On Saturday, April 21, 2018 Közgazdasági Politechnikum, our partner in Budapest, Hungary, held a public event called Europe Day. This was within the framework of European student parliament. During event ComServ ran 4, 1.5 hour workshops on what our project is about, including general information on the Erasmus+ program.
The entire ComServ segment was designed, developed and run by students in the project. Teachers in the project were merely there as facilitators in the planning sections and during the event as observers. It was full on peer-to-peer teaching, explaining; dissemination to the corp.
The ComServ members were split into two teams, each team ran two workshops back to back. Participants were eighth graders from the school, specifically chosen because they will be eligible for Erasmus+ projects starting the following year and organizers wanted to use dissemination as a means of garnering more interest among students in Erasmus+. The workshops were of two different types; code names Brains and Brawn. This tongue in cheek reference to the fact that in the Brains workshop activities included: brain games like a Kahoot on the project, fun discussions on Erasmus+ where students to work out logic puzzles, a quiz if you will, on the content of what they had seen/heard. Of course there was a Prezi as well providing more fun facts for the students.
While the Brawn workshops were more active. Students learned by doing. They discussed how feeding the hungry was carried out and planned food that they could prepare and were invited to come and cook them with the help of ComServ members in the next school year. Here at the event, they made the traditional Hungarian snack, kokuszgolyó. They also came up with designs for bird feeders – and they were invited to make them with ComServ members next fall. One more environmental protection game revolved around selective rubbish collection. Students worked in teams, picked up “litter” and had to literally toss it in the correct bin from the free throw line. The team that was the most accurate was the winner. Lastly, but not least, there was a “Blind Day” game as a warmer to next year’s ComServ event and community service idea. In this game students were paired up, one blindfolded and one not. The seeing student had to guide the blindfolded one through a maze using words only, no touching. The organizers then elicited responses from the participants, leading to the conclusion that when you host somebody during an exchange you are completely responsible for them.
Students took part in both workshop types and left enthusiastic about the project, about volunteering and Erasmus+ . Several parents also expressed their pleasure that in the coming academic year their children will be eligible and thanked the organizing students for all their hard work, for coming in on a Saturday!
Hats off to you folks. You did wonderful! #thisiseramsus #erasmusplus !!!
