Article 24 of the UN Convention on the Rights of Persons with Disabilities recognises the right to education of persons with disabilities. Education plays an important role in promoting the personal development of our pupils and is the basis for self-determined and active social participation. The project “Europe on a plate” was aimed at fostering social participation and equality of opportunity and at developing human resources. All of the three countries involved in the project consider education a lifelong process. The young people we work with are, despite their mental disability, able to learn and develop, and learning processes are possible for them throughout their lives. These were the main goals of the project: - Pupils practise organising and implementing a project. - Pupils strengthen their key competencies such as the willingness to learn and perform, creativity, resilience, openness, perseverance, concentration. - Pupils are motivated to actively shape their lifestyles and to acquire the skills that they need for entering a profession. - Pupils eat healthy. - Being in an intercultural community enables pupils to acquire the ability to stick to rules, to develop social skills and to experience being in that community as a stimulating learning opportunity. Achieving these goals had a positive effect on pupils’ lives and on partner schools. The young people developed competencies such as the willingness to learn and perform, creativity and intercultural skills. Thanks to the project, pupils understood themselves better in their living environment and be able to master future challenges of a European model more successfully. The pupils involved in the “Europe on a plate” project learned how to eat more healthily and control their weight. They improved their mobility and their physical fitness. They learned how to cope with stress and disappointment, thereby also strengthening their sense of self-esteem. This has been achieved by teachers involved in the project reducing the complexity of Europe to action-oriented contents and methods in their teaching approach. The topic “Europe on a plate” addressed the basic need of “eating”, which is a motivating topic for all pupils throughout Europe. In terms of methodology, different worksheets and recipes at various levels of abstraction was developed and put to use (text, text-picture, picture) and pupils at the respective skill level could practice reading in a concrete situation, with the teachers demonstrated the action steps that need to be performed. The pupils’ joy in moving and physical activity was stimulated by different excursions that offer motivating opportunities for physical activity. The expected results of the projects for pupils with a focus on “mental development” are mainly in the areas of knowledge acquisition and the development of communication skills. Pupils went food shopping and prepared a meal together, thereby learned more about new food products and methods of processing them. The outcome of the practical activities was a buffet. In addition to healthy nutrition, physical activity and fitness were also important roles during the entire project. In the field of communication, pupils expanded their vocabulary and had the opportunity to actively use it abroad. Simple words of welcome and rules of politeness were applied in Portuguese, English and German language. This increased the self-confidence of our young pupils. The final products of our project are a cooking book and an image film.

Schools from Czech Republic, Lithuania, Portugal, Iceland cooperated in gaining knowledge and skills working on the topic of water and investigating it in four aspects:1) geographical location and its influence on the cultures and traditions;2) the role of water (bodies) in historical events, stages, movements;3) discoveries through water (waterways, new lands, inventions);4) sending messages in bottles-creative approach to the information/knowledge acquired within the work on the previous three project topics.First the partners established a project web after they had been schooled in the use of the platform Weebly. Later they produced and voted for a project logo. While working on the individual topics the participants produced a major outcomes each term: 1) 3D map of waterways depicting also how the countries are connected; 2) presentations; 3) visuals; 4) real exchange of messages in bottles along with maps, posters, albums, exhibitions, performances; they took part in workshops etc., met in person in short term students exchanges. Min. 6 students from each visiting school per a meeting were hosted by their fellows. 3 such meetings were organised and the partners took turns to host once and then visit all the others. The last learning activities could not take place due to the COVID-19 pandemic. The partners did their best to substitute it by a meeting online and they sent the outcomes by post.The teachers were presented new teaching methods, techniques, broadened their awareness on different related topics and transformed the acquired knowledge and skills in meaningful support for their students helping them achieve the same: broaden their awareness, extend their knowledge, gain and develop skills and competence (language, personal, social, cultural etc.). Joint staff trainings were organised and attended by 2-3 participants from each school per a session. The 1st one dealt with the creation of a project web; The 2nd planned at the application stage was not approved and was organised just as a project meeting. The 3rd training was dedicated to conducting surveys and data processing; and the last one planned to present Adobe connect platform could not take place due to the COVID-19 pandemic (substituted by 2 online meeting). The schools relied on further students and teachers who took part in local activities and events; some with fewer opportunities. All the meetings (trainings and with students) were designed so that all