Visibility of eTwinning Projects Group Newsletter 2017 No. 7 | Page 122

Visibility of eTwinning Projects Group July 2017 Newsletter
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From partnership to friendship
by Barbara Klaaßen
I have been involved in eTwinning for several years
now. I have worked with teachers from many
different countries and schools. I really enjoy
getting to know new teachers, new schools and new
ideas. Nevertheless there are some teachers we are
working together in projects again and again. One
of them is Zeliha Uğraş from Mersin in Turkey.
In 2013, when I was looking for a German speaking
partner for my eTwinning group in the afternoon
care at a primary school, I was introduced to Zeliha
by a colleague of hers. She was a newcomer in
eTwinning when our joint journey started with
“Kommt, wir treffen uns!”. We were 4 Turkish and
one German partner. Zeliha and I fit together
perfectly, we understood each other straight away.
Last summer Daniela Gubbels, a colleague of mine,
and me connected Daniela’s 3a with Zeliha’s class
3a. “Das kleine Quadrat“, a very intensive
eTwinning project with our 3 rd -graders, started.
Of course, kids introduced themselves, sent letters
to their one-to-one partners, and introduced their
schools. But the main point of this project was the
story of a little square, which was very sad in the
beginning, as it thought that it was pretty boring.
On every page of the story the square is
experiencing something and is folded in different
ways, until it recognizes it is special. Partners from
both countries read out the pages alternately and
explained in videos how to fold the Origami. The
other class followed this and prepared the next
page. Both sides read the story in German and
Turkish.
Our second project – this time with another Turkish
and one Lithuanian school – was really a pleasure.
We collaborated really well, had common ideas, we
were able to adjust and react. The project “Wie sagt
man das bei Euch?” was a great success thanks to
all partners involved; in Germany my kids and me
were awarded the German eTwinning Prize.
In Daniela’s and my group we have many kids with
Turkish roots, which were really proud to be able to
read the text in their mother tongue. Zeliha teaches
their 3 rd graders some German. As the story has 22
pages, we had to plan very well, when and who was
responsible for which page; keeping in mind
different free days, holidays … Indeed we were a
little nervous if we could manage in time as our
plan was really very strict and narrow.
So Zeliha and I went on and started in 2015 our
third project called “Auch ein Kind hat Rechte!” a
multilingual project related to the UN Convention on
the Rights of the Children. Again we collaborated
with other partners – this time from Spain and
Turkey. As in the projects before, we
enthusiastically shared ideas and complemented
each other in a very productive and creative way.
In all these projects I participated with a group
from the afternoon care.
Although we had some problems with illness,
secondment of Daniela to another school ... we
made it. We are really proud!
Each kid created her/his own printed copy and we
produced a multimedia version of the story with all
the folding instructions embedded as well.
Additionally kids created and played online games
around the story and both classes performed the
story as theatre play. Our whole school enjoyed a
performance of the story of the little square.
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