Final activities

We are slowly coming to the end of our InMETE 55+ Project. After two years of cooperation all project's products are ready:

1. The resource pack of materials, ideas and guidelines for English teachers

2. Nine detailed lesson outlines together with teaching/learning materials for teachers and students (each for two levels: elementary (A2-B1) and intermediate (B2))

3. Two curricula compiled for a one-year (60 hours) course for learners 55+, two levels: elementary (A2-B1) and intermediate (B2).

All of them have been presented during multiplier events that we have organized in Hungary, Italy and Poland at the end of our project. They have been also disseminated through different means (e.g. uploaded at the dissemination platform: the Erasmus+ Project Results Platform - http://ec.europa.eu/programmes/erasmus-plus/projects/).

Each meeting started with the project film presentation: https://youtu.be/j3KWkO5-T9w. This great video was prepared by our Italian friends and shows why we had decided to have project about teaching English to seniors.

During dissemination events we invited teachers and educators working with seniors to feel as learners and we showed them some of activating, innovative and increasing cognitive functions of elderly learners activities that we had invented. We also asked the teachers and educators for their opinion about our products and presented exercises and here are some of their comments:

“I learned very interesting and unusual methods to teach English in a way which is easy and funny for both teachers and learners.” Italy

“It’s always good to hear about methods that really work. Thank you.” Hungary

“Great project, great film, great products – I’m impressed with your work, congratulations!” Poland

“Most of the activities are focused on games, having fun, speaking and vocabulary. It is exactly what our learners need.” Italy

“The method introduced was absolutely challenging and stimulating. I can’t wait to try it on my learners.” Italy

"It was great to learn about new methods and tasks, to talk to learners who were involved, and exchange ideas with colleagues.” Hungary

“I love the Resource pack and the Lesson plans – they really will help me in my lessons preparation” Poland

“The Resource Pack will be a great source of inspiration. There are some original activities never seen before.” Italy

“Great new methods of working, very good techniques and materials (lexis with pictures) + music. Lesson in the museum – extra! Something new, different, activating!” Poland

“The Resource Pack is really a good collection of ideas.” Hungary

“It was very innovative to have lesson in the museum and use game cards to teach language” Poland

"After attending this interesting meeting and some examples of lesson according to this new methods I have decided to change completely the position of desks and chairs in my classroom.” Italy

“The music activity was relaxing and motivating. I will copy it!” Italy

"In our everyday rush, we, teachers tend to forget about the importance of joy and games in classes. Thanks for the reminder” Hungary

"I need some time to come up with ideas and figure out how I can use the tasks and ideas, but surely I will use them! Thank you.” Hungary

“Thank you for a lots of new ideas for exercises that we can use during our classes!” Poland

We are very happy that people like our products and that they find them useful and inspirational. All our events were a great success!

Now we are working on the final project evaluation and preparing our final project report. It is also time for us to think how can we cooperate in the future and what common project we can realize together.

We would like to thank all teachers, educators and seniors who have helped us with our project. Without your hard work, brilliant ideas and support we wouldn't be able to achieve our goals!

            

Multiplier Events

After our final international meeting in Rome, there is no time for any rest because each partner organisation is obliged to organise a so-called multiplier event, according to the project proposal. The main aim of the events is to share and disseminate the intellectual outputs of the InMETE 55+ project. 

The Polish partner is organising a conference for English teachers from non-profit organizations working on seniors’ education field in Kraków, in early July. The conference organised by the Italian partners will be addressed to Unieda English teachers working in Third Age Universities, Popular Universities and Cultural Associations, representing also associations in different parts of Italy. The roundtable by the Hungarian partners took place with the participation of more than 60 people on 25 June, and it was a great success as the pictures in the photo gallery: http://tinyurl.com/Multiplier-event-Hungary prove. Italian presentation from the meeting is avaliable here: http://tinyurl.com/Multiplier-event-Italy.

Our final project meeting in Rome

Unfortunately, the end of the project is getting closer and closer ... We had our last international meeting in Rome at the end of May. As usual, the Italian team prepared a perfect programme and involved some of the learners too. We did lots of necessary paperwork, agreed on several tasks that should be done in the coming months before putting an end to the project, were brainstorming on a possible new project, and, what's most fascinating, we organised three mini-lessons for learners too. 

During these 30-minute long lessons teachers from each participating country could demonstrate and try out some activities from our project products. All of the tasks were really successful and the learners enjoyed themselves very much.

You can see how great the atmosphere was during the meeting if you open the photo presentation – in our project Gallery: http://tinyurl.com/last-meeting-Rome

Evaluation after the sixth international meeting

After the sixth international meeting in Rome we made evaluation. Short evaluation report from it you can find here: https://www.slideshare.net/secret/LKHqe9wWpZhlw

Students' comments

Testing our products (methods, exercises and materials for English classes) we asked seniors taking part in our activities to share their opinions and comments with us. Here you can read what they think about our proposed English lessons and our project.

Hungarian students’ comments:

“The lessons were all really interesting though sometimes even a big challenge for me. I like acting out situations, so I especially liked the tasks where I had to be creative and improvise.”

