Final survey may 2013

COMENIUS PROJECT BREAKING STEREOTYPES 1

FINAL SURVEY

Eduardo Riol Krisztina Botosné Mészáros INS Mercè Rodoreda L’Hospitalet de Llobregat, Spain May 2013

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Thanks to: Comenius Spanish teacher Javier López for designing the Moodle platform for the survey.

Hungarian teacher Kriszt ina Botosné Mészáros for collaborat ing on the comparison of the Init ial and the Final survey and supervising the English text.

All the teachers and students who took part in the survey.

Index 1.

Participating high schools and Comenius coordinators 2. Methodological notes 3.

The survey QUANTITATIVE QUESTIONS - COMENIUS QUESTIONS 3.1 Overview 3.2 Have students learnt from the Comenius project?

3.3 Have students “broken stereotypes”?

3.4 Have students improved their English skills thanks to the Comenius project?

3.5 Knowledge about Comenius countries QUALITATIVE QUESTIONS – TRENDING TOPICS 3.6 Trending topics CONCLUSIONS

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1.

Participating high schools

Coordinator: Mrs. Ave Teder Tallinna tehnikagümnaasium Sõpruse pst.187 13415 tallinn Estonia Coordinator : Mr. Mariusz Klimczak Zespół szkół ponadgimnazjalnych nr 2 w brzesku Ul. Piastowska 2 32-800 Brzesko Poland Coordinator: Mrs. Elena Scuteri Ist ituto di istruzione superiore "g. Malafarina" Via trento e trieste 88068 soverato Italy

Coordinator: Mrs. Irene Tiago Agrupamento vert ical gonçalo mendes da maia escola e. B. 2/3 da maia Avenida luís de camões 4470-194 mai-porto Portugal Coordinator: Mrs. Krisztina Botosné Mészáros Prohászka Ottokár Orsolyita Közoktatási Központ 2-4 újkapu street Győr Hungary Coordinator: Mr. Eduardo Riol INS Mercè Rodoreda Rambla Marina 393 08907 L’Hospitalet de Llobregat Spain

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2.

Methodological notes

The survey was carried out between late April and early May 2013 at all part icipat ing high schools.

Spanish partners designed a Google Drive platform to make the process of collect ing answers easier.

It was agreed to gather answers of a minimum of 5% of the populat ion of each high school in order to give a fair representat ion of answers.

Quantitative survey The first part of the survey refers to basic social classificat ion of our students such as age, sex , nat ionality and country of birth.

Some quest ions about religion, geographical localisat ion has already asked in the init ial survey, so we think the distribution of answers must be very similar, hence they do not appear in this final survey. We must remark that these quest ions were essent ial to carry out our project since we wanted to know which stereotypes we had to “break”, which fields of knowledge we had to work on.

The second part includes different quest ions about the performance of the Comenius project, concerning: Level of learning about the Comenius part icipat ing countries Self-percept ion of having broken stereotypes about the Comenius part icipating countries Aspects where this self-percept ion has changed Self-evaluat ion of knowledge of the other Comenius countries after the project Qualitative survey Some qualitat ive answers were included in the survey, in order to complement quant itat ive quest ions.

Quest ions about politics, culture and food appearing in the init ial survey were useful to know which topics we had to work on in order to “break stereotypes”. In fact, the answers of students were the basis of most of our workshops during the different mobilities. For this reason, these quest ions do not appear in the final survey.

On the other hand, most of the study is based on the self-assuming knowledge of the students.

We assume that, despite the fact that some subject ivity may appear in the answers of the students, the fact that now they really know what the Comenius project is, helps the survey to be more realist ic and honest.

As in the init ial survey, we have kept a qualitative quest ion that effectively shows clichés and stereotypes. The students had to write down the first three words that came to their minds when they were asked about the other Comenius countries. We are extremely pleased to see that results have notably changed since our Comenius Project started nearly two years ago.

Difficulties Whereas most of the students have given logical answers to every quest ion, Italian students show strange patterns answering the qualitat ive question “name three words related to each country”.