partners could always meet, regarding this as a method how to build a good partner team able to complete a good project-that intention was could not be fulfilled due to the cancelled meetings in relation to the COVID-19 restrictions.The schools provide general education and are non-profit public bodies; they included their secondary level students aged 11-16. The Czech school's size: 220 students+25 staff, located in Bechyně, a small town in the south. The Icelandic is from Reykjavík with 300 pupils+50 staff; the Lithuanian is from Siauliai and is profiled as catholic with 500 pupils+36 staff; the Portuguese has several education bodies with about 1000 students, located near Castelo Branco.The project objectives were: acquiring knowledge on the topic while elaborating the results and outcomes and in an international cooperation, including different learning and teaching methods; improving the language level of the students and staff; developing/improving the ICT skills of teachers and students; teachers’ and other staff professional development.Impact+long term benefits: the fulfilment of the objectives stated: acquisition of skills and competences together with acquiring new knowledge; along with impact on the organisations: strengthening the schools' positions in their regions, gaining prestige; profiting from the team building as a result of the experience from the team work on the project.Teachers shared personal experience and could adopt new ideas and methods of teaching while working across the curriculums, incl. team work and integrated learning including broadening the awareness about the subjects and countries involved. They could strengthen their individual organizational skills and became more motivated to work in teams.Pupils learnt more about the importance of water following the project topics scheme. Exploring different cultures lead to promoting a higher level of tolerance and understanding of the differences and similarities throughout the EU. It was a motivation to work in teams with individual contribution to the issues and accepting the opinions of the others in order to reach the aims of the project. It helped develop a sensible competitiveness among students as they contributed in the outcome releases which were further evaluated if they could become parts of outcomes. All this made learning beyond the traditional curriculum, participating in school activities, attracting and engaging students who would want to be included in future projects possible.

"The project was based on intercultural and interdisciplinary exchange of ideas, experience and knowledge. Studying water in its various aspects provided opportunities for complex researches including the meaning and importance of water to life, the environmental aspects of the problem, investigating the social and anthropological aspects of water (establishing settlements and the influence of water on their development) and searching for water connotations in arts. All the institutions involved in the project preparation are situated by a significant body of water – rivers, lakes, seas, the ocean.The teams hopefully managed to show the students the complexity of such an essential thing like Water hoping that continuous examining the aspects, and especially in an international context, reflected in more responsible attitudes of the young people as well as the adults to the environment and the cultures. Furthermore, using English language as a communication means raised the students´ interest in studying English and possibly other foreign languages. The work on the project and the partner meetings enabled the children to improve their foreign language skills gained at school as well as to acquire new ones in practice while working on the project (either on the outcomes delivery or directly during the partners´ meetings).The interdisciplinary study and intercultural exchange of ideas on a topic of a global meaning and importance provided opportunities for the implementation of a wide variety of activities – firstly, part of the project work was concentrated on activities held in order to elaborate project outcomes and results: 1) locally at the individual schools (including some pre-teaching and preparation work, conducting the researches themselves and the work on the products as well as dealing with their final completion and presentation to the other partners by means of ICT or directly on partners meetings), and 2) in transnational cooperation including comparative surveys based on the individual approaches from the local researches, complex issues involving works of all partners gathered at one (such as exhibitions of arts and crafts works of all the partners, studies comprised of the contributions of each of the partners, i.e. the presenting of the biodiversity in the regions represented by the institutions involved in the project, the various approaches in the presentation of a work of Arts with Water connotations etc.).Another important part were the short-term exchanges of groups of pupils and transnational project meetings which involved teachers and students where the representatives from each of the institutions worked on common outcomes during workshops and other activities, visited places in relation to the project issues in order to get acquainted with the specifics of the host partner´s country, region and school, exchanged ideas about the problems and issues addressed by the project, promoted different approaches and shared different experience.The partners released: Multilingual Dictionary – a cross-project outcome; presentations, a booklet, videos, performances, exhibitions.Profiles:Základní škola Fr. Křižíka Bechyně is a primary school situated in the south of the Czech Republic and is attended by about 200 pupils providing education into two levels: primary (pupils aged 6 to 11) and secondary (11-15) with about 20 teachers and other staff.IES”Albaida” is a comprehensive school located in Almería. It