Non-formal methods...

The activities planned during this youth exchange included, exclusively, non-formal methods; the aims were to facilitate the process of interconectivity, to activate motivation and creativity, to support the process of decision making and contribution with new ideas, encouraging freedom of expression and tolerance among participants.

All these methods facilitate the learning process and support the development of key competences, the integration and assimilation of the project results and cooperation among young people. The involvement of young people in these activities help them to develop personal and social competences, and also competences for teamwork.

The non-formal methods proposed during the project activities had the objective to develop a participatory attitude, to support the process of refection, to promote tolerance, to support the integration of intercultural differences in the proces of creation and to support cooperation among young.

Enegizers: The aim of these activities is to facilitate the getting-to-know-each other, to energize them and also to facilitate the switch between the activities.

Usually these activities are group games that take up to 15 minutes.

Archer, Grandmother & Dragon: The game revolves around the story of an archer, a grandmother and a dragon. Participants divide into two teams and stand in two lines, with their backs to the other team. Each team decides whether they will be the archere, the grandmother or the dragon. They turn around to face the other team and mime an action representing who they are. The idea is that: the archer defeats the dragon, the dragon defeats the grandmother, and the grandmother defeats the archer. Sometimes, neither group will defeat the other because they will both choose to be the same thing!

A lifetime experience!

Not a very long time ago, only 6 months have passed since I have learned more

about humans, about humanity, about how similar we are in so many different ways.

Before the serious part in which I explain what exactly we did there, I need to thank to my soul sister, Andreea, to call me and tell me about this amazing experience for a human being.

The deep part is not ended, this is the start actually, because that's who I am, this is how I express myself. If you are searching for something more emotionless, well, this article won't give you that.

"Let's get a job" helped me to understand people in a way I couldn't do this with something else.

This project, the coordinators, the participants (a part of them are my friends now and I keep in touch with them) showed me that I really can do it, that I will become what I desire for years.

During Romanian Cultural Night, because I am romanian and I started to talk with anybody, I tried to learn them something about our culture. We danced traditional dances, we ate "zacuscă", "mici" (I tell them in this way because I like how they sound in romanian), a bulgarian participant (which is now an amazing friend) wanted to learn our language and that was his first lesson (by the way, he is still learning and I am proud of him).

Then, the next day we were at Târgu Jiu, the city with 3 of the most popular sculptures of this genius Constantin Brâncuși. I was a guide in there, I have never think that I will tell what is the matter with these 3 pieces of art to 40 foreigners in english. But I did it and they listened to me. I am very thankful for this. They showed me I can do something I thought it's almost impossible.

The other days were amazing. The workshops? Full of work, team work, another possibility to know how amazing people are. We made different types of CVs, cover letters, movies about how difficult or not is to get a job in this world, in EU. We did it. We made a beautiful work.

The other cultural nights? My thoughts? Amazing. I danced a lot and I had a lot of fun with people. I even helped the italians participants to make Tiramisu (so delicious). The spanish cultural night? Well, a big chance for me to understand that I really can dance. I love them for who they are. I wouldn't change anything. I prooved myself that I am still good at dancing, that I can focus again without a headache at everytime I do it.

I am grateful for every single person who was in this project. I know that the very serious part is still missing, but I mean it. I think that this is the main point of the Erasmus+ projects - connecting people. Get to know each other. Understand each other. Smile to each other.  Dance with each other? (be serious, music is really connecting people).

Thank you for giving me the chance to express my feelings in this article. My heart is grateful for it.

Oh, I have almost forgot. I’m Ana-Maria, only a human.

„Talk-show” about our project on a Radio staion from Warsaw

0 - 2 min: Kacper asked me how it was in Romania. I answered him that it was an amazing time, we were living in beautiful place near mountains. I said also that I've liked Romania since first moment because during the flight I was sitting next to soldier who started talking with me about Romania, he said only positive things. He asked me what I'm going to do in Romania and I answered that I'm going to Erasmus Plus project, he was really happy about my answer and interested in.