It looks as if there was a mistake and they have reproduced the same answer many t imes. In this way, they cont inue to reproduce some clichés about the other countries, unlike the rest of the students.

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The essay below uses percentages instead of total number of answers, with only some except ions. We assume that, despite the mistakes, the answers of our students are quite representat ive of their total populat ion.

On the other hand, it is important to highlight that the age of students is different because of the different educat ion systems, so this factor must be obviously taken into account when we take most of the answers into considerat ion.

Finally, in order to make the reading easier, the set of answers of the students from the different countries have been often summarized with only the name of the country.

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3. The survey 3.1 Overview These are some basic sociological considerat ions about students who took part in the survey.

Population ESTONIA n = 41 ITALY n = 61 PORTUGAL n = 54 HUNGARY n = 75 POLAND n = 56 SPAIN n= 64 Age The age of the students cont inue to be different at each school, owing to our different educat ion systems, so this factor must be obviously taken into account when we examine the answers. Most of the students joining this survey have changed a lot and become older since November 2011, when the first survey took place. Most of the students in Portugal and Spain are between 13 and 16 years old, so they can be considered to be on a similar stage of learning. Most of the students in Estonia, Hungary, Italy and Poland are over 16 years old. In this last country there is a significant number of students who are over 19 years old. We can assume that their answers are more mature.

Age

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Gender Despite the different proport ion of male and female answering this survey, if we take all the countries together, we get a fair representat ion of boys and girls.

Gender

3.2 Have students learnt from the Comenius project?

One of the main object ives of our Comenius project obviously was to give students knowledge about Europe and the Comenius part icipat ing countries. In this graphic we can see students’ selfpercept ion of having learnt new things. Results are fair since most of them declare that they have learnt quite a lot or a great deal (values 4 and 5), especially in the case of Estonia (80.5%), Hungary (94.7%) and Italy (93.4%). Values are also positive in the case of Spain (57.8%), Portugal (59.3%) and Poland (47.3%) although there are a significant percentage of students who think they have learnt some (value 3). In any case, the percentage of students who declare they have learnt little or nothing is very low.

Have students learnt from the Comenius project?

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3.3 Have students “broken stereotypes”?

The essence of our Comenius project was to discover the clichés about each Comenius country and show students (and also teachers and families) that reality often differs from these stereotypes and that societ ies are much more complex than just a few preconceived ideas.

We developed this project in order to allow students to meet each other, to travel to other countries, to live with local communities, to learn about different cultures and to work at the schools and this way they can achieve this goal. That is why asking students if they have “broken stereotypes” seems completely necessary to know if we have succeeded.

A very low number of students declare that they have broken very few or few stereotypes in all countries.

The results show two different patterns. On one hand Hungarian and Italian students think they have broken quite a lot (value 4) or a lot of stereotypes (value 5) (89.3% and 93.4% of answers respect ively), on the other hand, most Estonian, Polish, Portuguese and Spanish students think they have broken some or quite a lot of stereotypes (85.3%, 73.2%, 77.8% 64.1% each).

Have students “broken stereotypes�?

In which aspects?

Students were asked to mark the three fields where they consider they have broken more stereotypes. Even if the answers are quite spread, it is possible to highlight three aspects: Culture & Society, Food and Geography. There is an explanat ion for this. These ones were the main topics we worked on through the different mobilities, after the results of the Init ial Survey.

Hungarian students stand out from the others considering Immigrat ion to be one of the main topics where they have broken stereotypes. This issue was dealt with during the Estonian mobility, and according to Hungarian teachers, it is a very sensitive topic in their country.

Random distribut ion of the other categories must be attributed to the different reality of each high school and also to the local teams of teachers that considerably vary in number and field of knowledge from one country to the other.

In which aspects?

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3.4 Have students improved their English skills thanks to the Comenius project?

Students were asked about their self-percept ion of having improved their English skills due to the Comenius. Answers are very positive, especially in the case of Estonia, Hungary and Italy, where more than 80% of students think they have improved quite a lot (value 4) or a lot (value 5).

