of practical training related to this field, who will be directly involved in project activities, outputs development and pilot testing of materials, tools and methods related to online teaching-50 students of secondary technical schools, aged 15 – 19, undertaking theoretical and practical training on the above subjects, who will also contribute to development of the outputs and their pilot testing, from at leat 5 schools in SK, CZ, IT, FIN while developing project outputs:O1/Needs Analysis in the target groups of the teachers and students, related to online teaching and practical training in the fields of Machining, Hydraulics and pneumatics, resulting in setting priorities, content, methods and proven tools related to online teachingO2/Educational Video materials/learning units to teach these topics, including online modules, supporting practical training on:1-Machining, eg. metal processing, turning, milling, grinding and drilling, CNC machining2-Hydraulics and pneumatics, eg. hydraulics, pneumatics, electrohydraulics and electro - pneumatics3-Logistics, eg. truck transport, eg. accessories and equipment for loading, unloading and transporting groupage goods (such as rear or side-lift, forklift, general cargo crane, hook and demountable containersO3/Tests for reviewing incoming and outcoming knowledge and skills of students, related to the machinery use, before and after the use of online educational resources, developed in O2, for the grades of 1 – 4 of secondary technical schools, with sets of questions, for each of the topics:•Machining (manual metalworking, turning, milling, grinding and drilling), CNC machining•Hydraulics and pneumatics (hydraulics, pneumatics, electrohydraulics and electropneumatic)•Logistics, eg. truck transportO4/ Examples of good practice for teachers with overview of suitable tools / technologies and methods for online practical training and teaching concrete vocational topics, tested during the project, Also, we will focus on testing the outputs and implementing them in practice, in 5 pilot schools and/or organisations from SK, CZ, IT, FIN and subsequently enabling their use among other schools from the same vocational field, as well as transferability and adaptability in other vocational fields. Project should be carried out transnationally due to identical problems the schools face and needs created by COVID – 19 in all partner countries, and due to first common experience with online teaching gathered by schools during lock – down in the spring time, as well as the common will to provide high quality incusive digital education across Europe, through mutual cooperation, under the new circumstances. In the project, we expect the following impact: -Detailed needs analysis carried out, identifying teacher´s and students needs in relation to online teaching of vocational subjects (O1)-New educational resources developed for online practical teaching and training - interactive learning units, video – based, on the topics of Machining, Hydraulics and pneumatics, Logistics, including assesment tools – incoming and outcoming knowledge and skills tests for students (O2 & O3)-Cooperation skills developed, sharing of experience and teaching resources, supporting each other and enhancing teaching togehter in a time of crises

Before the pandemic, in the Slovak republic, car industry was and still is the key industrial sector. Car producing companies and industrial parks create 200 000 work places, which creates 9% of the total employment rate. Car production subsequently requires other experts, who sell the cars and provide high quality services. This area offers more than 10 000 additional job opportunities. However, with fast changing technologies and innovative solutions it becomes difficult to follow the needs in this industry in terms of qualifications needed. In the time of project submission, in Slovakia, there were 14 000 qualified workers missing on the automotive work market (TASR 2017, Feb 27th). The above numbers affect also vocational education system, setting up concrete requirements for: - Qualified VET teachers and practical workshop leaders in 87 schools in Slovakia, providing relevant training programmes in automotive professions (ISCED 3C), (ISCED 3A) - Necessity of Innovative, up - to - date, high quality teaching materials reflecting the work market needsIn March 2015, before STEP AHEAD I project submission, SŠOA DA carried out the online research, targeting 87 secondary schools in Slovakia, from automotive professions. From 71 respondents, 78,9% confirmed the need to integrate the topic of trends and innovations into current school curricula. 94,4% expressed their interest in the new teaching methodologies and 93% interest in interactive online resources. Also, strong interest and need for teacher training was confirmed through STEP AHEAD I. the project preceiding STEP AHEAD II, where 24 training participants and about 70 conference participants from both SK and CZ expressed their interest and need for similar kind of learning opportunity. STEP AHEAD II, therefore, built on the real and concrete needs confirmed by 71 respondents of the online research (2015), as well as by 94 STEP AHEAD I. project participants (2017), while providing one of the possible solutions to actual situation. In STEP AHEAD II, in addition to providing intensive teacher training programme, we developed 2 main outputs: O1/319 Interactive learning screens, structured in 13 online modules, in each of 5 language versions/EN,ES,FIN,CZ,SK, focused on concrete topics of the new trends in Automotive industry O2/13 support teaching methodologies/lesson plans related to concrete topics of innovations; and other support materials, related to the topics, most of which cover also environmental aspects, that become really crucial:•CAN NETWORK (FINLAND)•ELECTRIC CARS (SPAIN)•FULL HYBRID (FINLAND)•TRUCKS – FUEL CONSUMPTION (CZ)•TRUCKS – EMISSIONS (CZ)•TRUCKS – HYBRIDS (FINLAND)•GPS MONITORING, TELEMATICS (CZ)•AUTONOMOUS CARS (SK)•BIOFUELS (SK)•HYBRID BATTERIES (SPAIN) Project outputs were developed in partnership of 5 institutions: SSOŠA DA Bratislava, replaced later by SOS Vranovska (SK), INAK (SK), KOMTES (CZ), APAGA (ES), TTS (FI). All partners provided expert supervisory on the concrete topics on automotive innovations. Project directly targeted the group of teachers from secondary automotive schools in all partner countries, staff members of partner institutions, representing work-based settings, and indirectly students in the schools where developed materials will be used, as well as all the teachers who will use them. During project implementation, there were alltogether cca 50 participants who attended 3 training programmes and 70 attended conferences. We believe that project, contributed to increase of quality of VET in Slovakia and the Czech republic as well as Spain and brought a positive experience for Finnish participants, too.