The 4th Activity in Huhtisen koulu, Finland

 

The 4^th Activity took place in 24.3.-28.3.2025 and it was organized by Huhtisen koulu. The activity was held in Porvoo, Finland. Huhtisen koulu hosted 29 participants, 10 teachers and 19 students from the partner schools in Piraeus, Chios and Montesilvano.

The program for the 4^th Activity begun by a guided tour of the school facilities and was followed by a welcome ceremony, where the staff and students of Huhtisen koulu were introduced to the participants and the participants kindly introduced themselves to the school. Introductions were followed by a song Matkustan ympäri maailmaa (Travelling around the world) sung by the entire school, and by teaching the participants a traditional Finnish dance Letkajenkka to “break the ice”, i.e. encourage cooperation and teamworking skills, among the students in particular. The welcome ceremony was then concluded by the school’s 6^th graders who taught the participants some basic Finnish word and phrases. After the ceremony the teachers were given an introduction into the Finnish school system while students took part in art, music or PE classes. The day was concluded by a tour in the historic old town of Porvoo by a local guide. Porvoo is the second oldest city in Finland, history dating back to the 1300s, and thus, preserving the uniqueness of the old town is essential: due to, for example, climate change special measures have had to be taken to preserve the old town.

During the second day of the 4^th Activity the participants took part in a coding workhop focusing on programming and building Legos. The fun yet educational workshop was held by the city’s ICT teacher Topi Lehosmaa. The workshop provided an opportunity to learn how to utilize digital skills in learning and teaching as it was one of the main goals of the project. During the second day, the participants also got to bake a traditional Finnish delicacy “korvapuusti”. While waiting for the delicacy to come out of the oven, the students learned about Finnish nature by completing digital tasks together in small groups or in pairs. The tasks focused on the difference of Finnish nature as compared to Greece and Italy. Here are the links to the tasks:

• Finnish nature: https://www.outinthenature.com/finnish-nature-quiz-for-kids/
• The effects of ice age on Finnish nature: https://www.outinthenature.com/quiz-traces-of-ice-age/
• Finnish wildlife: https://www.outinthenature.com/nature-quiz/
• Finnish trees and their leaves: https://www.outinthenature.com/out-in-the-nature-quiz-can-you-match-the-autumn-leaves-to-the-trees/
• Finnish nature above the Artic Circle: https://www.outinthenature.com/out-in-the-nature-quiz-above-the-arctic-circle/
• Finnish wildlife: https://www.outinthenature.com/out-in-the-nature-quiz-wildlife-in-finland/

• Finland: https://www.thinglink.com/view/scene/1960329281083015845

Originally the idea (instead of baking “korvapuusti”) was to explore outdoor activities in winter conditions, i.e. how to dress in the winter, how to walk on snow and ice, what kinds of activities Finnish children typical do on snowy and icy conditions, how does the weather affect Finnish nature during the winter and so forth. Unfortunately, due to climate change the winter in 2025 was very warm and at the time of the Activity, all of the snow has melted. Thus, we had to replace the outdoor activities with a more suitable option.

The third day of the activity focused on a workshop given by the Porvoo Nature School’s Pia Lindström and by a local sustainability teacher Anni Välikangas. The first part of the workshop was held outside in a nearby forest exploring Finnish nature and observing wildlife. The students had the opportunity to a) witness that forests are everywhere in Finland, even in the cities, and b) that the forests in the cities contain a lot of life in terms of types of trees and plants growing there as well as the wildlife found in the forests. They also had the chance to observe that similar trees and plants grow in all the participating countries but that they might look slightly different in terms of, for example, size. Naturally attention was also paid to the differences in biodiversity and the typical plants and trees found in Finnish forests. The second part of the workshop focused around making signs centered on raising ecological awareness (e.g. Save water, Recycle, Plants trees). Even though the participating schools’ countries face different kinds of challenges due to climate change (e.g. water as a resource), many of the issues are the same and the same signs could work in all the participating countries. The day ended in textile and wood working classrooms. Textile and woodworking classrooms are classes that are not taught in the other participating countries. They focus on hand-on skills such as using tools and sewing machine: being able to, for example, repair instead buying new is an essential life skill in today’s world.

On the fourth day of the Activity all the participants as well as Huhtisen koulu’s Erasmus teachers and 10 students from 6^th grades spent the day in Helsinki, the capital of Finland. The visit to the capital region started with a guided tour of Fazer, a Finnish food company founded in 1891, that thrives on making sustainable food (chocolate, candy, bread) by using as many local resources as possible. Fazer has grown to be a global company, and it provides a great example of a company that regardless of its growth, values sustainability in the way it operates (for example utilizing local ingredients as much as possible and how they package their products).