Spanish and Portuguese students show lower opt imist ic percentages (around 60% of values 4 and 5). Polish students were even more sceptical, producing a lower percentage of posit ive answers. Value 3 (slightly) is dominant with more than 40% of the answers.

Have students improved their English skills thanks to the Comenius project?

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3.2 Knowledge about the other Comenius countries.

ESTONIA In November 2011, Estonian students declared that they had low-medium knowledge about every country, with the only except ion of Italy, which appeared to be more popular among them.

Hungary was the least well-known country. There were no students saying they knew very well any country and were no blank answers either.

Estonian students’ general knowledge of the Comenius countries, November 2011

In May 2013, Estonian students' knowledge about each country has remarkably grown; a lot of them have chosen value 4. They claim that they know about Spain the most, which is followed by Portugal, Italy, Hungary and finally Poland Estonian students general knowledge of the Comenius countries, May 2013 11

HUNGARY In November 2011 the prevailing answer of Hungarian students to this quest ion was 2 (around 40%), that is “little knowledge” of all countries. Estonia was the least known country (77% said they knew nothing).

Only Italy and Portugal got a better result with 26% and 24% of students who declared that they had a medium knowledge of these Mediterranean countries.

Hungarian students’ general knowledge about the Comenius countries, November 2011

In May 2013, the bar chart of the Hungarian students has totally changed. Their former knowledge with value 1 and 2 has dramat ically increased (value 4 and 5). This change is the most extreme in the case of Estonia. 68 % of the Hungarian students say that they know this country well or very well. Spain has got the best value, on the second place there is Italy followed by Portugal.

Hungarian students’ general knowledge about the Comenius countries,May 2013

ITALY In November 2011, the most well known country for Italian students was Spain. 56% of students said that they had a medium or quite advanced knowledge of the country. Portugal ranked second, with more spread results. However, Poland, Hungary and Estonia were absolutely unfamiliar to them.

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Italian students’ general knowledge about the Comenius countries, November 2011

In May 2013, Italian students also show significant change. This t ime only 1.6 %-1.6% say that their knowledge about Estonia and Hungary is minimal. Spain has remained the most well known country. About Hungary, however, 77% say that they know a lot or very much. The results are approximately similar in the case of Estonia and Poland.

Italian students’ general knowledge about the Comenius countries, May 2013 13

POLAND A remarkably high, 94% of Polish students declared in November 2011 that they knew nothing about Estonia nor about Hungary (75% ), even being a neighbouring country. However, 55% said that they had a medium or quite advanced knowledge about Italy. The answers were mixed in the case of Portugal and Spain, having significant groups of students giving values 1 to 4, although Portugal got better results.

Polish students’ general knowledge about the Comenius countries, November 2011

In May 2013, Polish students have moved towards the average and medium knowledge, which is especially significant in the case of Estonia and Hungary (44.6 % and 41.1% say that their knowledge is average). They know Italy the best, however, the two other Mediterranean countries follow it closely. Nevertheless, when compared to other nat ionalities, Polish students show the lowest knowledge of the other countries after the project.

Polish students’ general knowledge about the Comenius countries, May 2013

PORTUGAL According to the results, in November 2011 Portuguese students knew Spain best. 63% of them said that they had a quite or very advanced knowledge of their neighbouring country. Italy was also considerably popular among them. They also showed more knowledge about the other countries than the students of the other high schools, together with the Estonians.

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Portuguese students’ general knowledge about the Comenius countries, November 2011

Portuguese students know Spain and Italy the best henceforward. Their knowledge about Hungary (about three t imes more), Estonia (about five t imes more) and Poland (twice more) has become average or good compared to the survey carried out in 2011.

Portuguese students’ general knowledge about the Comenius countries, May 2013 15

SPAIN An overwhelming majority of Spanish students declared that they knew nothing or little about Estonia (95%) and Hungary (92%) in November 2011. Poland got 79% of similar responses.

However, it seemed that they felt closer to neighbouring countries, so 55% of students claimed they knew quite a lot or a lot about Italy. The distribut ion of answers in the case of Portugal probably was exaggerated. 96% of Spanish students said that they knew quite a lot or a lot about Portugal.

