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DR. AMELIA HADFIELD ALEXANDRA MIHAI
DR. MAGDALENA SAPALA SILVIU PIROS
I. SETTING THE SCENE 3
II. TEACHING THE EU: VARIABLE GEOMETRY 3
III. TEACHER TRAINING 5
IV. CURRICULUM DESIGN 6
V. BEST PRACTICE 10
VI. TEACHING EUROPE IN THE CLASSROOM AND BEYOND 11 1. GOING VIRTUAL: ONLINE TEACHING TOOLS AND RESOURCES 12 2. FOCUS: SIMULATION GAMES 15
RESOURCES 19
ANNEXES 21
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The Educational Development Unit thrives on challenge. Operating within the IES, itself a Jean Monnet Centre of Excellence, with its strong record in advancing both high quality research and academic development on EU issues in a thoroughly inter-‐disciplinary manner, the EDU had a clear idea from the outset of what the 2012 Jean Monnet Programme Learning EU at School mandate entailed. Entitled ‘Bridging the Gap: Improving EU Teaching’ (#357577), our goals were three-‐fold. First, to improve the quality of education in secondary schools on key aspects of the European Union. Second, to increase the level of participation and knowledge of the EU amongst teachers and teacher trainers, from everything to blended learning tools, webpages, to more interactive activities offered in the two 2-‐day workshops of 2012. Third, to encourage independent thinking on the EU as both a subject and object of study amongst teachers and students. Drawing on its skills and reputation as a provider of high quality teaching, training and blended learning, the EDU was revolved to be both thorough and creative in offering a combination of re-‐schooling teachers in the cardinal issues of the EU, and retooling them with a series of new didactic materials to bring into classrooms and schools. The upshot was a series of activities that we hope fused together to provide 50+ teachers from within and beyond the EU with a solid grounding in EU issues and a renewed enthusiasm to teaching EU in various curricula. We have enjoyed very much meeting this marvellous group of secondary school teachers, and we remain inspired by their attitude and enthusiasm. Equally we enjoyed the challenge of assembling the best practice outputs and more in this present ‘Bridging the Gap’ Handbook, which is designed to accompany both the ‘mini-‐module’ on teaching the EU and to flesh out in more detail the content of the six webinars that supported the year-‐long project. Thus, with viable lessons gained over the past 12 months, and a view to the potential of the future, I and my colleagues Alexandra, Magdalena, Silviu and Marion, welcome you to this handbook, and look forward to discovering more of the endlessly challenging and interesting world of Learning the EU.
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I. Setting the scene The European Union and its various policies have a great impact on our daily lives, from the way we work and travel to our safety and the quality of our food. However, we are all too often unaware of the close link between our everyday activities and EU structures and policies. Moreover, the complexity of EU policy-‐making and the multitude of information sources, many of which use a heavy, technical language, does not make it easier for the citizens to get relevant information and, even less, to get involved in the process. Education plays a crucial role in creating the feeling of belonging to the European society and offering, at the same time, the tools for understanding our rights as European citizens. Topics related to the European Union are taught in university courses on politics, economics or law, but they feature only seldom in primary and secondary education. Moreover, the amount and depth with which these topics are tackled, as well as the level at which the are taught, varies hugely from country to country (and sometimes even among the regions of one country); some countries have a specific curriculum for teaching EU topics, others simply touch upon them, in an ad-‐hoc manner, in various disciplines. The consequence of this heterogeneous picture is that the teachers play a very important role in deciding what topics are being discussed and, more importantly, how they are being approached, what pedagogical methods are used and what is the ultimate learning goal for the students. But with European topics not constituting school subjects in themselves, it is not an easy task to include them in the compulsory curricula and more often than not they end up simply as peripheral items, dealt with in a fragmented manner and in a rush without being fully integrated in the overall pedagogical goals. This is why there is a real need for a systematic approach to teaching EU-‐related topics, possibly including a core curriculum that can be then customized in the different countries to best address the cultural context the students belong to. Moreover, beyond the curriculum, specific teaching methods and environments can be designed to facilitate the teaching and learning process. The underlying principle should be creating activities that are interactive and engaging but at the same time fulfill the main function of conveying clear and essential information on the EU to the students.