is attended by about 1,000 students and offers secondary education to students aged 11-18, secondary education for adults and intermediate and advanced vocational training in audiovisual studies, nursing, and health studies - clinic laboratory, dental hygiene, radiology and environmental health. ""Sandoros"" progimnazija is a catholic school in Siauliai. It has got 38 teachers and 556 students, aged 7-15; 200 of them are Lithuanian emigrant students who live abroad but study at the school via a distant learning. There are also some students with special needs. Agrupamento de Escolas José Sanches e São Vicente da Beira is in Alcains. It has 1270 students from kindergarden to secondary level. It has lots of projects for all the students, aiming to improve the students’ experiences, including sports, Europeans club, eco school, theatre etc.The project had a great impact on all participants such as perfecting the language and social skills, teambuilding, interdisciplinary approaches and gaining new knowledge, raising the intercultural awareness, enhancing civic competences. As long as the long-term benefits are concerned we hope the students are motivated to study languages and approach different cultures; after two years of studying water in its various aspects the students are more environmentally conscious and have implemented the ecological aspects into their daily lives. Thanks to the project realisation the children and the teachers are still in touch due to the social media and ICT."

Although our students are provided with quite high quality formal education, we often find they are not adequately prepared to handle and solve the challenges of nowadays because the skills relevant to the demands of our society aren‘t often covered by the traditional lessons and classes. Sometimes there is a significant “skills mismatch“ between the competences the students need to succeed for the personal and professional success in the future life and those they actually possess. All the partners of our Project, five schools from Lithuania, Latvia, Turkey, Portugal and Poland, are focused on the growing active and productive members of their communities and providing them with the supportive atmosphere. We, teachers and educators, look for the new attractive teaching methods and techniques which would help us to meet the students‘ needs and build their key skills and competences. The main goal of this project is to provide appropriate opportunities for the students, their families and other community members to experience and practice life skills, to inculcate them into day to day practice so that it can last with them for their life time. The activities of our Project combine improving the life skills with the learning through the Arts. We focus on such arts areas as music, drama, painting and photography asserting that practices in those fields lead and support most interpersonal skills and deal with the conflicts, provide self-confidence and social tolerance, and show positive effects on other processes. Learning through the arts involves children and adults from the different social and cultural backgrounds and creates equal opportunities for all students including those from the disadvantaged groups. We believe that the general effects of such a Project mention a development of cognitive, social and personal competences for all the participants. We‘ll use a wide range of the methods and approaches such as peer and group learning, classes for the students of mixed ages, experimenting, guided, focused and free exploration, modeling, simulation and visualization, role play, discussions, and conferences. Carrying out the activities of the Project we expect to create and prepare the brochures related to the teaching life skills through four fields of our project: music, drawing, painting and crafts, drama and creative dramatics,and photography and video making. They will contain the descriptions of the teaching techniques, lesson plans, practical exercises, scripts and photos of the students’ works. The brochures will be prepared in paper and digital formal and spread among the learning community on local, regional, national and international levels sharing the best practices and experiences. One of the outputs of our project will also be the photo album “The world seen through the children eyes.” containing the social, street and nature photographies taken by the students . We expect that our students will develop a wide range of leadership skills. The students will improve the skills and abilities to work well with others and step forward to lead with the new ideas and initiatives. In a long time perspective our students will take on big issues and address them in a meaningful way that will have an impact on the world outside the classroom. The students as well as other participants will develop healthy work habits of doing the job in time, respecting the contribution of others and putting the efforts into the success of the final piece. Because most arts disciplines are collaborative in nature , the participants practice working together, sharing responsibilities and compromising with others to accomplish a common goal. The students will learn that a constructive feedback is a part of learning and it isn‘t anything to be offended by or to be taken personally. The evaluation is incorporated in every step of the process in the learning through the arts ensuring that critique is a valuable experience and greatly contributes to the success of the final piece.We believe that our Project matches the real needs of the teaching staff as well as needs of the students and other educators on local, national and international levels, and its results and outputs such as practical guidelines for the workshops and trainings, teaching techniques, lesson plans, descriptions of the exercises to teach and learn life skills through the arts, will be used and exploited continuously after the end of the Project.