Spanish students’ general knowledge about the Comenius countries, November 2011

In May 2013, Spanish results show a more balanced, equalized picture compared to 2011. The most significant change has happened in the case of Poland. 50% of the students say that their knowledge about Poland is good or very good. In the case of Estonia, the results have moved from value 1 to value 2 and 3. Their knowledge about Italy is average, while Portugal is known well.

16 Spanish students’ general knowledge about the Comenius countries, May 2013

QUANTITATIVE AND QUALITATIVE QUESTIONS I 3.6 Trending Topics The aim of the qualitat ive quest ions was to find out more about the image that students have about other Comenius countries. They were asked to say the first three words they associate with Estonia, Hungary, Italy, Poland, Portugal and Spain.

November 2011 In November 2011, the results showed that students were very familiar to clichés about the other countries.

This is a summary of the answers they gave at that t ime: First of all, there is a great change ignorance about the other countries. Most of the students of every country just gave a single answer or none at all, especially in the case of Estonia, Hungary and Poland. However, they showed a little more knowledge of Spain and Italy, which received the highest number of quotat ions.

Most of them gave answers related to geographical or meteorological facts, such as “cold” in the case of Estonia and Poland, or “hot” and “beach” for Portugal and “hot” and “Costa del Sol” for Spain. “Danube” is a cliché for Hungary, as “fields” is for Poland.

The capital cit ies of each country were frequently quoted.

The cliché monuments of Barcelona (Sagrada Familia) or Rome (Coliseum) are also quite known.

Some well-known sports such as football were very well represented in the trending topics.

Teams such as “Real Madrid”, “Sport ing de Lisboa” or “FC Barcelona” showed to be relat ively popular among students. Poland 2011 “championship” was also ment ioned. The same happened to a world famous football player, the Portuguese “Ronaldo”.

Food references were also often ment ioned. In fact “pizza” and “pasta” are the winner trending topics by far. “Paprika” for Hungary, “paella” for Spain or “apples” for Poland were relat ively popular among students.

Some famous notable people such as Woyjtyla were named for Poland.

Spain is st ill most known for “bull fighting”, even if the corrida has been banned in two autonomous communities.

Estonia seemed to be the least known country. Quotat ions for this country often referred to “cold weather”, “north” and “fish”.

May 2013 In comparison with the first survey carried out in November 2011, we can notice a great leap concerning the great variety of the answers given, especially in the case of Estonia, Poland and Hungary.

We can read mainly such words which are in connect ion with the locat ions, the sights, the museums, the meals and the neighbouring settlements of the mobilities.

For example in the case of Estonia the following words are the most often ment ioned ones: Tallinn, the TV tower, Jagala waterfall, Kama, Kumu.

As regards Hungary, the following words are ment ioned: Budapest, Győr, the Danube,

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Pannonhalma, goulash soup.

In the case of Italy, students write mostly these words: Soverato, Calabria, bronze statues, archeology and the name of the Italian school.

About Poland students do not have personal experiences so they give similar words to the former survey such as Warsaw, beer, apple, however, it is pleasing that a lot of students have learnt the name of Brzesko in addit ion to Krakow.

The leading words concerning Portugal are Porto wine, cod fish and its Portuguese name Bacalhao, Azulejo and Maia.

At Spain we can read paella, dragon, Barcelona, Castellers, Gaudi, tapas, fiesta and St Jordi's Day. Words which describe the characterist ic features and temperament of the inhabitants of the given countries have also come into the limelight, for example at Estonia polite, at Hungary friendly and good people, at Italy extrovert, at Poland friendly, hard-working, kind and shy, at Spain hospitality and friendship.

A lot of words connected with geography and weather appear again, such as cold, the Balt ic sea at Estonia, the Danube at Hungary, cold, Krakow, Warsaw at Poland, warm, Lisboa at Portugal, sea, Madrid at Spain, Rome, warm and sea at Italy.

As regards the food, pizza is st ill on the first place at Italy, at Hungary goulash and paprika, at Spain paella, at Portugal fish, at Poland apple. However, it is pleasing that some local specialit ies have also appeared such as the Estonian kama, the Spanish tapas and the Portuguese bacalhao.