II. Teaching the EU: variable geometry When discussing teaching the EU, both in schools and in higher education, the first aspect to be tackled is defining the study area. The topics that deal with the European Union can be integrated in several different disciplines, ranging from history, geography, civic/ political culture to art and even mathematics. This multi-‐disciplinary nature can be both an advantage and a pitfall; the approach can be either vague or too specific, often lacking depth and consistency. But it also offers
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the opportunity to tackle the topics in an inter-‐disciplinary manner, placing the European Union’s institutions and policies in a broader context that touches upon various aspects of the students’ life. A cross-‐curricular approach also constitutes a chance to better integrate the topics in the overall learning targets. However, as various disciplines use different teaching methods, it is important to start with a coherent and comprehensive planning and then follow it up by dividing the various topics according to the disciplines they best fit with, while making sure the assessment remains consistent throughout. Close coordination among teachers is thus crucial, but sharing the teaching burden can be seen as an advantage in the current context, when the time dedicated to EU topics in any given curriculum is limited. Another issue to be discussed is the content that should be delivered to the students. It is commonly acknowledged that EU-‐related knowledge is of a rather complex nature and not always very appealing. Therefore, it is very important to design a core curriculum including the topics that are essential as well as topics that can also be taught, depending on the specific interest of the students. Issues like the functioning of the institutions and the policy-‐making process, as well as the internal market and its principles should doubtlessly feature in the curriculum, while other topics, dealing with different policies could be approached in a more practical way, as case studies for instance. That being said, it is not only because the content may seem dull and unattractive that the teachers should simply discard it and focus on something else. The essential facts must be conveyed in ordered to lay the ground for further exploration, and it is mainly a matter of what methods are used to engage the students. Practice shows that the most efficient way of approaching topics related to the functioning of the EU is using aspects of the students’ lives, things they are familiar with as a starting point and then gradually building the link with the European Union. This enables the students to identify themselves with the topics being discussed, thus increasing their interest as well as the chances of their involvement. Moreover, the use of interactive activities, such as games and debates, is a very useful and fun way of consolidating the knowledge and sparking the students’ interest in the topics and their desire to explore them further. One thing that adds to the already complex equation is Europe’s diversity. This includes cultural diversity, different educational systems and traditions and, for all that this implies, diverse views on the European Union and its impact on the respective countries. It is therefore unrealistic, and also not desirable, to strive towards total harmonization; it is however important to offer the students the opportunity to become aware of the various perspectives, so that they can form their own reasoned opinion about the European Union. This can be best achieved by means of study visits and establishing partnerships among schools from various countries in the EU and beyond. Both teachers and students can benefit from these experiences and enrich their general knowledge of Europe by broadening their horizons to different perspectives of education.
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III. Teacher Training “I hear and I forget. I see and I remember. I do and I understand.”
Confucius “The mediocre teacher tells. The good teacher explains. The superior teacher demonstrates. The great teacher inspires.”
William Arthur Ward
Teaching is one of the oldest professions in the world and has been always associated with esteem and high quality. It is not easy these days however to be a teacher. The fast changes in economy and society create new challenges for teachers. In order to fulfill the growing requirements of the society they have to constantly upgrade and update their knowledge, skills and competences. And this concerns new teachers as well as experienced teachers (veteran teachers)1. A life long learning facilitated by professional and high quality training is important for teachers’ work performance and is a measure against their occupational burnout. There are numerous ways to develop teachers’ professional skills. From short-‐term in-‐house training and exchange of experience to long-‐term university programmes or study visits requiring usually a career development leave. The advantage of short time training is that while it does not interfere very much with ongoing work and teaching assignments in their working place, it may prove to be a powerful source of change and innovation. Even a few days training, if well designed, provides teachers with an impulse and fresh ideas and can boost their professional development. Especially if is experiential, collaborative, and connected to and derived from working with students and teachers. Moreover, an effective training combines theory and practice so as to “immerse” the participants in the topic. Therefore, the training given by the IES has been conceived as a two days workshop consisting of balanced theoretical and practical parts. The combination of ex-‐cathedra lectures, discussions, teamwork and individual presentations with the usage of multimedia proved to be an excellent way to inspire the participants. In fact, apart from getting the general and specific up to date knowledge about the EU the workshop fulfilled several important functions and created an opportunity to develop many skills such as:
• Presentation and speaking for the public; • Acting skills; • Time management;
1 This is confirmed in several OECD studies which are summarised in the document: Developing Teachers’ http://www.oecd.org/education/preschoolandschool/45399491.pdf [access: January 2013]
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• ICT skills for the classroom (use of multimedia and modern tools); • Using English as a working language; • Working in an international environment (cooperation and communication
with colleagues coming form different countries); • Team work; • Leadership; • Communication skills; • Exchange of best practice; • Development of a new curriculum and lesson plans; • Mentoring and peer tutoring.
As a result the workshop had a power to strengthen the motivation for future work and development. Furthermore, it created an opportunity to develop new attitudes and beliefs and even restate somewhat cliché principles and standards of conduct. Above all, this form of education has a great potential of a spillover effect since it may lead to the spreading of the knowledge in the group where a teacher works in his
working place and colleagues.
IV. Curriculum design
One of the toughest things about teaching on the European Union of course is the sheer size of the subject area. The Union is more than half a century old, it is ever-‐changing, multi-‐level, multi-‐actor, multi-‐policy, and genuinely multi-‐faceted! Even to experienced policy-‐makers who consider themselves ‘old hands’ in Brussels, the EU institutions, their modes of decision-‐making, and the sheer range of emerging and changing public and foreign policies presents a considerable challenge; it is even more so to secondary school teachers across, and indeed beyond, the EU. The Jean Monnet-‐supported ‘Bridging the Gap’ project of 2012 identified a variety of ways to come to grips with the plethora of information on the EU, and for this reason divided the May and November “Teaching the EU” Workshops into two key parts: re-‐schooling and retooling. Re-‐schooling entailed approximately a day of familiarizing teachers and trainers with the broad structure of the EU, bringing them up to date on developments that have occurred since the 2009 Treaty of Lisbon, as well as providing a refresher on the institutions, the modes of decision-‐making and policy profiles.
