Sport is a topic which students deal with every day. Therefore, it is a good starting point for the project. The idea is to get to know traditional kinds of sport from different European countries as an expression of a culture of a region. At each project meeting the host school will introduce a local traditional sport which will be taught to the guest students. Through this common interaction, the students get to know other cultures better and thus also learn to appreciate their own culture as they understand what makes their own culture unique.

To be able to work commonly for a week, each meeting will have an additional new thematic focus to be dealt with, which highlights another aspect of how sports influences our culture: exploring a region through outdoor sports (Germany), trends and sports and changing awareness of sports (Finland), local communities and their sport traditions (Spain), environmental impacts of sports (Great Britain) and sports and music (Netherlands).
The project results will then be presented on a common interactive website created by students. Increase pupils` and teachers` ability to cooperate using modern technology and media in an innovate way
 

Throughout the project, the use of modern technology will strongly be encouraged. For most teachers participating in the project, this is a new working field so we also hope to learn from the project. We strongly hope to profit from the knowledge of the Dutch school as well as to learn from the computing experience of our students, as many of them have their own web pages and are more experienced than the participating teachers.

Through these activities we hope to

• promote intercultural exchange and understanding
• By comparing and contrasting one of the core constituents of their culture, namely sport, the participants come to a better understanding of the uniqueness of their own culture and likewise get to know and appreciate traditions of other cultures.
• enhance the use of modern languages (mainly English, but also French, German and Spanish) by meaningful communication in a foreign language
• promote a healthy lifestyle: By looking at the effects of malnutrition and keeping track of own sports activities, the participants become more aware of possible effects of their own habits.
• increase pupils’ and teachers’ ability to cooperate using modern technology and media in an innovate way
• create awareness of the social and environmental implications of sports

The main subjects addressed are sports and traditions. These two topics serve as a red line running through the project.

What approach will you take to achieve your objectives?

• Cooperative learning approach (anytime-anywhere learning using an e-learning platform)
• Reflective learning: the learning process itself will be reflected at the three fixed evaluation sessions.
• Communicative approach (do sports with your partners, do research together)
• Integrative approach (integrate it in the school curriculum)
• Residential visits: direct contact with host communities

The following publication tools will be developed:

• Each partner school has its own webblog. The students will update it frequently with their experiences, both in writing and in pictures and video. The various webblogs will give visitors an inspiring insight in the different perspectives on the project.
• A website about the traditional sports, the instructions on how to play the sports and instructional videos will be created.
• The main innovative content consists of the various movies, which students will record, edit and publish themselves.
• Besides the above publications on the internet, offline media will also be used to publish the projects products and results. The videos will be burned on a DVD and the instructions will be published in a booklet, which will be published at the end of the project.
• Together the internet publications, the DVD and booklet will give an insight in traditional sports across Europe.