Fortunately, some stereotypes have disappeared such as bullfight at Spain, snow, trucks and fields at Poland, the Estonian Santa Claus. In the case of Portugal instead of the sea the Atlant ic Ocean has appeared. At Hungary the expression wide fields has also disappeared. The same has happened to Italy with football and the Colosseum.

The biggest difference can be felt in the case of the most often mentioned words. At Estonia besides Tallinn and cold we can find Modern Technology, forest, TV Tower. At Hungary besides Budapest, the Danube, goulash, there are some other words such as friendship, Győr, good people. At Italy besides pizza we can read Soverato, archeology, the name of the school, monuments. At Poland Brzesko, friendship and nice people have also appeared, however, religion is st ill the most central element. At Portugal Porto wine has taken over the lead from football besides fish, Lisboa and the Atlant ic Ocean. Hungarian students have also ment ioned Fat ima because they organized a pilgrimage there during the Portuguese mobility. At Spain dragon has taken over the place of bullfight and football is also pushed into the background. Instead of Sagrada Familia they ment ion the name of its architect, Gaudi. Moreover, hospitality and friendship are extremely frequent words.

The graphics have been created following the absolute number of answers for each item. Only the words with more than 3 citat ions have been included.

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BREAKING STEREOTYPES TRENDING TOPICS MAY 2013 These are the trending topics of ESTONIA about: HUNGARY

Friendly Budapest Pannonhalma

Győr

Danube

Paprika

Tradit ional garment Wine

ITALY

Pizza

Pasta

Wine

Soverato/Calabria

Warm

Rome Pisa Ferrari

POLAND

Warsaw Nice people religion

hardworking people Chopin

Apples Polish language

PORTUGAL

Maia

Porto

Porto Wine Warm

Football Explorers Atlantic Ocean SPAIN

Hospitality Paella Barcelona Gaudi Madrid

Music

Warm

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These are the trending topics of HUNGARY about: ESTONIA