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Retooling was an opportunity to take these various categories of the EU, from its history to its policy-‐making power to its public and foreign policy impact, and break them down, on a topic-‐by-‐topic basis, to explore which themes might be useful in which ways, in particular subject areas. We tried not to be too orthodox about the constraints of curricula; in other words, we felt that a topic-‐lead approach (e.g. EU climate change policy) rather than a curricula-‐led approach (i.e. only the following topics can be taught in the following subject areas) would produce a richer range of approaches to teaching, and indeed learning. A central tool upon which we drew was the wide range of educational material available online from the EUCE.org forum (http://euce.org/education/), including course syllabi for college courses and pedagogical materials for secondary school teachers. We strongly recommended that teachers take the time to explore this website, because it offers such a variety of information sources “that explore specific EU political, social, and cultural issues”. 2 Under the category of “EUCE K012 Materials”, information is divided into four categories (http://euce.org/education/k12.php#content):
• Lesson Plans • EUCE Materials • External Links • Multimedia Resources
We focused first on EUCE Materials in our “Retooling” sessions, and then upon “Lesson Plans” to prepare the ground for the interactive (and intensive!) group work on exploring and formulating EU-‐oriented curricula. The Annexes detail the good practices established through several group sessions, but a few examples of the Lesson Plans are helpful here as well. What is striking about the Lesson Plans is their sheer flexibility: all teachers need is the basic working concept of a given issue area, and a competent method of achieving its
2 ‘Educational Materials’, at http://euce.org/education/, accessed 12 January 2013.
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Lesson plan example 1 • Title of Lesson Plan: Analyzing Song Lyrics as Poetry: What do the lyrics of
European national anthems show about the countries they represent? • Suggested Grade: 9th (e.g. age 14+) • Brief Description: Students familiarize themselves with the words of the
national anthems of EU Member States, analyzing the history, values, perceptions and identities stated explicitly and implicitly. Students can then write their own "personal anthems" to show their values and express themselves to the world.
• Time: 3 class periods (45-‐60 minutes each) • Materials Needed: Lyrics and recordings of the national anthems of EU Member
States (students can research this online (http://europa.eu/abc/european_countries/index_en.htm); possibly include also a recording of the music of the European Union anthem (Beethoven's "Ode to Joy”.
• Objectives: This exercise is a good jumping-‐off point by which to explore the concept of national histories, national identities, differing national attitudes to the EU and EU integration, national interests and foreign policies. It also invites comparative analysis across the EU Member States themselves, and between EU MS and other states like the US, Canada, or perhaps Russia, China, etc.
learning objectives in the class time allowed, and practically any EU topic avails itself of the possibility of being taught, by any teacher, at any level. EU Lesson Plans that proved particularly popular among the two groups of teachers (themselves representative of a wide range of topics, e.g. Math, Economics, History, Civics, Language) tended to be the most interactive. As the site itself comments, teachers within the EU and indeed abroad
“looking to expand and deepen their classroom coverage of the European Union can now download cutting-‐edge lesson plans created by teachers for teachers. Bring your European view into the 21st century with curriculum guides focused on environmental policy, immigration issues, economic integration, and contemporary society”.3
Operating with a relatively standardized template, lesson plans are now available in the following subject areas: English, French, German, Italian, Language Arts, Math, Music, Science, Social Studies, Spanish, Technology, Theater Arts, and World History. However, given that the templates operate on a thematic basis that puts a general idea or concept first, many of the offered lesson plans operate successfully across multiple disciplines, and on the site are helpfully cross-‐listed. These two examples below cover a wide range of EU issues that can be captured in the classroom: history, national identity, integration, and policy-‐making in the former and economic and fiscal policy in the latter, as well as competition.
3 http://euce.org/education/k12plans.php#content.
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Lesson plan example 2 • Title of Lesson Plan: The Euro: Money Changes Everything -‐ Classroom Activity • Suggested Grades: 9-‐12 • Overview: Students use the Euro currency to compare purchasing power with
the US Dollar. • Objectives: Basic introduction to euro for students unfamiliar with currency or
foreign exchange rates; or a clarification to students within Eurozone countries as to the purchasing power of the euro, and changes impacted upon it in the wake of the financial crisis.
• Materials Needed: “The EURO: Money Changes Everything” background paper (http://www.unc.edu/euce/resources/TheEuro_UW_2007.pdf); A Euro; a non-‐Eurozone state currency; a US dollar coin or bill in equal denominations; images of the spectrum of euro coins and bills, either physical specimens or images; exchange rate. Euro images are available online: http://ec.europa.eu/economy_finance/euro/notes_and_coins/notes_coins_main_en.htm. Posters can be downloaded from the web site www.eurunion.org. Computer or newspaper on which to find current $/€ exchange rate. It is available online at the Financial Times web site (www.ft.com) or in major print newspapers.
• Options:
1. Introduce students to the currency the euro; comparing exchange rates between Euro, non-‐Eurozone currencies and the US dollar in equal denominations.
2. Have students look up and apply the current exchange rate. 3. Have students evaluate the value of the euro with a simple exercise. At
McDonald’s in Belgium, one can purchase a hamburger for €1. Ask students to figure out how many dollars that is using the current exchange rate. (equation is xy, where x=price and y=€/$). If a hamburger in the US costs $0.80, where would the hamburger cost more in US$?
4. Have students explain the role of the European Central Bank, and in simple terms, the impact of the 2012 Fiscal Treaty.
