Comenius 1.3 School development project 2002-2005

Project Title: "Qui non si fa la storia , l'Europa…….. ma non solo

This 3-year history project was a School Partnership supported by Comenius 1. It involved representatives from schools and colleges across five European countries: Italy, Portugal, Spain, Romania and the United Kingdom.

This is the story of its development together with the development of the schools, the teachers , the students , the Headmasters and all the people involved. It has changed the perspective of all of them and added a challenging experience to a curricular routine

Project aims:

a. To exchange knowledge and experience of teaching practices
b. To enhance the teaching and learning of national history by developing the European context and perspective
c. To develop different teaching materials including a website which can be accessed internationally

General themes for the project :

1. People and power (totalitarianism and democracy)
2. People in movement (from countryside to towns, immigrants and emigrants)
3. People at work (the labour process, impact of economic and technological change) (this last theme was replaced in the last year by terrorism due to the international events)

Each partner in the project has contributed materials from their national perspective on one or more of these themes .
All project materials and activities maybe found on the project site.
All the activities have always been decided by all partners together in the project meetings.

THE SITE: www.stevenson.ac.uk/comenius
This site has been developed as part of a 3 year project involving 5 partners from different European countries. The purpose of the site was to act as a repository of resources that can be used for the teaching of history and to act as a forum for exchanging knowledge and experience of teaching practices. It is divided in: Home, History Resources ,Discussion Forum, Student work, Partner links, Questionnaires, News and Events, The Project, Comenius.

PROJECT MEETINGS and ACTIVITIES

1st project meeting: Rome 22-26 October 2002 IPSIA C. Cattaneo

The first meeting of the project brought together individuals from schools and colleges across Europe to discuss the aims and methodologies of the project.

Points of discussion:

• Introduction to the school, the Headmaster, the teachers involved and the students
• The European projects of the school
• Reflection on each country's needs in History curricula
• Topics to be developed together in the first year.

All the points of discussion were deeply examined and possible solutions identified It was clear from the first that the project was an ambitious one in that we all have different modes of delivery, different levels of resources, curricula and so on. However, it was also clear that we could learn from each other and 'think outside the box' into which habits and other organisational constraints have put us.
Problems: the different curricula, contents and modes of delivery in the countries involved in the project.
Solution: We examined and compared the history programs of the different curricula and schools trying to identify common paths and decided to include each country' s history programs in the schools where partners teach to understand the different situations better.
Language: English was used as the lingua franca, but occasional use of other languages was made; Italian in most cases, since the majority of the partners could understand it. .
Themes identified

• people and power (totalitarianism and democracy)
• people in movement (from countryside to towns, from countries to other countries - EU, non-EU)
• people at work (the labour process and its changes)
  

Problem : how to compromise between two different points of view:
-to identify a common methodology and approach (which was impossible given the many teaching systems involved)
-to keep complete freedom in methodology and approach (which would leave little need for the project)
Solution: a sort of matrix, on a common framework which allowed flexibility. The partners can choose where they input material to the matrix, how much, and to what level
Since it was impossible to specify a particular historical period to focus on because of the different curricula of the partners ,in the first meeting they agreed that, apart from specific exigencies, the nineteenth and twentieth centuries would be the most fruitful areas to look at.

General themes to work on:

1.People and power (totalitarianism and democracy)
2. People in movement (from countryside to towns, immigrants and emigrants)
3. People at work (the labour process, impact of economic and technological change)

Each partner would contribute materials from their national perspective on one or more of these themes. The material for each of the themes might be presented at 3 different levels of complexity:
1. Summary
2. More developed
3. Source materials and documents

In addition, so that the inevitably artificial separation of the themes is overcome, case studies which show how one or more of these themes are interlinked could be added.
As a start, partners decided

• to produce a short piece on the development of universal suffrage in their respective countries ( to be used as a useful and brief comparative study. A model outline was produced and emailed it to the respective partners. )
• to develop questionnaires to assess the students' knowledge of European history, the Europea Union and their personal interests.

February 2003 Launch of The History Project web site

The web site would provide a repository of resources for the project and a discussion forum through which students and staff can make contact and discuss issues relating to the project.