"The main goal was to develop English communication and we succeeded. The realized objectives -English communication developed with the help of the methods of competency-based teaching, cooperative workforms and using ICT -A large number of students passed the language exam -The involved teachers got trained in Methodology and ICT -Communication in the mother tongue developed -The students got acquainted with their own and the partner schools’ history and culture -The digital competency of students developed Participants -Students with a minimum A2 level of English according to CEFR at the beginning of the project who turn 14 no later than the finishing year of the project. -Teachers of English, ICT, History and mother tongue -Members of the project management – school leaders, colleagues with project experience -Parents -Maintainers of the schools and local governments -Local and regional mediaActivitiesIn the first year we assessed the English knowledge of the students, and they joined a virtual classroom. Parallel to the exam preparation there were 10 skype lessons taught by all five schools. These lessons prepared the students for the interview and short conversations parts of the exam. The syllabus was prepared together but making the lesson plans was the responsibility of the involved teachers. The video recordings, the vocabulary lists, the lesson plans and the syllabus were uploaded to the project pages of the websites of each school so that other teachers and students have access to them. The children put together a presentation about their schools in any digital format for the students of the other schools. As a complementary activity, the students were prepared for the reading part of the exam.The activities of the second year followed the path of the first year, only the topics were different. During the skype/messenger lessons pupils practiced for the transactional dialogues, picture story and making notes parts of the exam. The digital presentations were about the towns where the students live and the complimentary activity was preparing children for the writing part of the exam.In the third year the children prepared for the discussion and radio programme parts of the exam. The platform of online preparation was changed to google classroom and we used MEET for the digital lessons. The topic of the presentations were the participating countries. Instead of practicing for the written part of the exam, the students were to register on the website of Euroexam and take part in the e-learning course available there. Because of the COVID-19 situation it was impossible to organize the ""international"" exam in Poland so this step was left out for all partners except for Hungary.The transnational project meetings were nor financed so the planned tasks such as planning, determining responsibilities, assessment, compiling, analyzing the doccumentation of assessment, planning necessary changes, etc.were realized together with the short term learning/teaching/training activites.There was training for teachers twice during the project, once in Hungary in autumn 2017 and one in Greece a year later. The topic of Euroexam training was the methodology of preparing students and training evaluators of oral exams. Both were available for English teachers in the region and for those meeting the legal requirements, they were accredited. The topic of the second training was methodology of teaching English and using ICT in teaching English. These were be open for other teachers.The students met only twice instead of the planned three times and took part in activities based on the topics of the skype and MEET lessons. They worked in mixed nationality cooperative groups in lessons, took part in individual competitions based on the tasks of the exam and they shared their digital presentations with the other students. The third meeting was to be a sample exam as well, and it would have been followed by the real exam in May. Because of the COVID-19 situation we had to leave out the training and the sample exam instead the Hungarian school compiled a sample exam and it was conducted by the participant schools.The methodology of the project -Thinking together -Constant contact -Careful and well thought out planning -Continuous assessment -Planning the necessary adjustments The realized results and impacts -13 B2 complex exams, 2 B2 oral exams, 43 B1 and 20 B2 ""sample"" exams -Syllabus, lesson plans, wordlists, video recordings connected to the skype/MEEt lessons -Digital presentations -Students’s communication developedboth in English and the mother tongue -Students and teachers’ digital competency and creativity developed -Techers renewed in terms of methodology and are ready to use ICT in their lessons effectively -Students and teachers’ self evaluating ability developed -Students are able to cooperate, make decisions, organize and keep deadlines for a common goal"