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V. Best Practice In addition to the Lesson Plans that we examined, the final outputs of the workshops highlighted some truly valuable features in terms of Best Practice (itself broken down into various ‘dos’ and ‘don’ts’, as seen in the Annex). Most instructive are some of the following observations from teachers with a substantial experience in getting across the ‘EU message’ to secondary students and trainers of prospective secondary teachers. 1. The overarching theme must surely be interaction. Virtually every teacher identified the positives associated with creating games and simulations that effectively broke down the ‘barrier’ between student and teacher, and whose lesson plans presented students with opportunities to debate amongst themselves in small and large groups, to speak to or against a given concept, and to include the teacher as part of this ‘sounding board’. Simulation games, which give a greater sense of ownership and participation to students, thus ranked very highly. 2. A clear requirement to make any form of interaction work effectively was relevance. Students (and quite likely teachers themselves) had to be aware of the social, but also personal ways in which policies like climate change, the new Fiscal Treaty, communication, regionalism and even aspects of foreign policy affected them as EU citizens. For this reason, teachers suggested using broader themes like identity, language, sports, music and culture as methods of casting the net widely to begin with, to kick start debate, and from open-‐ended questions of ‘how did we get here’, either work back through salient watersheds of EU history, or laterally to specific policy developments that accompany these broad socio-‐political patterns. “Raise their awareness”, teachers said, time and again. 3. Underwriting the need for relevant approaches is the need for relevant tools. A small note but an important one therefore is the use by teachers of practical, available, tangible, digestible data in any format by which students can gradually approach more complex policies with more sophisticated methods and tools. As we discussed, such tools can include flags, anthems, the key speeches of heads of state or EU leaders, films, events (e.g. EU day), geography/maps, newspaper articles, and -‐ in the ever-‐expanding age of social media – blogs, Facebook and twitter features on aspects of the EU. 4. Cross-‐curricula content is not only an inherent feature of EU issues themselves, being so highly interwoven, but a practical necessity for time-‐pressed teachers who perhaps have only one or two lesson plans to convey as much as possible to a disaffected class about the EU. The Lesson Plans mentioned above are for the most part inherently cross-‐curricula, meaning that they combine two or more areas of EU policy, the require two or more chunks of understanding to effectively understand these policy areas, and there is a simple method of seeing how the two areas work
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together: e.g. sports vs education policy; climate change policy vs competition; EU fiscal difficulties vs. personal spending; competition policy vs. enlargement and immigration; or within an area like foreign policy, defence vs. security. Equally however, teachers were keen to place caveats on throwing too much, or too difficult information at students, and cautioned against info-‐overload, and making too early use of abstract concepts, both of which can have a dampening attitude in the classroom. 5. Lastly, in terms of providing tools to teachers, the ‘Bridging the Gap’ project highlighted (and will continue to do so in its permanent outputs) the range of available EU teaching tools, online and published, by which teachers can bolster the time and curricula options they have to impart info on the EU to their various student cohorts. This raised the positive of point of enormous amount of EU didactic materials on offer (though not all of it is available in one key online site or forum, so a bit of adventuresome exploration is required). It also highlighted the more pragmatic point that teaching the EU is frequently an exercise in isolation in some schools, and teachers whose personal enthusiasm extends beyond the immediate classroom setting to get other students, and staff involved in the overall challenge of finding out about the EU tend to enjoy it more, get better results, and build up sustainable structures of school-‐wide support, particularly from supportive colleagues. This places the onus of success in teaching EU studies firmly on the shoulders of individual teachers, which is a trying demand at the best of times. The teachers who attended the workshops however seemed ready to rise to the challenge, stating repeatedly that ‘teaching the EU is 360 ° process’, in that teaching is not only necessarily interactive and cross-‐disciplinary, but also highly social, “not a matter of one single teacher, but requiring the whole school”, and thus an innately holistic process, possibly as holistic as the EU itself is, as a policy-‐maker.
VI. Teaching Europe in the classroom and beyond While the content of the core curriculum and how it is meaningfully distributed among the various disciplines plays a crucial role in the success of the teaching activities, the methods used are equally important and influence to a great extent the overall learning experience of the students. With such a complex topic at hand, mixing various methods and learning environments is strongly encouraged. This “blended learning” approach represents a selection of several pedagogical methods that can be used both in the classroom and beyond the classroom, in the virtual environment. This creates new opportunities for teachers and students to “break” the classroom walls, by extending, delocalizing and personalizing their learning experience.
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Beside the traditional classroom format, which can be used bearing in mind to make the lecture as interactive as possible and schedule enough time for discussion, other classroom-‐based activities that can complement the lectures are simulation games (see special “Focus” chapter below), which help the students understand the practical dimension of what they are learning, and debates, which encourage the students to research and come up with solid arguments on EU-‐related issues. But what happens if the “classroom time” is limited and the teachers are forced to use only one activity, which proves insufficient to convey the complexity of the EU system? Thanks to the proliferation of online tools in the last decade, there are various options the teachers can resort to, such as e-‐learning platforms that can be use both to host additional teaching resources and tasks and to serve as platforms for international school partnerships and exchanges and webinars that offer the possibility to virtually bring guest speakers in your classroom, or take part in a lecture elsewhere without any travel costs.
1. Going virtual: Online teaching tools and resources There is a variety of opportunities to enhance the teaching and learning experience by using tools that are available to both teachers and students, usually for free and do not confine them to the classroom. These online tools extend the learning space by adding the virtual dimension and, even though, when used efficiently, bring added value to the educational process, they take the teachers out of their comfort zone and prompt them to reassess their pedagogical goals and strategies. The use of technology should never be taken as an aim in itself, but merely a (often very useful) means of achieving learning goals. That is why, while keeping an open mind about
using technology in the classroom, online tools and platforms should be used only for the specific parts of the teaching process for which they are most suitable. Their success is directly dependent on the extent to which they represent an integral and meaningful part of the curriculum, and the purpose and relevance of their use must be clearly understood by teachers and students equally.