2nd project meeting :Bucharest, 8-13 April 2003

It became clear that each of the partners had widely differing opportunities and environments in which they were operating with a different range of flexibility .Most of the partners concentrated on developing teaching materials and website (Stevenson College) . Students were involved in answering questionnaires and writing materials .However methodology was not significantly innovative in most cases with the only exception of Italy .(The Italian partner was able to set aside two weeks of the academic year for an intensive history project course. This meant rewriting both the teachers' and students' timetables (the teachers, for example, being given a week's extra holiday in return for intensive work in two weeks). The students had opportunities for research on the web and for the development of PowerPoint presentations and CD- Roms of the results of their work. Italian partner used tests quite considerably. Here the emphasis was much more on evaluative essay type work.

Problems:

• how to improve students' involvement
• how different partners could find their own individual routes to involve themselves and their students in the project
• for the later stages of the project it didn't seem possible to work in common on the basis of agreed topics (as it had happened for the Universal suffrage. This approach was particularly emphasized by the Spanish Partner)
• how to give the students new teaching experiences and ways of relating to History
  

Suggestion: Collaboration might take different forms such as fostering direct links between students, videoconferencing and so on.

Use of ICT in the Project

• online messaging (Romanian, Spanish and Italian Students communicated online during the project and the meeting)
• web used as a research tool (by Italian and Spanish students)
• PowerPoint presentations and CD (Italian students)
• web pages to introduce themselves, to present their interests and to enable communication with other students in the project.(Italian and Spanish)
• questionnaires
• the site

Agreed actions

• the web-sites would be used purely as starting points for studying historical topics
• that there would be no requirement for the partners to produce long articles. Instead, it was hoped that the web sites would encourage students to carry out research on historical themes using the web
• there could be links from the introductory articles to authoritative web pages on other sites.
• the content of the web sites could be used as an introduction to history at the start of partners'History courses
• the Stevenson web site would be used as the official site of the project, and that it would contain links to all the other partner sites.

The following actions were also agreed:

• To create an online forum (within the Stevenson web-site discussion forum) that would enable all the partners to discuss how they wanted the project to develop, how to publicise the project within the schools and colleges and to the broader community, to set the goals for the rest of the project
• To incorporate the presentations of the Italian students onto the project web-site
• To produce a CD version of the website and distribute it to all the partners by the end of June to support each country's bid for continued funding of the project
• To set up video-conferencing facilities at each centre to allow the staff and students to communicate with all the other centres
• All the partners had to send to Stevenson College all the material produced in the school year in order to put it on the web site, on the CD ROM and sent to the Socrates National Agency.
• All the partners would send the questionnaire and their results to Stevenson College.

3rd project meeting :Seville, 21-26 October 2003

Wednesday 22 October
Partners reported improvements and changes.
Romania - The profile of project was raised by last year's visit. They spent one afternoon a week on the project, but had had problems with access to computers. There was only one computer lab and one machine with internet connection. They were about to finalise a contract which gives broadband internet access throughout the school.
Spain - Here there was very successful work using the universal suffrage material, both the chronology and the factors element. The class was able to use these for an effective comparative study of the rise of universal suffrage and produced a very interesting chart showing the different rates of development. There was also a discussion paper that was produced as a result of this. It contained some very sophisticated analysis.
Italy - Now two schools were involved in the project - Cattaneo and the Art School. In the Art School there was little access or use of Information Technology and not many students studied languages . They were hoping to introduce English and Spanish language teaching as well as Information Technology (on a volunteer base).
Scotland - There was some good successes with the project. First of all, for the first time, it was possible to link up studying history with using Information Technology. Groups of students worked on the internet and researched various topics (on the website ). In addition the different modes of delivery and motivation suggested by the project led to the arranging of a trip to Paris for history students.
Portugal - The Portuguese partners have been using the universal suffrage material with their students and this was found to be a useful and interesting means of providing an international comparison of development.

Proposals for new activities It was important to identify new themes and actions to work on

• Immigration/emigration
• European constitution
• Developing the online discussion forum with students
• Videoconference

Immigration/Emigration
This theme was accepted by all partners because it unified all cultures and peoples involved in the project. The point was how to find an approach which might be significantly different from our previous one.

