Explore, Learn and Protect Our World!

Living sustainably means living within the capacity of the natural environment to support life and ensuring our current lifestyle has minimal impact on generations to come. As the need for greater sustainability becomes more apparent globally, so does the importance of embedding sustainability in children’s programs. The NEEDS can be summarised as follows: For STUDENTS - to adopt a sustainable way of life and to fight against climate change, - to understand what sustainability is, - to spend more time outdoors and to explore the nature. For TEACHERS - to share experiences about Early Childhood Environmental based Education, and to increase their teaching skills in this field, - to get to know different approaches to outdoors environmental education, - to improve their language skills. For INSTITUTIONS - to set up school policies for sustainability, - to gain experience in implementing Erasmus+ projects, - to become eTwinning schools, - to support the internationalization of their institution, and to take it out of the local isolation, - to build long term collaborations with other European schools.

The main achievement of the project will be students equipped with necessary knowledge and tools to find real solutions to climate change, and to make contributions towards the achievement of Sustainable Development Goals, on a local, regional, national and European level. The specific aims we set for this project are the following: OBJECTIVES FOR STUDENTS: 1. To develop awareness of global issues. 2. To explore the environment in non-formal areas. 3. To respect and protect nature and the living environments. 4. To stimulate the children’ motivation for environmental protection. 5. To learn how to protect the living environments. 6. To develop the children’s inquiry skills. 7. To reduce the negative impacts of the periods of lockdown. FOR TEACHERS: 1. To develop environmental education lessons outside the classroom. 2. To increase the number of outdoors lessons taught. 3. To develop interdisciplinary collaborations. 4. To make an exchange of good practices. 5. To increase the amount of time teachers get actively involved in outdoor environmental learning. 6. To design and use materials for environmental education. 7. To promote the internationalization.

The activities we implemented can be divided into several categories: 1. Environmental outdoor activities withing the school hours: we planned 9 different modules centred on one of the environmental issues of our times, such as sustainability, recycling, reusing, consumerism, pollution, wildlife conservation etc. All the activities are planned outdoors, in non-formal environments. The methodologies involved are all learning by doing, and student centred, for example experiments, cause and effect trials, research, and nature exploration. The planned activities are meant to give students a chance to implement the knowledge acquired during the LTTs. 2. Extracurricular visits to institutions relevant in fighting against climate change, so that students can see the impact of such actions, get information about environmental issues, and see the damages done to nature by human activities. 3. Environmental events out of school are planned for the involvement of parents and local citizens to raise awareness against climate change and help for the cleaning and environmental restauration of the local areas where the schools are set. 4. Training sessions in 5 of the partner schools are aimed to meet the teachers needs in terms of innovative approaches on environmental and outdoor education. 5. Dissemination activities such as launching of the project's website. 6. Project result work and publishing. 7. Final transnational meeting in the coordinating school.

Depending on the recipients, the project is expected to have the following outcomes: Expected outcomes for students: 1. A sustainable and environmentally aware way of life from a very early age, a lifestyle which extends beyond the classroom and the educational institution. 2. A deep understanding of the main global problems that the World is fighting against, and to play an active role into this fight. 3. An increased knowledge of the natural world that surrounds us. 4. A wider knowledge of the cultural and ethnical diversity in Europe, by being involved in activities with students from the partner schools. 5. More opportunities to communicate in a foreign language 6. Increased school motivation by participating in outdoors expeditionary activities. Expected outcomes for the teachers: 1. A deeper specialization in the field of outdoors environmental education. 2. An increased ability to communicate in English. 3. Detailed training sessions on how to conduct environmental education outside the classroom. 4. Acceptance, tolerance towards different cultures, ethnicities. religions and nationalities from European countries, by working in mixed teams. Expected outcomes for the partner institutions: 1. Local/regional prestige gained by being the beneficiary of Erasmus plus grants. 2. Setting examples for other institutions on how to implement European projects. 3. Implementing eTwinning projects and becoming eTwinning schools. 4. Increased experienced in managing international projects. 5. More students willing to study in these schools, due to the benefits and opportunities created for students through this project. 6. Introduce school policies to reduce waste and adopt sustainability in their regular work.