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The most often used such tools are websites and online platforms. These can range from school websites that can be used to host specific information about the European Union and activities/ projects related to it to fully-‐fledged online learning platforms that can bring added value through alternative teaching and learning resources such as games, quizzes, as well as synchronous and asynchronous interactive applications (forums, chat). Moreover, blogs can also be used, both by teachers and students, with various purposes. They can be used as a tool for internal communication between teachers and their students but they can also be integrated in the curriculum and used for assignments, as a “safe space” where students can practice their writing skills without the rigors of assessed essay-‐writing tasks. Wikis are another useful online tool that can be used as a platform for collaborative work by both teachers and students. For teachers the added value comes from the opportunity to build and share curriculum maps, as well as best teaching practices and ideas; the wiki ca also serve as a thematic portal for lesson plans, a very useful coordination and collaboration tool especially where the EU topics are tackled within various disciplines. Students can use wikis to work together on group projects and assignments, as well as for collaboratively building a knowledge repository to support their learning. Podcasts and web lectures can also be used to enhance and complement the teaching activities, as audiovisual material has a very strong pedagogical value. Recorded lectures can be a valuable learning support, while recording classroom debates and simulation games and playing then back during the debriefing session is a very useful feedback tool. Moreover, web lectures or webinars can connect teachers and students from various schools and countries in real time, allowing for exchanges of ideas and experiences without involving any travelling.
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Last but not least, social media has been emerging as a powerful environment that connects people across borders and backgrounds. However, its educational value is often not clearly enough explained, leading to the medium being underused. The main reasons why various social media can be used in education are linked to the concept of student-‐centered learning, implying reaching out to students and joining them in their environment. This is by no means risk-‐free, as the borders between private and public, personal and professional are rather blurred, so clear rules should be set before integrating any of the social media platforms in the teaching process. Sometimes this involves teaching students about internet safety or creating closed, password protected networks where the students can feel safe enough to share ideas and work together. Moreover, the goals of using social media and how/ if this will be assessed needs to be very clearly explained by the teachers, so that the students know exactly what to expect and use the platforms accordingly. The two main social networks that can be used in education, by both teachers and students, are Twitter and Facebook. Twitter can be very useful for teachers, as a “virtual staffroom”, enlarging their horizons and expertise pool and allowing them to exchange teaching ideas and lesson plans with peers from anywhere in the world. It can also play the role of a “newsroom”, helping them keep up-‐to-‐date with what is happening in their field. Last but not least, Twitter can be used as a reflective space, where teachers can reflect on their own practice while sharing with others. Students can use Twitter as part of various (beyond the classroom) assignments, mainly with the aim of teaching the students how to communicate the essential in a succinct manner. Moreover, like in the case of teachers, Twitter is a good way for the students to keep themselves updated with the latest developments in the European Union and in specific fields of their interest. Facebook is often used for broadcasting news and activities of organizations, so schools could easily make use of this platform and thus communicate with a wider audience, reaching beyond students and teachers and including alumni and prospective students. Facebook can also be used as a support network for teaching activities such as simulation games, which makes sense from a practical point of view, bearing in mind that the vast majority of students are already on that platform so teachers can use their everyday communication to link it to the course content. However, as Facebook has often been criticized for its rather loose privacy policies, it is crucial that the boundaries between private and school-‐related are not crossed and the teachers should confine themselves to playing a neutral referee role in the process.
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2. Focus: Simulation games Within the mix of teaching methods, simulation games stand out as a particularly efficient tool to complement the lectures on EU topics. They offer the practical dimension to the content taught, while enabling both students and teachers to actively engage with EU matters. Negotiation scenarios on various policy issues are a good way to experience the complexity of the EU institutional setup and decision-‐making process. They are run in conjunction with, and usually towards the end of, lectures that tackle the European Union and experience shows that they represent the activity the students enjoy the most. Nevertheless, the term “games” should not be deceiving; we are talking here about “serious games”, a pedagogical method used by the teachers to better illustrate the content of their subject, by designing scenarios and assigning the students roles through which they can explore and better understand the issues at stake. It is therefore a lengthy and complex process of extracting a core issue, imagining a scenario that is not too far from reality but doesn’t replicate it either, thinking what are the main actors involved, writing briefings for the actors and making sure there is a conflict that is strong enough but that can be solved through a compromise. Simulation games thus represent a form of simplifying a real-‐life situation, reducing it to its essential elements in order to allow the students to get first-‐hand experience of the respective situation. Both teachers and students experience the benefits of using negotiation games. For the teachers, games represent a move towards a more student-‐centered learning environment, which is based on interaction, rather than one-‐way teaching. This implies a change in the role of the educators, as they are no longer in their comfortable position of knowledge conveyors, but they need to take a step back and assume a facilitator role, guiding and supporting the students rather than lecturing them. This is not always an easy task and usually takes more preparation and skills than traditional teaching, but it is a position that teachers will find themselves more and more often in the future, as “active learning” becomes commonplace at all levels of the educational system. For the students, beside a chance to better understand the subject in all its complexity, games are also a fun way to develop some very useful interpersonal and social skills, ranging from research and negotiation to public speaking and teamwork. In order to make the most of the simulation games, both teachers and students have to be very well prepared. First and foremost, the aim of the game must be clear to
