„National minorities – treasure of Europe”

The project „National minorities – treasure of Europe” aims at presenting the cultural richness of Europe on the example of the Belarusian minority living in Poland and Lithuania as well as the Lithuanian minority in Poland. We want to show the uniqueness of these regions of Europe and at the same time indicate cultural similarities and common origin. The project implementation aims at making the participants aware of the common heritage of all three nations: Polish, Belarusian and Lithuanian as inheritors of the Grand Duchy of Lithuania.

Implementation of the project will make participating youth understand how important the sense of one’s identity is, while respecting cultural heritage of their countries and being open to values of other cultures in Europe. The project will enable widening the horizons of its participants by understanding that propagating their own customs and traditions enriches the cultural mosaic of their countries of residence. The activities of the project will develop in its participants the feeling of being an element of European culture and understanding of their contribution to European heritage.

Another objective of the project is increasing teaching and knowledge acquiring standards by enriching school activities with new forms, tools and methods of work aimed at supporting the institutions in the didactic process directed at facilitating learning about culture and traditions of national minorities covered by the project activities. These activities will contribute to strengthening the professional competence of the teaching staff.

An important objective is developing the language skills of the project participants in the field of using a foreign language during international meetings. This informal aspect of language learning will enable the participants to overcome their own barriers related to the fear of speaking in a foreign language.

As a part of the project there will be 3 short-term exchanges of student groups in the schools of all project partners, in addition in Pužsk a short training program for employees of all schools will be organized. Working visits of the project management staff and students’ representatives at the leading institution in Hajnówka as well as at the Gymnasium in Vilnius were also planned. Throughout the project the schools will maintain contact through the eTwinning platform.

The impact of the project on its participants and target groups will be manifold and sustainable through:

deepening of identity by comparison with partner schools
recognition of common roots and values which will lead to an enhanced awareness of European citizenship
improvement of linguistic competences
increase of self-confidence and personal responsibility by staying with host families
exchange of pedagogical concepts.

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