“I enjoyed the dialogues most. They were not typical dialogues but made us think. And there were good expressions that we can use in real life.”

“I liked the discussion activities where we could practise both words and expressions, and grammatical structures too. The context was really interesting too.”

“Listening to music and trying to understand the lyrics makes me always happy. I am usually quite tired after a busy working day when we have „FUNglish” meetings on Friday evenings but being with friends, doing enjoyable and funny activities in English, and singing a good song together always make me forget about my problems or tiredness.”

“My favourite task was when I had to work with slices of paper that I had to put in the correct order to form a coherent text. Also, the pictures we used were really nice and could help us to come up with ideas to talk about the topic. We laughed a lot too because there are very nice and funny people in our English group.”

“Most of the tasks were quite new to me and I enjoyed them very much. The topics were inspiring and made everybody actively participate in the discussions.”

Italian students’ comments: 

“It was very funny to work in teams like in a competition. At the beginning I thought I didn't know any words but then I discovered I knew many of them!”

“It was very funny! Even if I am not good at singing and I am shy, in group it was much easier.”

“The song was catchy and easy to follow. I learned a lot of new words. I would have liked to sing more than twice. Just when we were starting to sing better, the lesson was over!”

“I am an awful singer and I just pretended to sing during the exercise!”

“I had the chance to know better my class-mates.”

“I like readings about travelling and journeys because they make me dream!’

“In this role play we learned how to complain in practical situations that we might have to face in everyday life so I think it was very useful.”

“It was extremely funny and dynamic. I wish I had had more time to talk to my partners. When the conversation started to flow smoothly the bell rang and it was time to change!”

“It was very original. I couldn't imagine that we could do that during our English lesson.”

“Original and team building. It helped us break the ice (we sometimes copied from each other when we didn't understand what we had to do!) and we really had good time.”

“After this activity I learned an incredible number of words and verbs. We should repeat it with other topics. You learn while you play, and I think that when you are relaxed and without stress you learn better.”

“Very original activity. We should do it more often. We students are obliged to listen carefully to the teacher and we can't have distractions otherwise we lose the game!”

“It was funny, we could work in couples so we were less tense and more relaxed, we found a lot of new words that would have been useful during the lesson.”

“Not only did I like the food tasting and the recipe presentations, but I also appreciated the personal stories and memories that were behind every dish presented.”

Polish students’ comments:

“I like the project very much. It shows how much can still be done in adult education.”

“I think that adult education is very important - we still want to learn all the time!!”

“English language is so important nowadays, I can find it everywhere I go. In shops, at the station, at the airport, in my computer - everywhere! So I need to learn, and I need teachers that know how to teach me.”

“I am a teacher myself and I can see how important your project is. It is good to find out about new ideas and new materials, well done!!”

“Seniors have a lot of experience and a lot of passion to learn. I wanted to learn English all my life, but I never had an opportunity. Now I travel a lot and I need English more than before. I support all ideas that are making English more achievable to seniors.”

“I think that it is fantastic that learning English became an international issue, and that different teachers from different countries work together to improve teaching that language. I can't wait for thefinal products.”

“I follow your blog and I can see that you work and you have a lot of fun the same time. Is it true? If so I think that it is great that you can mix work and fun - it usually gives the best results.”

“I like the fact that at the end of your project there are going to be products, something that you can touch, that you can use, something real. It is very exciting.”

“I found your project very inspiring - your work looks very creative. I have my fingers crossed for the final result.”

“I like that teachers and educators from different countries exchange experience in the project - I think that in many other areas a policy like that would be very fruitful. It's good to talk, discuss and share opinions, and I see that you do a lot of that in the project. I like it a lot.”

Two products are ready for dissemination!

The Inmete team is proud and happy to announce that the final version of the first two outputs, the Resource Pack and the Lesson Plan, is ready! The introduction of Output 3, the curricula, is ready and everybody gave their precious contribuition in it.

Evaluation and photos from the fifth international meeting

We are after the fifth international meeting in Krakow, Poland. It was great time for all and we wish to share our memories with you: Photo gallery - Krakow 2

Short evaluation report from the meeting is available here: Evaluation - Krakow 2

Project news 08.04.2016

After an unforgettable meeting in Poland we are very proud to say that our project is going really well. O2 is ready! Quality control was completed and met all the quality goals required. 

The curricula will be slightly modified according to the results of O3 quality control. A first draft of the "funny video" has been presented in Krakow. We are currently working on the leaflet layout and on the planning of the multiplier events that will be held in summer in the partner countries.

Our second product - the collection of lesson plans at two levels - is almost totally ready!

Recently teachers have been busy with testing lesson plans (O2) with local groups of learners. After each class, learners are asked to fill in a questionnaire and give feedback.

 

On the basis of the comments, it might be necessary to make some minor changes in order to make the content and tasks of the lessons more appropriately tailored to the needs of senior learners. The lessons are said to be really enjoyable and motivating.

 

 

As for the two curricula (O3), we are ready with the analysis of the feedbacks from external evaluators. The next task is to decide what modifications must be made.