Which focus?

• Interaction between students in the different countries working on the issue was considered important
• Content : there was no point in producing lengthy teaching materials which would sit on a website without being used. It would be important that students read and comment on any materials and this meant that the materials had to be brief and accessible.
• Students should prepare short materials on immigration/emigration
• Language: . It was suggested that online translation services could be used to help with this and these could be provided through the Stevenson site . This would not be a complete solution because these translation services were limited in what they could do. As a way around this it was proposed that students would prepare very short and very simple submissions on the issue.
• Approach: as there were practical difficulties with administering a very interactive discussion of immigration/emigration individual partners could be left free to approach this issue in the way they thought appropriate.

Activity coordination: One means of coordinating the activity of the partners without imposing too strict a method of work was for all to look at the topic under the following headings:

• Who (who immigrated/emigrated) ?
• When (a chronology of population flows in the different countries) ?
• How (by what means of transport, under what conditions) ?
• Why (were people driven by economic, political, social and cultural factors) ?
• Consequence (cultural, economic, political, social) ?

European Constitution
There was a great debate in Italy on the nature of the European constitution and in Romania a new constitution was about to be voted on. This might be a useful thing to look at in a historical and comparative context. Moreover some students were going to be first time voters and so these issues should be important to them. .However it was felt by several participants that the subject of constitutions would not be stimulating for our students and therefore difficult to involve them with. There was also the difficulty that the UK does not have a constitution.

Online discussion forum
Aims: to involve all the partner students actively in relating to the forum and to each other
to provide a directly measurable outcome. (The number of contacts would be verifiable from the website.)

Suggestions :

1. To centre the forum debate on economics because this is something that students find to be of immediate relevance to them given their socio-economic position.

2. To put forward a number of very general questions which different groups of students studying perhaps different areas of history could still provide an input to.

3. To prepare a timetable for the online discussion (not to be started before February 2004)

4. Students would provide a personal summary of interests, a photograph and so on and email accounts They would then post material on the forum and seek a suitable partner to communicate with in the later online discussion

5. The forum itself would be used to test the system through students registering with the forum.

6. Answers to the questions would be posted in the local language (if preferred) and some form of online translation facilities would be used to aid comprehension

7. A Comeniad prize would be awarded to the best contribution in each country.

Problem: Some people thought no.4 might not be appropriate for their students as they would not want to divulge personal information in this way and they would not think it appropriate for a project of this type.
Solution: this preparatory work, while worthwhile, would not be practical for all the partners. While it would be open to particular schools to adopt this approach and to contact other schools with a similar approach, it would not be possible for the project to adopt this idea as a whole. Therefore, the online forum would begin in February leaving individual schools to prepare for this in the way they find most suitable.

Questions proposed

1. History is about the past . It does not tell anything about the present

2. How important is the individual in shaping history, and what alternative explanations might there be. Think of a practical example from what you have studied. Is manipulation all-powerful?

3. Wars can be avoided and always should be. Are these statements true?

Timetable

• Template for immigration/emigration to be sent out (by November 2004)
• Translation of the questions for the forum to be sent to to go on the forum (by 1 December 2003)
• Involving students in the online discussion forum (February 2004)
• Evidence of work on immigration/emigration (by May meeting)

Videoconferencing

Aim : to show students that there are other people in other countries working on the same topics. It was left to a further step since not all schools had the necessary equipment.
February - 2004 The History Forum
From now on students from all the participating schools in the project would discuss on a variety of historical issues.

