Without Borders: Intercultural Education through Innovative tools and ICT

Migration has made cultural diversity a daily reality in European schools. An intercultural classroom aims to create a climate of cooperation, communication, acceptance and respect for the “other”, with equal access to learning for everyone. This course helps educators develop an intercultural approach and use innovative tools and ICT creatively to work with diversity in the classroom.

Participants start by understanding diversity: the power of words, anti-rumour strategies and social campaigns, case studies on integrating minorities and exercises based on “Monologues across the Aegean Sea”. They then see refugee inclusion in practice:

• how asylum seekers are supported in Crete
• school enrolment and the educational challenges refugee children face
• a Human Library that challenges stereotypes through dialogue
• best practices for inclusion and the challenges ahead

Next, participants explore the basic principles of interpretation and how stereotypes form, through the workshop “The story of Annabel” and “The power of a single story”. In ICT workshops for culture and history classes, they create digital stories and videos and use gamification apps for history and art. The course ends with identity and cultural competence: the experiential workshop “The Hero”, exploring diversity through film, a cultural competence workshop and self-identity through psychodrama and role play.