2 - 4:30 min: I'm talking about Horezu, about the village, the place and about pottery workshop we had there. I said that Horezu pottery is very famous in Romania.

4:30 - 6 min: Kacper asked me about typical Romanian food so I said that we were eating it all the time. I was telling about different meals we ate.

6 - 6:30 min: I was telling about prices in Romania.

6:30 - 8 min: I said about the project's topic "Let's get a job!". I said what we were doing there, that we did a lot of presentations for example about youth unemployment, we were writing CVs, cover letters. Telling about people I met in Erasmus Project, their nationalities etc.

8 - 11 min: I'm telling about visiting Bucharest.

11 - 12 min: I encourage people to visit Romania.

after 12 min: We changed the topic.

Check the radio transmission here.

See with your own eyes how fun and work blended so perfectly!

The project activities were aimed to engage young people through active participation, which is a priority in the "Erasmus+" framework. 

Also, it has been facilitated intercultural exchange, exchanging ideas, sustaining dialogue; organized tasks so that each participant had the opportunity to come into contact with a different culture. 

Knowledge and understanding of diversity, resultied from involvement in the planned activities, has contributed to increase tolerance and openness towards exchanges and intercultural dialogue.

See with your own eyes how fun and work blended so perfectly! 

Watch our project video!

Problems of youngsters on the labor market

Today we were split in teams in order to make short videos connected to the youth labour market (youth unemployment). 

We started our work in the groups with brainstorming. All of us shared our ideas how the video should be made and we made decisions about filming it. In our teams, we chose topics and prepared scripts.

During the second part of the morning of day 8, it was finally time to put all of our ideas into action.

Anyone can act, but none of us could really be an actor... we had to solve this problem with an energizer: each one had a paper on his/her forehead where a different emotion was written and he/she had to guess what the emotion was just thanks to others people's mimic of that emotion.

After that, time to play!

After acting and recording some scenes we sat down to edit our videos. This part of our video project was very satisfying, because we could have watched how results of our work are getting clearer, prettier and funnier. 

This was also very creative part, because you can really change the conception of video in editing process.

Video CV

The CV is a short structured autobiography, serving the purpose of making an introduction and first impresion of us in front of our future employer.

There are lots of ways to present our CV and one of them is Video CV.

We all put a lot of creativity, passion and motivation making the best autobiography. The two teams presented different types of CVs, showing that there can be various ways to present the diversity of each one of us.

As it follows:

The CV should include - information and contact, education, experience, personal skills and competences and any additional infotmation, that can be useful for presenting us the best way.

...about sending NGOs!

All the partners involved in the project support and facilitate, through their active participation, the project objectives and also, european citizenship, intercultural dialogue and social inclusion.

The Starry Start of Talents Foundation deals with young people to help them develop their musical and dancing talents and tries to encourage them to develop their own skills, giving them opportunities to engage in useful activities. 

They organise symposiums, seminars, conferences, round tables in the field of culture, as well as music competitions and festivals in the country and abroad. We educate young talented people and organise public events for them. We do charity activities aimed at assisting young people who need financial and other support. 

The foundation organise children and youth art festivals “Starry moment” which take place in the National Palace of Culture, and also many concerts together with the National Agency for Child Protection, National Agency of Youth and Sport, Ministry of Culture, Ministry of Education and Science, with the Sofia municipality.

Gaziantep Local Youth Group (Gaziantep Yerel Gençlik Grubu) is established on the 1^st December of 2014 by youth in Gaziantep.

Vision: motivated people creating the world inspired by each other, care and cooperation.

Mission: encourage people to care about their lifelong learnig

Goals:

I. Implement non-formal education;

II. Find a bridge between formal and non-formal eduation;

III. Develop creative thinking;

IV. Support youth in identifying their skills and abilities;

V. Encourage entrepreneur thinking;

VI. Promote the cooperation between young people;

VII. Organize personal development trainings, culturel events, outdoor activities, job fairs, seminars for students and abroad opportunities.

