Strategic Partnership "Perspective Inclusion"
From 2015-2017, the Kreisau-Initiative e.V. was the coordinator of a two-year Strategic Partnership involving five other partner organizations from Poland and Germany:
- "Krzyżowa" Foundation for Mutual Understanding in Europe, Poland
- Brücke/Most Foundation, Germany
- Kulturanima, Poland
- designbar Consulting, Germany
- ZZS (Special School) Oława, Poland.
The Strategic Partnership is an open format by Erasmus +, which promotes innovative project approaches to improve the quality of education. This was also the goal of the project "Perspective: Inclusion", which was carried out under the Strategic Partnership. The focus was to examine the role of language and communication in non-formal education from the perspective of inclusion, and to develop innovative, tailor-made educational materials as an important contribution to the development of inclusive education.
The project idea was conceived as a result of the experiences and observations of the team. While the international youth work sector already has a broad repertoire of communication enhancing methods (e.g. language animation), inclusive education does not have a lot of educational materials, especially those focusing on communication processes. The idea behind the project was to find synergies and interfaces between the different educational approaches and to implement the modification and development of methods on this basis, as well as to create initiatives which could purposefully promote communication during international meetings in inclusion groups.
At the conclusion of the Strategic Partnership, the partners have established two high-quality products which are released in the publication "Perspective Inclusion". This document is intended for professionals working in the area of non-formal young people's education, youth workers, special educators, teachers, and all those interested in the role of language in shaping social reality and promoting barrier-free communication in their practice.
Through this publication, we aim to share our many years of work experience in the field of international inclusive education, as well as contributing to increased opportunities for disadvantaged young people and to spreading the topic of inclusion. We hope that the materials provided will help to reduce barriers to communication and open up international educational possibilities to young people from different backgrounds and different competences.
The Strategic Partnership was co-funded by the Erasmus+ program (KA2) of the European Union.
Perspective Inclusion
Language and communication in international inclusive education
Methods, guidelines, impulses
This publication refers specifically to language and communication from an inclusive perspective. The first part of the whole publication is a lexicon and methodological didactic handbook. The authors examined the key aspects of international meetings, providing examples and presenting a wealth of methods and guidelines for non-formal education designed to support the communication process when working with inclusive groups.
The second part describes a selection of innovative educational approaches and best practices aimed to facilitate mutual contact and communication within such groups. Here, the authors drew on the experiences of practitioners from the partner's network, who are actively involved in supporting and developing inclusive education approaches.
The publication is available in three languages (DE, PL, ENG.) for free download.
Reproduction and use for non-commercial purposes are permitted with acknowledgement the source.
The publication "Perspective: Inclusion" was co-funded by the Erasmus + programme (Key Action 2) of the European Union and the German-Polish Youth Office (DPJW).