At a time when the founding values of Europe are being questioned, and because we strongly believe in these values and the power of education, we are 5 European educational institutions that have decided to work together for a better future. By combining best practices, educational innovations and by taking into account our students diversity, we wish to improve their education and therefore enhan
ce their prospects in the professional world. Our project "The Gardens of Babel", brings together students and teachers from France, Romania, Italy, Sweden and Spain. We hope to unite each educational community around common values and ideas. The consequences of climate change are causing ever growing concerns. Countries are willing to fight them and therefore societies are changing: awareness has been raised and time for change has come. Together we decided to propose a project based on the teaching of sustainable development by the creation of educational gardens in 5 European countries. We hope to integrate sustainable development into our student’s curriculum by the creation of educational gardens (vegetable gardens, sensory experiences, different climates, etc.). This transnational collaboration, through the use of the European E-twinning platform will enhance the European dimensions of our work. This program will aid communication and will enable us to learn from each other’s differences. Encouraging our student’s curiosity to explore and practice new languages will lead them to personal enrichment. It will demonstrate the Importance of the ability to communicate in foreign languages. In order to highlight the uniting link between all of the European participants, each teacher has established a join project within their respective subject. For example, in mathematics a work of art will be created using geometric shapes; art and architecture will work together to introduce green vegetation around the schools; foreign language classes will study the various systems of education and will learn about each country’s traditions, this will encourage discussions, reflections and debates; geography and history classes will study the climate and tourism in each region and how this can effect businesses in the area. Regarding teaching of sustainable development, each establishment will create eco-friendly gardens around different themes (climate gardens, sensory gardens, flower gardens and vegetable gardens). The creation and observation of these gardens will help us to build a guide: "how to create eco-friendly gardens in school environments”. Travelling to visit each other’s’ schools will allow students to see for themselves the progress of the project and then to report back to their home school. During these visits, students will join classroom lessons and participate in field trips in the iconic natural parks. Staying with local families and taking language courses in the host country will help to improve language skills essential to ensuring the project’s success. Finally, we aim to simulate a conference on the awareness of global warming. During the first year, each school will hold an internal COP then during the second year we will take part in simulation of this COP at our French site. Once again, the European dimension will contribute to the sustainable development. The principal methodology will be to work in pairs to allow everyone with their differences and difficulties to collaborate in our partnership. All information will be shared through our online journal "The Gardens of Babel Diary" as well as via the project website and the European Platform E-twinning. We would like where possible to move away from the traditional framework of the classroom to learn better and differently, including through the use of modern technologies such as video conferencing. A combination of home classroom activities and other European classrooms will increase the enthusiasm and interest of both students and teachers. We hope that our Europe, whose territories are too often seen as individuals can finally be the symbol of strong and lasting friendships between all participants. Lastly we will rely on the distribution of our educational kits to continue what has been started by this project and see the Gardens of Babylon become the gardens of the world's future.