Neothemi Conference Campobasso 8-9 October 2004

This conference was not part of the project .However project partners are allowed to take part in a Comenius 3( Comenius Networks) final meeting in order to meet other partners and learn about Comenius networks and news from Brussels about the future of European funded projects.
The final meeting of the Cultural Heritage and ICT Neothemi network took place in Campobasso in Italy during 8 and 9 October. Harry Kogon and Donny Gluckstein attended from SCE. Marzia Zabbatino attended from IPSIA Cattaneo and Antonio Baudrocco attended from ISA Pomezia
The conference was very useful and stimulating. This was for several reasons:

• The conference was a presentation of three years of work from a network of 10 different partners, ranging from schools to Universities.
• One session, addressed by a speaker from Brussels, covered the future of European funded projects. Here it emerged that at present educational institutions encompassing 2% of European young people are involved in projects. The intention is to increase that percentage to 5% from 2007. Accordingly funding for projects will increase from the current €499m to €1600m.
• We were able to meet up with other partners involved in our Comenius project and so were able to have very useful discussions about carrying our project forward which is also coming to the end of its three years. Although there was a project meeting taking place shortly, there was a great deal of work to do in terms of completing the project and presenting it at the final session in Rome.
• We also met many people from a wide range of European countries who were in a similar position to ourselves in that they were completing projects and wished to become involved in new ones.
• Many of the sessions dealt with issues which we have been wrestling with in our own project such as the extent to which ICT can be employed in education. For example, one group from Norway explained how all their students had been given laptops and they now operated a 'Learning Management System' which had revolutionised the way education was carried out. While there were many advantages to this new system there was also a danger that some advantages of more traditional teaching methods would be lost.

As a result of the conference we were much better prepared for the forthcoming Comenius meeting, we had the privilege of seeing how a very well run and professional Comenius 3 network operated and have some useful ideas about where it might be possible to develop new projects that involve wider layers of students and staff at SCE.

4th project meeting: Edinburgh, 4 - 9 May 2004

The meeting was attended by teachers from all the partner schools, but also, for the first time, by some of the students who had been participating in its activities. These students (three male, two female) were from Cattaneo and Pomezia in Rome.

Evaluation of work

THE FORUM
positive aspects: teacher's viewpoint

• the forum was 'very successful, and better than had been expected
• It offered 'the first real possibility of strong student involvement
• students were interested to see how much the answers written in different countries had in common
• larger number of students had been able to become involved and discuss general questions outside the rigid framework of the curriculum to which they were usually bound.
• class discussions on the forum questions had been good
• IT and History had come together
  

Positive aspects: students' viewpoint

• the forum assisted with history
• it was valuable in their learning of IT skills and English
• he had not been interested in history before getting involved with the forum,
• it had changed his viewpoint towards History
• working on the forum questions had been motivating
  

Negative aspects: teacher's viewpoint

• contact with other students was necessarily indirect and there was no immediate response to postings.
• there had been problems with fitting into the timetable set for the forum.
• it had sometimes been difficult to translate class discussions on the forum questions into written answers that were posted especially for vocationally oriented students not very much used to writing
• there had been technical problems in posting the answers, related to the limited number of computers available at some schools.

Immigration/emigration .
Work on the theme of immigration/emigration had been done, but it lacked the immediacy of the forum because of lower student involvement.. Works were produced for the website by some partners .
Students' meeting
The project teachers and students met one of Stevenson's history classes and there was a brief discussion about how work had gone on the forum. Although students from both Italy and Scotland were nervous about speaking, those that did made interesting points about their experience of the forum and its questions.

General conclusions
It was felt that the most important aspect of the project's work was not the content but the methodology - the fact that it involved a variety of aspects and ways of working (including the school trip of the Scottish students to Paris to see sites related to the 1789 revolution and the Paris Commune. This had been inspired by the project's aim of developing new ways of teaching. Although school trips are not a new idea, such a trip for history students was completely new at Stevenson).
How to measure success. Should be it in terms of what the partners are able to do together,
what the partners are able to do in our individual schools.

Comeniad Prizes
A short list was drawn up and the winners (one for each school) were voted. The prizes consisted of contributions of typical produce from each of the countries. Stevenson provided certificates to the winners in due course.

Ideas for new themes :terrorism
The idea of making terrorism a theme for next year seemed the most appropriate (starting from the Spanish CD-Rom on the terrorist attack in Madrid). The issue of war, which was one of the forum questions, was felt as a very important one.