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the teachers who, in their turn, have to explain it to their students. In order for the game to be taken seriously, the goals should fit well with the overall learning objectives of the course the game belongs to. The next thing to consider is the way the game operates and make sure it is in line with the ultimate goals, in order to create a suitable learning space for the students. They must be aware of the role the game plays in their overall learning process and what exactly they are expected to learn from it. The final outcome of the simulation games cannot be foreseen and therefore explained, but it is important that the students understand why this teaching method is used and what is the added value it brings. They should also be encouraged to immerse themselves in the simulation environment and take it seriously in order to make the most of the experience. The next step is the preparation of the game. For the teachers, this means designing a scenario, for which they need to do research, designate the actors they want to involve and fine-‐tune it to fit with the course objectives. This also implies deciding the level of complexity, which should be adjusted according to the study cycle and level of EU knowledge. This may sound daunting and it can take a good amount of work hours but since the scenario can be adapted and reused with different groups of students, the teachers might find it a good time investment into developing teaching resources. Alternatively, teachers can team up and build scenarios they can all use and share. This is a more sustainable way of designing and using educational materials and it can also work cross disciplines and even cross-‐countries. Once the scenario and the actors’ briefings are ready, teachers have to decide how much time ahead of the game they want their students to start preparation. Here there are two options: simulation games with a long preparation time (weeks or even a whole semester), in which the scenario and briefings are distributed a long time before the game, or games with short preparation time (a few days). Obviously this decision is made with the complexity of the game in mind, but one has to remember that the students need to be prepared so that they can perform at the expected level. In case the preparation time is short, teachers need to explain that this is part of the game and that what is being simulated is a real-‐life situation where the preparation time is limited. For more elaborate games, that last two or more days, it is important the students get enough time to do research and prepare their positions. Besides offering students their briefings, it is recommended that they be also given some tips on negotiation techniques. These can prove useful not only for the purpose of the game, but also for enhancing skills they can use in the future. Another suggestion is giving the students the opportunity to express their ideas about the scenario and rules before the game; by incorporating these, the teachers offer a sense of ownership to the students, which can be beneficial for the overall atmosphere and ultimately for the final outcome. The students should also be encouraged to ‘raise the bar’ by becoming familiar with the brief and fully identifying with it.
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In order to ensure that the game is indeed taken seriously, the physical setup is very important. A new type of learning environment should be created, different from the classical classroom setup. The room should be arranged to resemble, as much as possible, the real life location for the scenario; props such the name cards and flags can be used and the formalities of the meeting or procedure should be replicated, including the use of logos and document templates and vocabulary. This might involve an extra amount of work but it will undoubtedly contribute to the success of the simulation game. After the game is over, a crucial part of the process is the feedback. The discussion should be around what worked as well as what did not work very well, the reference point being the overall learning goals but also the students’ and teachers’ expectations. A good tool to facilitate feedback is recording (parts of) the simulation game and playing it back to the students. It is a nice way to confront them with their performance and ask them to draw their own conclusions. Moreover, another aspect to be considered is assessment. If the game is part of the overall course assessment, the exact criteria and the weight if the final grade need to be explained to the students in the beginning of the game and then once again in the evaluation phase at the end. Special attention needs to be paid when deciding what exactly will be evaluated. As the outcome is never certain and students might get disappointed for not “winning” the negotiation, the best thing is to explain them that the assessment will be made for the process as a whole and their activity, regardless of the final outcome. The main learning goal is to experience the process and that is why it is usually advised not to make the games part of the formal assessment, thus giving the students a sense of freedom and creating a safe space for them to learn from their mistakes without a direct implication on their grades. With the simulation games being quite a complex pedagogical method for the teachers, it is important to bear in mind some of its pitfalls and try to avoid them. One of the most common problems is the temptation to overcomplicate the scenario, by including too many actors, too many policies to consider or too many background scenarios. Teachers should resist this temptation and try to keep the game focused
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on the main storyline, which has to be clear yet not oversimplified. It is a very fine line to cross and the feeling for “what should be in” comes with experience; the possibility of adding small extra elements to keep the dynamic of the game should be also considered. Another issue that the teachers could be struggling with is how much to interfere in the students’ performance. As suggested before, teachers have here a facilitator role and their input during the game should be kept to the minimum. Again, the temptation to step in when things go slightly wrong or when the students seem “stuck” is great, but if the initial preparation was thoroughly done, they should allow the students to go through the process in their own way and limit themselves to procedural remarks or light steering for time-‐keeping purposes. Teachers need to be fully aware that, even though they wrote the scenario, neither them nor the students can foresee how it will develop and what the final outcome will be; therefore, they should evaluate the process as such and make sure the students understand there is no “failure” and that there are lessons to be learned from whatever outcome the game results in. Simulation games are a very versatile pedagogical tool and can take different forms. According to the available timeframe and the level of knowledge of the students, teachers can choose the format and length of the game. Simulations can last from a few hours to one day, two or more days. The duration is closely linked to the complexity of the game; some simulation games focus on one institution (e.g. the Council of the EU with the various Member States or the European Parliament), while others have an inter-‐institutional dimension (involving two or more EU institutions and other stakeholders). The goals and preparation time need to be adjusted to the chosen format, to ensure that the students take full advantage of this experience.
