Constanta is a 7 months host for 4 youngsters from Spain and Georgia, as participants to the project Human Skills for Human Life, funded by the European Union through the Erasmus + program. Opportunity is called the European Voluntary Service and can be accessed by any youngster aged 17-30 in Europe.
The Association for the Promotion of Creative-Ecological Education and Innovative Skills wanted to organize this project in Constanta because the local NGOs lacked this offer. Although the program has been running since 2007 in Romania, there have been only few attempts in Constanta, not always highlighted. But starting in 2017, children from the Agigea Day Center, from the two schools in Corbu and Sacele, and from Gymnasium 29 are the beneficiaries of the educational activities of the 4 volunteers. Through games and various methods of non-formal learning, they learn together about a having a good human life . It’s not enough to have a soft family background, or be prize-winners or, on the contrary, be labeled as the problem-student, so you can know basic things about cohabitation between people. Sometimes school becomes a jungle, a land of aggression of all kinds, regardless of social status. The youngsters who are starting their independent life are not self-confident enough to access their potential – this is, in short, the need to which the project is addressed.
“In the beginning pupils were interested in carrying out their work tasks,hoping that they would be noticed by the 4 volunteers; then they were eager to scold them, find out who they are and what they can learn from them. There was direct collaboration in the classroom activities and culminated in the interaction with the volunteer’s intercultural presentations, where the little ones were just eyes and ears!”, says a teacher from School 29. If you are wondering what the impact of these activities is, here is one of the most common answers: “The children asked when the volunteers will return. And they have asked extra questions about what they have presented. They also wanted to find information about other European countries”.
Beyond the specific purpose of any project, what remains is the interaction between cultures. Information about different people, with different customs, is brought to life in the form of fairy tales. Sometimes they are also brought in a culinary way, or through songs, movement, and interaction. It thus becomes a complete experience whose learning value is proven. Two intercultural evenings, Spanish and Georgian will be held in February for the general public.