Points of discussion about terrorism

• it had to be handled carefully as it is a sensitive topic.
• Are all terrorist acts fundamentally equal - examples of a general phenomenon
• are motivations behind the act or the context important?
• each act should be looked at individually with motivation and context taken into account.
• an act of political violence - might be terrorism
• not all examples of terrorism should be treated as the same.
• what should be defined as terrorism
• teachers had to be careful not to try and impose their views upon the students
• it was important to take into account the feelings of the students about this issue

How to develop the new theme

1 Discussion forum on terrorism
A new set of questions was proposed for the forum

• How do you feel about terrorism?
• How does the media treat terrorism?
• 'One man's terrorist is another's freedom fighter. '(One person might consider an act of violence to be an example of terrorism, another person might see it as part of a struggle for freedom). Is this true or false? Choose one example from your own country's history and one from abroad to discuss this issue.

These issues would be developed through the forum and be part of the final material to be presented at the end of the project.
The timetable for the forum on terrorism was agreed as follows:

• answers to the first question before the next meeting in Portugal
• answers to questions 2 and 3 by 21 December

There would be Comeniad prizes awarded again. The decision on winners would be taken at the Rome meeting.

2 Other materials
Problem : How far we could move towards a fully interactive event with full student participation?
Methodological solution : different partners would prepare different kinds of material around the theme of terrorism which could be presented at the end (CD-Rom presentation. essay on terrorism, photographic exhibition, opinion poll, questionnaires, web pages, multimedia study of the media on terrorism). When all of these were brought together the result would be a more complete 'product' than the individual countries could create for themselves.

All of this material would be brought together in Rome and copies given to each of the schools. It could then be taken home and presented to the students. We could ask the students for their opinions of the different aspects. This feedback from the students would then form the basis for a videoconference (or other interactive format) for the teachers. The aim of this, which would take place after the Rome meeting, would be to evaluate the project as a whole.

Technical issues

• Each partner should have an IT expert who could assist with the project.
• All students should have e-mail address
• All students should register with the forum
  

5th project meeting Cortegaça, 19 - 24 October 2004

Aims:

• to evaluate how work was progressing
• to look at the next phase of work on terrorism including the discussion forum
• to make preparations for the final meeting of the project in Rome,
• to discuss ways of evaluating and disseminating the project.

Decisions taken

• To propose other questions about the theme of terrorism
• all contributions to the discussion forum should be completed by 31st January 2005
• all the materials students were producing would be put on the site with appropriate links
• to award "Comeniad prizes" for the best forum contribution from each partner school
• How to procede with the Comeniad Prize
  

Comeniad Prize

• each partner school would first select three of the best contributions from their own school.
• These contributions would ideally be chosen by the students themselves to ensure that it would be done in the most democratic way.
• The best three contributions would proposed by 31st January 2005 at the latest
• After this, each partner school would vote on the best forum contribution from each school from the ones proposed.
• Each school would have one vote for a contribution from each school but they would not be allowed to vote on contributions from their own school
• Voting would be done in secret using the voting facilities of the web site.
• One person from each school was elected to be the voting representative.
• It was agreed to complete the vote by 28th February 2005 and announce the winners at the next meeting in Rome.

Preparation for the final project meeting in Rome
Aims of the meeting: to present this year's work on the theme of terrorism and to review the entire three-year Comenius History Project

Decisions taken.

• the meeting would be held from Monday 4th April to Saturday 9th April.
• The first two days will be for preparing for the presentation events.
• The presentation would then take place over two further days; one day on I.S.A. Pomezia and one day in IPSIA Cattaneo
• As the overall theme of the project is a historical one, it was agreed that there must be at least one history teacher from each school at the meeting.
• a provisional plan for the two-day presentation
• chair persons appointed .
  

Evaluation of the Project

Problem: how to carry out a final evaluation of the three-year project.
Suggestions for the evaluation

Who will provide the feedback?

• Students
• Teachers
• Managers (headmasters, administrators, National Agencies, others)
  

How will information be collected?