Forest

Rain

Kama cold

TV Tower Modern

technology Kumu Museum ITALY

Happiness Terracotta

Palm trees statues

Stromboli

Bronze

Pizza

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Archeology POLAND

Beer

Kindness 21

Folk dance Catholic

Shy

Polite

Friends

PORTUGAL

Fish Fatima Football

Codfish Azuleijos Palm trees

Casa da Musica

Douro

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SPAIN

Castellers Gaudi Tapas Sant Jordi’s day Fiesta Emotion

Dragons Sea Friendly

These are the trending topics of ITALY about: 23

ESTONIA

Cold Jägala waterfall Kama

Forest

HUNGARY

Friendship

Exchange

Good food

Paprika

Goulash

POLAND Cold

PORTUGAL

Porto wine Cockerel

Douro

Soup

Football

SPAIN Beaches

Friendship Paella

These are the trending topics of POLAND about: ESTONIA

cold weather tall people fish

wifi shy

Tallinn tv tower

HUNGARY

Budapest spicy food brotherhood

Paprika

parliament Warm summer

Tokaj

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ITALY

Rome

Pizza

Pasta

Friendly Ferrari

Football

Monuments

Wine

PORTUGAL

Football Ocean Porto

Lisbon

Bacalhau

Porto wine Nice people SPAIN

Football Barcelona Gaudi

Good food

Corrida Ocean

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Castellers Warm

Friendly

These are the trending topics of PORTUGAL about: ESTONIA

TV Tower Sagadi Manor Sea Museum

Tallinn Kolu Tavern Open air Museum

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HUNGARY

Budapest Győr

Buda castle

Paprika

House of Parliament

Danube 27

ITALY

Tropea

Borgia

Istituto Malafarina

Soverato

Bronzi di Riace

Reggio di Calabria

Pizza

POLAND

BrzeskoWarsaw Apple Pierogi

Pope

Football

SPAIN

Barcelona Madrid INS Mercè Rodoreda El Corte Inglés

Paella Football Gaudí

These are the trending topics of SPAIN about: ESTONIA

Landscapes

Polite Beautiful country Blond hair Baltic sea 28

Cold Tallinn HUNGARY

Budapest

Fun Győr Good people Danube

House of Parliament

Good food

ITALY

Soverato

Pizza

Monuments Renaissance

Extroverted

Roma

Pasta POLAND

Friendly

Concentration camps

Marie Curie

Warsaw Vodka Krakow

Continental

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PORTUGAL

Polite

Mourinho Atlantic Ocean

Lisbon

Codfish

Porto

Ronaldo

CONCLUSIONS These were the conclusions in February 2012, when the Init ial Survey was published: One of the aims of our “Breaking Stereotypes” Comenius Partnership was to carry out a huge survey in all part icipant high schools to find out relevant informat ion about two facts: - The current knowledge of our students about their Comenius neighbours.

- The general sociological percept ion of the other societ ies, including clichés and stereotypes The purpose was to detect which aspects are more important to be developed if we want our students to effect ively “break the stereotypes” which exist when they think of other countries in Europe. The other aim was to bring our societies together through common knowledge and cultural exchange.

Now that the survey has just finished and the results have been gathered and analysed, there are some conclusions that may be drawn: The survey has allowed us to discover many interest ing facts about the knowledge of the Comenius part icipat ing countries.

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Geographical quest ions show that there is quite good knowledge about the geographical facts of the Comenius countries. It would be good to work on some topics related to EU membership of our countries to assure a better understanding of what it means for our societ ies.

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Concerning the quant itat ive and qualitat ive quest ions, there is very little cultural and gastronomic knowledge about the other countries, especially Estonia, Hungary and Poland. The Southern countries are more popular. Reasons for this have not been analysed in this text and are to be discussed in the following mobilities. For this reason, an extra effort should be made to improve the perception of the first three countries as act ive nat ions of the EU.

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The Trending Topics quest ions show us that knowledge about the other societ ies is very basic and related to Mass Media facts. We must develop act ivities and exercises to generate more and deeper knowledge about our complex societ ies in order to overcome prejudices and clichés.

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Considering political issues, percept ion becomes more economical. Even if there is a scarce knowledge about what is happening in each country, there is one word and this is “Crisis”. Maybe we should work on this issue to explain our students how it affects our life and what we can do to overcome it.

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Cultural knowledge about the Comenius societ ies is extremely low, even if the students assume they know a little, which is likely otherwise. But when they are asked to name two specific facts, most of them cannot answer.

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After the results, social characterizat ion of the other countries is frequently based on vague clichés, coming from Mass Media or assumed historical perceptions. Once again, our rich societ ies deserve a better cultural and social knowledge by all, so we should work on this to change the percept ion of our students.

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CONCLUSIONS MAY 2013 At the end of a varied and complex project and cooperat ion we can say that according to the analised results we have done a successful work.

As the students declare, they learnt a lot during the project, they were able to get rid of several stereotypes especially on three fields: Culture and Society, Food and Geography. They ment ion those areas which we dealt with and on which we laid stress on during the two-year work.

The language of the project was English about which most of the students reported significant improvement. This was partly due to the variety of the presentat ions they had to make and also the communicat ion during the mobilities.

The charts which show the obtained knowledge of each country in 2013 give a different picture from the 2011 ones. There is a big change in knowledge from the very little towards the average, the good and the excellent. The three Mediterranean countries were more known for almost all students in the first survey, but our main aim was to convey deeper knowledge to them about Estonia, Hungary and Poland, too.

The success of our work is shown not only by these charts, but the words listed in the trending topics, as well. During the two years the students received a completely new and real picture about the countries they visited instead of the picture suggested by the mass media. The venues of the mobilit ies got closer to them and besides the capital cit ies they could get to know other cit ies, towns and regions, as well.

31 In conclusion, we can claim that during the two-year-old cooperat ion, which was unclouded and friendly, the students received and acquire such valuable knowledge which hardly could be obtained in the framework of school. Therefore, we are grateful to the European Union for the opportunity and the support.