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Resources Teachers Associations: General o Association for Teacher Education in
Europe: http://www.atee1.org/ o European Association of Teachers: http://www.aede.eu/ Subject specific o European Association of History
Educators http://www.euroclio.eu/new/index.php o European Network of Language Teachers Associations: http://www.real-‐
association.eu/ Area Specific o South Eastern Europe Teachers Associations: http://www.seeta.eu/ o European Trade Union for
Education: http://etuce.homestead.com/etuce_en.html Journals o Teaching Education: http://www.tandfonline.com/toc/cted20/current o Studying Teacher Education: http://www.tandfonline.com/toc/cste20/current o Journal of Technology and Teacher Education: http://www.aace.org/pubs/jtate/
o Teacher Education Quarterly: http://www.teqjournal.org/ o Journal of Teacher Education: http://jte.sagepub.com/
o Teaching and Teacher Education: http://www.journals.elsevier.com/teaching-‐
and-‐teacher-‐education/
o European Journal of Teacher Education http://www.atee1.org/publications/journal
o Journal of Technology and Teacher Education: http://www.aace.org/pubs/jtate/
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European level teacher exchange and cooperation o COMENIUS programme: http://ec.europa.eu/education/lifelong-‐learning-‐
programme/comenius_en.htm
o E-‐twinning: http://www.etwinning.net/en/pub/index.htm platform for staff (teachers, head teachers, librarians, etc.), working in a school in one of the European countries involved, to communicate, collaborate, develop projects, share and be part of a European learning community
o European Schoolnet: http://www.eun.org/web/guest;jsessionid=9CDDA2F6326610AA7186DBED0D5B49B0 network of 30 Ministries of Education in Europe and beyond; aim: to bring innovation in teaching and learning; key stakeholders: Ministries of Education, schools, teachers and researchers.
o British Council “Connecting Classrooms” project: http://schoolsonline.britishcouncil.org/programmes-‐and-‐funding/linking-‐programmes-‐worldwide/connecting-‐classrooms over 50 countries; offers school partnerships, professional development courses, accreditation and the chance to share best practice with international counterparts.
o British Council Teaching exchange: http://www.britishcouncil.org/learning-‐ie-‐teaching-‐exchange.htm Programmes for teachers to connect with peers & exchange best practice
o Teacher exchange programme: http://www.tes.co.uk/article.aspx?storycode=2599549
Network of teachers exchanging information, resources, etc o Council of Europe-‐ Pestalozzi Programme:
http://www.britishcouncil.org/learning-‐council-‐of-‐europe.htm In-‐service training for teachers from the 49 countries members of the Council of Europe (3-‐5 days workshops)
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Annexes Annex 1 Workshop 1, May 2012, Brussels Group activity: Discuss in your groups and come up with 5 best practices (methods, activities, etc) that you use in the classroom in a successful way to teach about the EU Gr
DOs DON’Ts Remarks
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• Games and simulations • Dilemma games (on terrorism,
civil rights…) • Make them do things by
themselves, as long term activities
• Develop COMENIUS and ERASMUS programmes
• Cooking contest • Art (music, painting)
Practice, Practice, Practice! Need for a standardised framework “When we feel too old to learn, you are too old to teach”
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Use language, geography, music/culture, football, etc as starting points for talking about the EU/ Europe • Role play: each student
represents a country and has to tell the others about ‘his’ history and culture
• Debate: freedom in Europe, how did we get there?
• Try teaching backwards: here we are, how did we get there? What made that happen? What made that possible?
Raise pupils’ awareness ! : The EU provides us things without us knowing we are talking about the EU (food safety, roaming prices…) The Russian Dolls theory on MLG There is no Eastern Europe, nor Western Europe; only Europe exists
Make sure you get your pupils to talk about things on a level they know, about things they can relate to (engage them!) Use relevant, tangible data and
Don’t do the presentations yourself: pro-‐activity is important in the learning process!
Bureaucracy makes things very difficult, due to the amount of files that are needed to be filled in, even just for a visit of
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information • National anthem (history,
culture…) • Playing with both math and
the euro • School-‐partnerships
How to get the students to talk about the EU?
• EU funded films • EU day (clichés…) • Geography, using blank
maps • Games europeanized
(Twister, Memory…)
another national school National programs don’t allow to spend much time on teaching the EU: some teachers are struggling Choices need to be made by teachers when picking their activities and building their curricula
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Cross curricula approach and more realistic • Start by asking them
WHAT they know WHAT are their ideas WHAT are their opinions
• Moral & ethical situations and games (baseball bat), via the foreign policy and security
• Make the students do their own research and presentations on various topics (student-‐centered)
• Get their opinion on the future of Europe, what are the problems it will have to face? How it will work out?