• Students - on-line questionnaire (general awareness of Comenius project and, in addition individual institutions can also choose their own preferred methods)
• Teachers - set of interview-style questions (to be prepared between now and December)
• Managers - short questionnaire

Quantitative evaluation

Examples:

• Number of forum contributions
• Number of hits on forum
• Numbers of students in classes involved in project
• Number of students who know about the project

Practical issues:

• Who develops student on-line general awareness questionnaire? : Spain
• Who develops the teachers' interview-style questions?: Cattaneo
• Who develops the managers' short questionnaire?: Stevenson
• Who, in each institution, develops method of student evaluation for their school

Dates for completion of questionnaire design:

• First draft end November
• Comments by end December
• Finalised end January
• Dates for submission of results: 10th May 2005 (in order to publicize results by the end of the academic year)

Publishing of evaluation results (to be decided in Rome on preparation days)

Dissemination

Points of further discussion:

• How the project should be disseminated to a wider audience
• whether to apply for funding for a 4th year for this purpose.
  

No final decision was made on these last points

6th project meeting: Rome, 5 - 10 April 2005

The final meeting of the 'Qui non si fa la storia' project took place in Rome under difficult circumstances brought about by the death and funeral of Pope John Paul II. The planned activities had to be altered at the last minute as a result. Nevertheless, all the activities which had been planned for at the Portugal meeting were able to take place and only one or two additional events (such as a music performance) had to be abandoned. The Italian partners had worked very hard both in advance and in the final difficult days to ensure that the final meeting would be a success.

Apart from a short preparatory session, the main part of the Rome meeting took the form of a presentation of the project and its results. It was held in the presence, and with the participation, of students from the Rome schools and Romania, plus members of staff from the Italian schools, their headmasters, and representatives of the Comune of Rome and the Ministry of Education. The presentation was spread over two days and took place on Thursday 7 April in IPSIA Carlo Cattaneo in Rome, and the Art School in Pomezia on Friday 8 April.(since on that day in Rome there was the Pope's funeral)

DAY 1: IPSIA Carlo Cattaneo
The meeting began with an address from the Headmaster of IPSIA Carlo Cattaneo. He explained why the project had been important for his school. Many of its students are from disadvantaged backgrounds, and he felt it was important that they were given the opportunity of participating in an international project which gave them contact with students abroad. He also stressed the importance of studying history. It is often the case that historical issues are treated in a superficial way by the mass media, and it was important for students to develop critical faculties which enabled them to use reasoning and analysis to make sense of the information that they are presented with.
A second address was given by a representative of the Comune of Rome. This looked at the issue of memory and memorials. One important date in the history of Rome was 10 September 1943, the day when Germans occupied the capital to prevent the government signing a peace treaty with the Allied forces. Schools in Rome had been involved in a variety of activities related to both this event and the liberation of Rome from Nazi domination in 1945. The role of memory was shown by the way the young people of 1943 and 1945 could tell their story to the young people of today. They can tell us not only about the events but the way they experienced these events. This makes the past real and this is important. Another example of this is the Holocaust. The speaker said that even teachers find it difficult to imagine the scale of something like Auschwitz. It is not just a question of what happened, but how it happened, and in a 'civilised' country.

The next session consisted of an introduction to the project by the Romanian partner. This described in detail the work that had been undertaken over the course of three years and which showed how the project had evolved in that time. In the first year work had gone into developing materials on the issues of 'People and power', 'People on the move' and 'People at work'. These materials were generated by the teachers.

In the second year the focus changed. More emphasis was put on students generating materials such as CD-Rom and PowerPoint presentations. It was during the second year that the history forum was developed. This used historiographical questions to encourage debate among students and bring them into contact with students from other partners.

The final year of the project had concentrated on taking the history forum further and focussing on prepared only to work but not think.

The Romanian teacher explained some of the difficulties they had faced. The history teacher had not wanted to be involved in the project and had not wanted to change her way of teaching from the traditional 'chalk and talk'. However, through the work of the teachers who were part of the project, the students had come to see that there are other ways of working and the history teacher had seen how the students were influenced by new ideas and approaches. Now she is ready to accept different methods. Other changes that had been encouraged by the project: at the start there was only one computer in the school available to students. Now there is a computer lab for all. This opens up the sort of things that can be studied by students. So the project has played an important role.
In the general discussion it was pointed out that under Comenius 'Qui non si fa la storia' was a 'school development project' and that in assessing the work that had been done this aspect should be emphasised. In Scotland it had led to members of different departments working together for the first time, and new methods such as ICT technology and trips to historical sites had been brought in for the first time.