Next, we visited the Natural History Museum of Helsinki and received a guided tour called “A year in Finnish nature”. Finland is a country of four seasons. Each of the seasons is vastly different from the next and thus nature and wildlife change accordingly. As we could not observe Finnish nature in person during all four seasons and did not get to observe Finnish nature covered in snow due to the lack of snow in winter 2025, the exhibit provided the visitors the best chance to see how the appearance of trees and animals changes from one season to the next (e.g. winter versus summer coats in animals, hibernating animals, trees chancing colour, growing season being very short).

The fourth day concluded in an evening ceremony taking place in a local and very typical Finnish summer cottage by the sea. The participants had the opportunity to experience Finnish culture in the forms of sauna, ice swimming and typical Finnish delicacies such as mämmi, karjalanpiirakka, meatballs and products from a local chocolate factory called Brunberg. The evening ended in a closing ceremony by awarding certificates to all of the participants. The fifth day of the project was spent in classrooms in Huhtisen koulu.

Overall, Huhtisen koulu enjoyed having international visitors from our partner schools! :)

What are the concrete objectives you would like to achieve and 'outcomes or results you would like to realise'? How are these objectives linked to the priorities you have selected?

Learning how to live sustainably is one of the biggest challenges of the 21st century. Thus, the key concepts of this project are to 
a) enhance awareness, b) create real-world learning scenarios in and outside of the school, c) expose students to working together with people from different backgrounds, cultures, and learning abilities, and d) use modern technology in a meaningful way to achieve the above-mentioned objectives.
The project's main priorities are: 1) to create educational scenarios focused on outside learning (i.e. Environmental Education, Sciences), 2) to adopt good habits and practices applied by the schools from different geomorphological environments, and 3) to transfer the acquired knowledge and experiences to a project website. The website will contain information about each country’s biodiversity, ready worksheets and digital material for teachers to use, and a repository for all the material created in the project. In other words, the aim of the project is to explore differences in biodiversity, environment, and climate (outside learning), and seek meaningful and useful ways of using digital tools in learning all while taking into account different kinds of learners and their respective needs and abilities (integration and inclusion). On a larger scale, we aim to trigger a sustainable lifestyle change.
We will work within a collaborative and experiential framework. Goals for students:
1. Increase familiarity with each country’s biodiversity.
2. Create awareness about climate change.
3. Make small lifestyle changes by combining technology and outside learning and being in contact with nature.
4. Increase digital awareness and use of digital media to produce educational and educational entertainment material.
5. Learn how to cooperate and participate in transnational groups and acquaint students with the multiculturalism of Europe.
6. Facilitate acceptance of diversity to achieve common goals.
Goals for teachers:
1. Improve and integrate good practices regarding biodiversity, the environment, and sustainability.
2. Forward gained knowledge and information to other teachers in the school district.
3. Produce useful material to other European teachers (other than the participating schools' teachers).
4. Learn how to use European online platforms to improve and modernize educational processes and present them on dissemination days.
5. Distribute the produced material on a project website, which will include e.g. information about biodiversity, ready worksheets, and digital material for teachers to use and it will act as a repository for all the material created and collected in the project.
6. Introduce the European platform Gynzy.
Goals for communities:
1. Educate and inform the local communities about sustainability and climate change with the help of “the 3Rs” (reduce, reuse, recycle).
2. Help students’ families to adopt good ecological habits and make small but powerful changes in their lifestyles