European Foundation for Education and Sport (Europejska Fundacja Edukacyjno-Sportowa ) is an organization working since 2014, mostly on international level. 

Their mission and the main goal is to promote creation of positive environment for development of NGO sector and civil initiatives focused on human rights, civil society development, promotion of European values especially in the field of multiculturalism and intercultural dialogue, also through sport. 

Working towards development of Europe EFES pay special attention to international cooperation and sharing those values with non-EU countries. They also focus on strengthening cooperation between NGOs, business environment, and authorities in order to empower the process of removing sociocultural obstacles in social integration and support the inclusion process. 

EFES vision is reaching synergy which will give greater possibilities of having impact of actions directed to European society. They want to achieve active participation of individuals in life of local communities, faith that one can have influence on the direction of social development, which will help us strengthen relations between European citizens, based on basic European values such as tolerance, equality, peace, democracy.

DESES-3 is an organization that works with young people, offering them opportunities of comprehensive training programs, while giving priority to those who are unemployed or have a cultural, social or economic disadvantage. 

They aim at social inclusion and thus provide the space and projects that will allow youngsters to develop their social skills. 

DESES-3 works on different topics depending on their respective goals. 

I. Organize and disseminate training activities and information events on the topic of Health and Disease Prevention. 

II. Inform, sensitive raise awareness and manage activities related to the environment. These aim at environmental protection, educating the public, disseminating useful information and ensuring an enjoyable time for their participants. 

III. Carry out activities such as courses, seminars and training days regarding leisure time and more. 

IV. Contribute to the personal development of individuals and help them to achieve their full potential – physically, intellectually and socially – as citizens. Attention is given to those who are most in need of assistance. These could be people unprivileged socially, culturally, economically, physically, mentally, ethnically etc.

V. Develop Actions and Programs for Social Intervention and Integration. 

VI. Carry out Activities, Classes, Camps, Youth Exchanges, Tours, and trips with and for children and young people, linking to the areas of Formal and Non-Formal Education. 

VII. Develop all kind of activities in Free Time and Non-Formal Education. 

VIII. Promote activities, programs, projects relating to societal integration and the incorporation of immigrants into our society. 

IX. Develop proposals and actions on gender equality, providing support to women, and promoting their inclusion and equal participation in society.

Scambieuropei is a Cultural Association dedicated to youth formed by a group of young people specialized in a wide range of fields, including but not limited to: non-formal education, international cooperation, communication & marketing and social work. 

The mission of Scambieuropei is to provide and promote mobility opportunities for young people in order to help them improve their work and/or educational skills. It undertakes several initiatives to promote and enhance active European citizenship, intercultural communication, social integration, media and journalism.

Scambieuropei also serves as a recruiter and professional mediator, helping match young adults seeking employment with European companies and NGOs, activating SVE's and internships throughout Europe. 

One of Scambieuropei main objectives is to promote the concept of “European citizenship” through the exchange of good practices and multicultural learning. That is why since 2010 they became an accredited EVS sending and coordinating organization.
Furthermore, Scambieuropei works with mobility activities for VET learners as hosting and coordinating organization. In this case, their aim is to provide young people with practical tools and knowledge about EU programs in order to develop their own initiatives.

Scambieuropei portal www.scambieuropei.info attracts over 800.000 viewers per month, the number of followers on our Facebook page totals well over 100.000, while their newsletter has more than 26.000 monthly subscribers.

In the Summer of 2011, they launched their online magazine dedicated exclusively to European Culture and trends which now serves as an excellent medium for users/ community members on the move to share their exchange experiences. 

If you want to know more about our project partners, please check the following links:

- The Starry Start of Talents Foundation [Bulgaria]

- Scambieuropei [Italy]

- Europejska Fundacja Edukacyjno-Sportowa [Poland]

- DESES-3 [Spain] 

- Gaziantep Local Youth Group [Turkey].