It was argued that in describing the work of the project it was important not only to concentrate on its successes, but also on the major difficulties that we had to confront and the ways in which these difficulties were overcome.

The project had changed the schools of the various partners. We had concentrated on the teaching and study of history but, almost independently of our wills, had succeeded in bringing about changes within the institutions. This was because the approach had been non-dogmatic and flexible and had not stuck to fixed objectives. We had been able to change our approach mid-stream.

DAY 2: ISA Pomezia
The final day of the project meeting was held in Pomezia. The whole of the entrance area was taken up by an exhibition of work by the students. It had been inspired by the work of terrorism by the other schools. The day was led off by the Headmaster who said that from the point of view of the Art School the project had begun with some major organisational difficulties, but the teachers and students had taken it up enthusiastically.

There was a general discussion on the project's methodology led off by the Coordinator from Cattaneo. The project had brought history closer to students who would otherwise have left it aside. It has succeeded because it emphasised the students' own activity. This had been learnt after the first year which had stressed the development of materials by teachers. This proved a dead-end. Instead the use of technology, and innovations such as a history forum had opened the way to broader student involvement. The forum proved a great step forward, not just technically, but because it used challenging questions to provoke a student response.

There followed a number of presentations from individual partners. The Spanish gave a slide show which summarised the general work that the project had undertaken over the last three years and raised the issue of dissemination and evaluation (through questionnaires). The role of ICT for the project in Scotland was described, showing how it had been introduced into the history curriculum for the first time because of this project. The students had conducted web research, produced PowerPoint presentations and contributed to the online history forum to great effect. The benefits for the students involved, which included greater motivation and improvement of ICT skills, were emphasised. Some of the practical difficulties encountered, such as access to ICT equipment and the integration of traditional and new learning techniques, were also presented together with the ways in which some of these problems were overcome.

Referring to the issue of 'People and power', the Romanians presented a short film on the life of Ceaucescu. Pomezia put forward the ideas that students had concerning new projects which they felt could be still more interesting and involving than the present one.

The final session of the meeting looked at the future of European educational projects. Firstly, the approach should be on learning and the activity of the learner rather than the traditional role of teaching. The process of education must be 'owned' by the students themselves. The aims of the EU are ambitious. 1 in 20 students should be involved in a Comenius project in the period 2007-13. There will be more opportunities for student mobility under the new arrangements. Twinning of schools will be introduced. Tempus Plus, which currently only operates at University level will be extended to schools. Links will be made beyond the current boundaries of the EU. The division between Socrates and Leonardo will be ended.

In 2006 project proposals will need to include how projects will be validated and disseminated. The themes of the projects will be monitored and participants working on similar themes will be encouraged to share their experiences. 25% of projects will be linguistic.

In concluding remarks a Scottish teacher stressed that the last two days of the meeting had concentrated on presenting the products of the project, such as material on terrorism. However, the project was also about 'school development'. In other words it was a process and each of the partners had demonstrated considerable progress over the three years. The changes that had occurred in each of the partner schools in Italy, Portugal, Romania, Scotland and Spain had operated at the level of the institutions themselves, for the teachers and above all for the student experience of history. Hopefully, the changes would be of lasting benefit and will reach not only those students who participated directly in the project, but also those students who would join the schools in the future.

Conclusions

Benefits of using ITC in the project

• Develop students' ITC skills
• Encourage new approaches to learning
• Focus on learner's needs
• Encourage indipendent learning
• Motivate students
• Develop cross-curriculum skills
• Introduce flexibility in curricula
• Encourage new approaches to teaching

Difficulties with using ITC in the projects

• Availability of ITC resources
• Limited students ITC skills
• Limited web evaluation skills
• Difficulties in integrating ITC and non-ITC modes of learning
• Difficulties in integrating ITC and non ITC modes of teaching
  

After Rome

Although we have had our last project meeting, it was previously agreed that we would undertake a process of evaluation using questionnaires (for students, teachers and school managements). A final publication (in a form still to be determined) would be produced

Project Evaluation

Questionnaires
To evaluate the Comenius History Project three questionnaries were produced and were submitted in the partner schools

