In the era of digitalisation, we are all aware of the importance of digital competence in our lives. Traditional teaching aids and media are now largely helped by modern technology to make both learning and teaching easier. Among the number of its benefits, there are some serious issues, the existence of which all partners agree on.

The instant accessibility of information has caused lesser attention span among children and teenagers in all partner schools, who find it hard to concentrate on larger chunks of information and have problems with memorisation and mastering basic skills, especially literacy.

Another problem is the lack of human interaction, which is being overtaken by social media, even among family members. At this point, we're facing the moment of need to introduce a balance between technology and traditional teaching and learning aids. According to our experience, one of the most valuable tools to achieve this is storytelling.

We strongly believe that reading and writing should not be taught as separate skills. We have come to the conclusion that our students, in all participant countries, learn faster when they are emotionally engaged and when they find meaning in what they are taught. Therefore, we want to provide our students with a different environment to master these skills. We believe that using storytelling is an efficient method to achieve this.

Since there will be no strict rules on how to tell and create stories, pupils with learning difficulties would get a chance to express themselves in a way that suits them best. Taking into account everything stated, we have agreed on the following objectives:

- to increase students' motivation for reading;

- to develop students' competence in applying knowledge into practice in literacy education;

- to introduce innovative practices to schools' approaches to teaching 8 competences for lifelong learning;

- increase the self-esteem of students with fewer opportunities;

- strengthen students' empathy towards different age and social groups;

- improve teachers' skills in providing individualized teaching approaches to students with fewer opportunities;

- improve our students' and teachers' intercultural knowledge.

 

Students with fewer opportunities will be actively involved in all phases of the project. Storytelling and related activities are a powerful tool to engage all levels of students, regardless of educational, cultural, social, health and geographic obstacles, to reach their full potential.

Concrete results we plan to produce:

-books of stories;

-teacher's guide with detailed descriptions of learning activities;

-brochures;

-DVD with cartoons/animated videos of stories;

-website,

-Twinspace,

-Facebook page with full coverage of all project activities and presentation of the results.

 

There will be two main target groups: students and teachers. We plan to meet the project objectives by carrying out activities described in the Project Timetable, together with institutions we have already contacted and made arrangements with: kindergartens, homes for elderly people, schools for children with special educational needs, societies and companies involving people with disabilities. Partners have already been collaborating with some of them, and with this project, we will expand the learning area of our students. Visits to these institutions and mutual participation in the project activities with their users will encourage students to embrace different age and social groups, to make them able to learn accompanied by diversity in all forms and also, improve teachers' skills in providing individualized teaching approaches to students with fewer opportunities; Students with learning difficulties will be supported by stronger students in pair and group activities. Teachers educated in work with SEN students and teacher advisors will be consulted throughout the project. Teaching assistants at partner schools will also be involved in project activities. There are three large schools (Italy, Sweden and Spain) with approximately 800 students each, one middle-sized school (Croatia), with approximately 450 students and a small school from Greece, with approximately 130 students. Altogether, there will be approximately 400 students and 40 teachers directly involved in the project, and approximately 2900 students and 280 teachers indirectly involved. Taking into account other stakeholders, such as institutions to be involved in the local activities, students' families and other people, addressed by dissemination, such as members of eTwinning community, the number of people who are expected to benefit from this project is (at least) approximately 5000.

The project was initially planned to last two years, starting from September 2020. Due to the circumstances caused by the COVID-19 pandemic, the project has been officially extended to the end of June 2023.