• Link all the areas of the EU using fundamentals of their lives
Don’t overwhelm your students with data and information Don’t start using abstract words/ terms, you’ll lose them right away
Collaboration is important, you don’t have pour information, but to engage the students Teaching the EU is a 360° process, teachers learn at the same time as the students Teaching the EU is not the matter of one teacher; the entire school has to be involved (holistic approach)
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Valued feedback and group work Examples: • Activities such as an Online
Parliament, in which students are involved; asking them beforehand what is the most important to their life and how to protect it
Don’t forget to give a proper introduction to the lecture/theme Don’t forget to explain the reasons why you are doing this activity
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• Make them do some research on the cultural aspects of EU members
• EU day • Games (“baseball bat” game on
moral and human rights)
Don’t introduce the topic as “dry” Be careful on the ‘over-‐complexity’; pupils need to be given an introduction on many things (topic, vocabulary…)
Annex 2 Workshop 2, November 2012, Brussels Group activity 1: Lesson plan Prepare a lesson plan on one of the following topics. Think of what you want to talk about, what is the aim, learning outcomes, types of activities you want to conduct, materials you want to use, etc… Work in groups of 5 and nominate a spokesperson to present the lesson plan to the entire group. Group 1: EU history Goal: show that the unification of Europe is not linear (has its ups and downs) Target group: 16 years old pupils (a group of 30) Main idea/ methodology: the pupils have to do the research themselves Time frame: 2 lessons of 2 hours each Proceedings: Day 1:
1. Introduction: discussing a news item – to catch attention (5 min) 2. short quiz-‐ 10 questions (basics information on EU) 3. pupils are divided in 7 groups of 4 pupils each; the goal is to have a
presentation or a poster by the end of day 2 (each group has a different topic: democracy, tourism, etc)
4. pupils are given 1 hour time to do research o method: in each team there are 4 different roles: president, time
manager, secretary, presentation manager (who gets everything together); everyone gets a different source they have to research and present from, to avoid free riding
5. pupils get half an hour to put the presentation together Day 2:
6. pupils give the presentation (each group gets 5 min present + 5 min Q&A) 7. the teacher gives feedback, rewards the best group
Group 2-‐ EU institutions & decision-‐making
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Name of activity: “Who has the power?” Target group: 17 years old pupils (a group of 20) Focus: EU decision-‐making process Time frame: 2 hours Equipment: PC(s) Proceedings:
1. introduction/ ice-‐ breaker-‐ picture of Luxembourg-‐ more and more buildings built in EU quarter (one institution after the other: EP, COM, ECJ…)
2. methodology: 3 phases: a. looking up information, b. sharing information, c. using information
3. Phase 1: looking up information: split the pupils in 4 groups with 5 pupils each; each group gets to research one EU institution; each group receives one questionnaire to fill in
4. Phase 2: sharing information: JIGSAW method: pupils are split in 4 groups (different than phase 1); in each new group there is one expert from the old groups
a. Peer teaching: explaining the institutions b. Work sheets for each institution to be filled in
5. Phase 3: using the information: depends on discipline, pupils, other aims: a. Role play about decision-‐making b. Debate c. Quiz…
(all activities need to be well prepared by the teachers) Possible homework: writing a paper: in which EU institution would you like to work and why? Group 3: EU policies Target group: 12-‐13 years old pupils Proceedings:
1. The pupils get a questionnaire to take home and fill in-‐ ask parents/ family what the EU means/ does for them
2. Back in class: present the various EU policies by means of drawing a human body with its various parts
3. show how the various EU policies relate to the different parts of the body: a. head/ mind-‐ research, culture, education, b. hands-‐ labour law, humanitarian aid, c. stomach: food safety, agriculture, d. feet: free movement, transport, communication… e. environment-‐ umbrella that protects the body
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4. The main point is to find an innovative and fun way to represent in a visual and tactile way the EU policies that otherwise can be abstract to young pupils
Annex 3 Workshop 2, November 2012, Brussels Group activity 2: Sharing and collecting best practice in teaching EU Discuss in your groups and come up with 5 best practices (methods, activities, etc) that you use in the classroom in a successful way to teach about the EU Group 1 There are various activities that work well in the classroom (best practice):
o Debates o Simulation games o Visiting EU institutions o School trips
But preparing all these activities uses up a lot of time and the national curriculum doesn’t allocate much time to teaching Europe -‐> generally we end up just lecturing (the easiest, takes less time) Solution? Let’s not look only at ourselves, in the classroom, but also beyond the boundaries of the classroom, by setting up school projects:
o “Europe week” (May)-‐ in every discipline-‐ EU related activities o Using Europa diary (Generation Europe)-‐ assign different teachers to
tackle one EU topic every week (all year around) in his/her course (multidisciplinary)
And: there should be a EU law saying in every country there should be a compulsory curriculum on EU. Group 2
1. Research task-‐ computer based, pupils need to investigate something; each one has to make a presentation of a part, then they have to merge their presentations and then present it to the rest of the class (this activity assesses many skills: research, presentation, group work…); they can also have a quiz.
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2. Family tree: take home, fill in and then look at the history of the families and trace the history of Europe based on that (pupils present that to each other); pupils are interested in their own history and this is a way to translate that into European history
3. Various techniques to make ideas visible: debates (formal way or a fish bowl), Twitter, or a silent discussion (with white boards with questions where you can fill in the answers – but you can’t talk); voting on a certain topic, debate on that and then vote again.
4. Simulation games 5. But it’s important to have the right mix: you can’t have only these kind of
activities, there has to be content too, from the teacher; also need to inform and motivate the pupils and then ask them to engage in these activities.
Group 3 (rapporteur is miming) 1. Cartoons-‐ visual expression is more effective 2. Games-‐ eg: freedom of movement in Europe 3. Projects (ex):
o for around 11 year old pupils: a fair-‐ each pupil has to promote a country o older pupils: pupils could make a movie about life would look like if the
EU was not there (currency, borders, …) o Become new EU member: create a country and apply to EU (pros & cons)
4. Cases: use various case studies to illustrate the various EU policies 5. Cooperation: working together with schools in other countries on the same projects
