BLABL.ART
Enhancing Multilingual Skills Through Performing Arts
Starting in the coming term, the department of English Methodology at our University will partake in the BLABL.ART Project.
BLABL.ART is a pioneering European Initial Teacher Education (ITE) project designed to leverage the performing arts as a tool for acquiring multilingual skills. By facilitating online collaboration through the eTwinning platform, this project aims to bring together student teachers aged 18 to 28 from various countries, integrating English and local languages of the participants to create a rich, multicultural educational experience.
The Project aimes to fulfill the criteria of Artistic and Cultural Education (EAC) in France, which involve specific learning outcomes through artistic practice and engagement with artworks and artists. The project is grounded in the scientific paradigm of embodied cognition and aims to develop professional skills among participants.
Working together in transnational teams, Students would get to know one another and gain insights into other cultures. During the work sessions the participants are able to share artworks they like (music, visual arts, performing arts, etc.) and/or art that represents their country/cultural area and create own artistic products.
The project spans the first term of the 2024-2025 academic year (September to December) and may extend into the second term (January to May) depending on the availability of participating countries. Interested students will engage in weekly collaborative sessions.
Looking ahead, BLABL.ART envisions expanding through a potential Erasmus+ project to create a multilingual theatre festival, bringing participants together to showcase their collaborative work. Additionally, possible partnerships with multicultural drama companies may further enhance the project's impact.
Course Offers at our University
Transcultural project-based learning with eTwinning/Erasmus+
The offered course is centered on advancing project-based learning skills and intercultural communication for the sustainable mediation of different formats of transnational learning environments (hybrid-format, blended). The course covers the basics of educational project management, engaging and cooperating with EU student teachers via eTwinning platform, developing and implementing self-designed projects.
The course focuses on effectively engaging pre-service teachers from European and transnational communities, developing their project-based learning skills, and utilizing the eTwinning platform, which is funded by Erasmus+ and unites 226,000 schools and 937,000 teachers from 43 countries.
Starting with the principles of project-based learning design and progressing to the integration of course participants into the BLABL.ART project on multilingualism through arts, this course aims to foster the professional development of future teachers in transcultural environments and enhance their social activism. Project partners will cooperate with course contributors from beyond the academia, including local artists, plurilingual drama company Teatromultilingue and Cadavre Exquis video performances.
- Develop and implement interdisciplinary transnational projects to enhance intercultural communication, linguistic, sociocultural, and hybrid-format learning skills.
- Cascade acquired skills and integrate them flexibly into future self-developed eTwinning or other transnational teaching and learning projects.
- Course participants involved in the BLABL.ART project may be invited to participate in an open-air performance by Robin Renucci from Les Treteaux de France at a festival in Corsica (France), subject to available funding through Erasmus+.
Goals
- Master intercultural competence skills to teach and learn sustainably in a diverse educational environment.
- Develop project management skills for teaching and learning.
- Advance English-language linguistic skills (listening, reading, writing. speaking) and multilingual awareness through arts, with a focus on international communication.
- Foster effective engagement, productivity, and performance in the chosen context.
- Enhance critical thinking, multiperspective interpretations, and creativity,
- Introduce healing pedagogical practices by allowing students to express their inner voices through calming and relaxing art practices.
- Promote teachers’ activism and global citizenship education through community-based, national, and international project-based learning.
Sub Goals
- Train the effective use of intercultural competence skills within specifically developed contexts and situations.
- Model sustainable teaching and learning art-based practices within the offered course and self-tailored scenarios.
- Foster empathy, tolerance, multiculturalism, and embrace cultural diversity.
- Enhance English-language skills required for international communication with a strong focus on effective communicative outcomes or deliverables.
- Effectively involve course participants and eTwinning partners for efficient productivity and performance in the course and beyond.
- Presentation & Written Assignment
- Create a cooperative project-based learning product in the form of digital narrative maps, plurilingual dynamic stories, and peer-to-peer activities within self-tailored intercultural and multilingual scenarios.
- Cascade the project-based product by creating MapPins – “pinned” stories about the cultural identities of course participants, or their chosen piece of art or any other cultural artifact. These stories will be commented on in a multimedia or multimodal format, pinned on a padlet, saved on TwinSpace (the eTwinning platform), and collected in a digital, accessible form and an open format for project partners or a wider interested audience.
AM (Aufbaumodul)
5 ECTS for Gymnasium student teachers
6 ECTS for Realschule student teachers
Online learning materials, including texts, multimedia files, and interactive digital tools. JMU students (future teachers) should register using the following link eTwinning | European School Education Platform (europa.eu). All other external participants may register in eTwinning with their Initial Teacher Education (ITE).
hybrid format and blended learning (Zoom & WueCampus, eTwinning TwinSpace)
This course will be offered in a hybrid format to facilitate mediation and effective transcultural communication in a specific learning context. The principles of universality, interdisciplinarity, openness, flexibility, respect, and resilience are key factors that support further course implementation on-site (at JMU) and extend it among the involved partners (eTwinning partners). These principles are embedded into the course content and are adhered to all stages of course development and integration.
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