ΤΑ ΨΗΛΑ ΒΟΥΝΑ, ΖΑΧΑΡΙΑΣ ΠΑΠΑΝΤΩΝΙΟΥ

THE HIGH MOUNTAINS, ZACHARIAS PAPANTONIOU

SUMMARY
Zacharias Papantoniou tells the story of a group of 26 children who, when they finish the last grade of the Greek school, decide (with the permission of their parents) to go on vacation alone for about two months in the mountains of Evrytania. There, amidst the beauties of nature, learning the stories of the people they meet, they build a community that celebrates team spirit, solidarity, and mutual respect, they learn to overcome life's difficulties through cooperation and respect for each other, always with humor.
There the children take an example from other villages in the area and decide to divide the jobs and organize themselves in their own community, thus making their own "village". With the instructions of Mr. Stefanos, who had taken it upon himself to look after them, and the material help from the other villages, they managed to survive, overcome every difficulty, and also protect the forest. This is how they learn about the beautiful but difficult life of shepherds. They learn the importance of teamwork and cooperation. The children become friends with Afrodo and learn letters from Lambros, her brother, who lives in the neighboring village. After this experience, they are stronger and more mature than before.
REVIEW
It is the first school reading book written in the vernacular. It is one of the few books with such a beautiful narrative and, when you read it, it is like living it. It has a very nice premise and indirectly conveys important messages to children, such as respect for nature, and the importance of cooperation and teamwork. It also talks about the organization of a community and the division of tasks so that there is harmony, coexistence, and proper functioning. So it also prepares children for their integration into society. For these messages it conveys and the way it presents the case and its development, it is believed to be a pleasant book and worth reading for all children.
ΤΑ ΨΗΛΑ ΒΟΥΝΑ, ΖΑΧΑΡΙΑΣ ΠΑΠΑΝΤΩΝΙΟΥ
ΠΕΡΙΛΗΨΗ
Ο Ζαχαρίας Παπαντωνίου αφηγείται την ιστορία μιας ομάδας 26 παιδιών που όταν τελειώνουν την τελευταία τάξη του ελληνικού σχολείου αποφασίζουν (με την άδεια των γονιών τους) να κάνουν μόνα τους διακοπές για περίπου δύο μήνες στα βουνά της Ευρυτανίας. Εκεί, μέσα στις ομορφιές της φύσης, μαθαίνοντας τις ιστορίες των ανθρώπων που συναντούν, φτιάχνουν μια κοινότητα που εξυμνεί το ομαδικό πνεύμα, την αλληλεγγύη και τον αλληλοσεβασμό, μαθαίνουν να ξεπερνούν στις δυσκολίες της ζωής μέσω της συνεργασίας και της εκτίμησης απέναντι στον άλλο, πάντα με χιούμορ.
Εκεί  τα παιδιά παίρνουν παράδειγμα από άλλα χωριά της περιοχής και αποφασίζουν να χωρίσουν τις δουλειές και να οργανωθούν σε μια δικιά τους κοινότητα, φτιάχνοντας έτσι ένα δικό τους «χωριό». Με τις οδηγίες του κυρ Στέφανου, που είχε αναλάβει να τους προσέχει, και την υλική βοήθεια από τα άλλα χωριά, καταφέρνουν να επιβιώσουν, να ξεπεράσουν κάθε δυσκολία, αλλά και να προστατέψουν το δάσος. Έτσι μαθαίνουν την όμορφη αλλά δύσκολη ζωή των βοσκών. Μαθαίνουν την σημασία της ομαδικότητας και της συνεργασίας. Τα παιδιά γίνονται φίλοι με την Αφρόδω και μαθαίνουν γράμματα στον Λάμπρο, τον αδερφό της, που μένουν στο διπλανό χωριό. Μετά από αυτήν την εμπειρία τους, είναι πιο δυνατοί και ώριμοι από πριν . 
ΚΡΙΤΙΚΗ
Είναι το πρώτο σχολικό αναγνωστικό βιβλίο που γράφτηκε στην δημοτική γλώσσα. Είναι ένα από τα λίγα βιβλία με τόσο ωραία αφήγηση και, όταν το διαβάζεις, είναι σαν να το ζεις. Έχει πολύ ωραία υπόθεση και με έμμεσο τρόπο μεταδίδει στα παιδιά σημαντικά μηνύματα, όπως τον σεβασμό στη φύση, τη σημαντικότητα της συνεργασίας και της ομαδικότητας. Μιλάει ακόμα για την οργάνωση μιας κοινότητας και το μοίρασμα των εργασιών,  ώστε να υπάρχει  αρμονία, συνύπαρξη και σωστή λειτουργία. Άρα προετοιμάζει τα παιδιά και για την ένταξή τους στην κοινωνία. Για αυτά τα μηνύματα που περνάει και τον τρόπο με τον οποίο παρουσιάζει την υπόθεση και την εξέλιξή της, πιστεύεται πως είναι ένα ευχάριστο βιβλίο και αξίζει να το διαβάσουν όλα τα παιδιά. 

• In the book, The High Mountains by Zacharias Papantoniou, we will see how a group of 12year-old children survived alone on a mountain. What was it that helped them create a community and how much did the diversity of each child contribute to this?

• Μέσα από το βιβλίο τα ψηλά βουνά του Ζαχαρία Παπαντωνίου θα δούμε πώς μια παρέα 12 χρονων παιδιών επιβίωσαν μόνα τους σε ένα βουνό.Τι ήταν αυτό που τους βοήθησε να δημιουργήσουν μια κοινότητα και πόσο συνέβαλε σε αυτό η διαφορετικότητα του κάθε παιδιού;

ΤΑ ΨΗΛΑ ΒΟΥΝΑ του Ζαχαρία Παπαντωνίου