1 Student evaluation questionnaire
2 Teachers' evaluation questionnaire
3 Managers' and Administrators' evaluation questionnaire

1 Student Evaluation Questionnaire
Cuestionario de evaluación de los alumnos

• Do you think you've understood the aims of this project? / ¿Crees que has comprendido el objetivo de este Proyecto?
• Yes, absolutely / Sí, totalmente
• Partially / En parte
• Very little / Muy poco
• Nothing at all / Nada en absoluto
  

Did you learn anything about the following subjects? (You can select several options) / ¿Has aprendido algo sobre las siguientes materias? (Puedes contestar varias opciones)

• History / Historia
• Computing / Informática
• Your own language / Tu propio idioma
• Foreign languages / Idiomas extranjeros
• Others / Otros

How would you define your participation in the History Forum? / ¿Cómo crees que ha sido tu participación en el Foro de debate sobre historia?

• Very intense / Muy intensa
• Intense / Intensa
• Middle / Media
• Low / Baja
• Nothing / Nula

Would you be inclined to participate in other European projects proposed by your teacher? / ¿Estarías dispuesto a participar en otro Proyecto europeo propuesto por tu profesor?

• Yes / Sí
• No / No
• It would depend on the topic / Depende del tema

Do you think the communication with the students of other participating schools has been useful? / ¿Ha servido de algo la comunicación con los estudiantes de los otros Centros participantes en este Proyecto europeo?

• Yes, very much / Sí, mucho
• A little / Algo
• Not at all / Nada

Would you have participated more or better in the proposed activites? / ¿Podrías haber participado más y mejor en las actividades propuestas?

• Yes / Sí
• No / No

Did you visit and read the web site of the project? (www.stevenson.ac.uk/comenius) / ¿Has visitado y leído la página web del Proyecto?

• Many times / Muchas veces
• Sometimes / Algunas veces
• Never / Nunca

What changes would you make? / ¿Qué mejoras introducirías?

Did your teachers explain well what you had to do to take part in the project activities? / ¿Te han explicado bien tus profesores lo que tenías que hacer para participar en las actividades del proyecto?
Would you recommend others to take part in a similar activity to this one? / ¿Recomendarías participar en una actividad similar a ésta a otros compañeros de tu Centro?

2 Teacher's Evaluation Questionnaire
Comenius History Project 2004/2005

As the three year Comenius school development history project is drawing to a close, would you please take a little time to answer some questions about it.

• How did you find out about the Comenius project "Qui non si fa la storia"?
• From the teacher's meeting
• From another teacher
• From a written notice
• Any other source
  

How much do you think that the project issues (universal suffrage, immigration / emigration, terrorism) are in line with history teaching, if you consider the latest events in the world?

• Very much
• Quite a lot
• Slightly
• Not at all
• I don't know

Do you think that a European partners' discussion of contemporary historical issues may help to create a European consciousness?

• Yes, definitely
• Yes, but not completely
• It's almost meaningless
• It's totally useless

Have the new technologies (use of PC, Internet, the official site of the project and the partner's sites) in some way influenced your teaching?

• Yes, definitely
• Yes, partially
• Almost nothing
• Not at all

According to your opinion, how do your students feel about ICT?

• Positively, they feel much more involved
• Positively, but partially involved
• Passively
• Any other attitude

Do you think that the use of ICT may change the students' attitude to history?

• Yes, definitely
• Yes, but superficially
• Practically no
• Not at all
• I have never used ICT

According to your opinion, what are the practical issues of integrating face-to-face teaching with ICT?

Managers' and Administrators' Evaluation Questionnaire
Comenius History Project 2004/2005

The three year Comenius school development history project is drawing to a close. Would you please take a little time to answer some questions about it. If you are not aware of the answers to any of these questions please leave them blank.

Were there positive features of the project for your school, and if so, what were they?

Were there any negative features of the project, and if so what were they?

Has the project contributed to school development, and if so, how? (Examples might be use of ICT, new teaching/learning methods, curriculum development, involvement of disadvantaged students, awareness of the European dimension. etc.)

Would you lend your support to another Comenius project based on your experience of this one?