WHAT'S THAT BUZZ

DESCRIPTION OF THE PROJECT

"WHAT’S THAT BUZZ, TELL ME WHAT WAS HAPPENING" was a youth exchange that took place in Romania between 14-24 november 2022 with 43 participants from 8 countries: Bulgaria, Croatia, Greece, Italy, Latvia, Poland, Spain and Romania

The project took place in a context in which the media of all kinds is assaulted by fake news in order to produce panic, confusion, propaganda, misinformation, conflicts, attacks on person, discrimination etc

The aim of the project was to increase the degree of responsibility of young people in managing fake news

Methods used were diverse and some of them new for most of participants We had presentations, dialogue, we created posters and land art masterpieces, we had debates and simulations, we discovered how to spot fake news by CRAAP method and how to avoid cyberbullying, we improvised and play short stories to find solutions to our problems We shared our cultures, tasted our traditional products and danced our national dances Media creation, video creation and forum theater were main workshops that created a kind of campaign to stimulate responsibility and a respectful attitude in social networks and a better behaviour towards people around us and to promote diversity and understanding After 10 days most of us are taking back home some TOOLS that can be used in our daily life to aware the our colleagues, families, people from communities that they can be better and the world can be better without hate speech, fake news, cyberbullying

We’ll not change the world with this project, with our ideas, emotions and campaign we produced, but this is a brick in the wall of efforts that ERASMUS + beneficiaries created to open minds and enriching lives And this wall is not a barrier like other walls but is a TOOL for tolerance, respect, empathy and friendship And if you’ll hear in the future than at least one person is feeling better because they used something we spreaded, then our mission is accomplished Great thanks and big hugs to all that contributed to this project and to all that will spread the ideas that stand behind our future actions to help our communities: sending organizations, partners and stakeholders, friends

And above all we want to thank for warm welcome and kindness to our wonderful host “Casa cu Tei” from Sarata Monteoru

Casa Cu Tei, Sărata Monteoru

Tolea Postovei – project coordinator and facilitator

TEAM BUILDING

It's clear we were a strong team during the exchange and that happenedbecause of our involvement, respect and willing and cooperation. First days we had activities to train us to work in a team and have a good spirit.

car/driver drunked bottle

In pairs, blind one had a role of the car and the other one was a driver It was a good game which made people to interact and trust each other and also made us understood feelings of our visualy impaired colleague.

In groups with one person in the middle having the role of a stiff and drunked bottle and the others are trying to push it but not to break it

land art

We had to create art in the nature, the topic being, of course, fake news.We used nature for the materials, being very careful not to hurt it. The exhibition was very powerful, considering the fact that every team had to tell the story behind the piece of art.

The story of this piece starts with a rumour of tragedyeveryone has an opinion about the character that's buried in this picture. Some thinks he has overdosed the drugs, some thinks that the tragedy has happened After several versions turns that that the character is actually alive - his death was actually fake news Just look how far the rumours and fake news can lead us... (photo 1)

TV is one of the platforms where many of us finds, actually sees the fake news stories So this piece is a good reminder to remember - TV is not just a innocent way to spend our free time but actually one of the platforms to spread fake news (photo 2)

The story behind this piece is based on the idea - what happens if you are not a good, critical thinker. It can affect you really hard Group compares it with the falling in the gorge But if you get out of it and gain new knowledgeyou can help yourself to be safe and protect yourself from all the fake news threats. (photo 3)

land art

Wipey swipey is a swipe to get rid of all of the fake news. Influenced from the old days, when brunch swipes were used to clean up the mess, this swipe also cleans up all the fake information around us, it consists of brunches that symbolize critical thinkers and is secured by a wire that symbolizes their knowledge. (photo 4)

This masterpiece was combined of two partsfirst it was a fake news cover on the jar - full with dirt and lies But the group encourages to get rid of it and dig deeper - where you can find a jar of good things, qualities to become a critical thinker! (photo 5)

Idea behind this land art piece was to tell the story of magic Some people, who have no idea about the world of fake news, that exists right around us can be happy that there are good magician - they just have to use a little bit their

magic wand and knowledge about critical thinking and fake news comes to their mind. (photo 6)

A land art piece - woman, made by a team of smart and ambitious woman. It symbolizes the effect of fake news and media on woman, how the wrong ideas of "what woman has to

be" are portayed in the information space around us. It encourages to think - despite of this information, think critically - women are much more than that! (photo 7)

eggsercise

This creative workshop gained our skills in engineering and also our skills to work as a team! From all seven teams, there were 3 constructions created that helped an egg to land from the 5 meter high balcony and to remain safe

WHAT'S THAT BUZZ?

Everybody learns every moment of the day. One can learn in various ways like by talking to others or by listening, by searching for information, or by attending a workshop

Communication in foreign languages

Communication is the skill to understand and express ideas, facts, and feelings with people who think, talk, and act differently. During our project, we were active and talk and talk with each other, heard people talk, and therefore learned new words and expressions in another language An international project is for many people a wonderful occasion to practice or learn other languages. We spoke in all workshops in English, do a presentation, acted, play, and create a business plan in English

Communication in the mother tongue

Communication is the skill to understand and express ideas, facts, and feelings. During our project, we were very active with our language For instance, we talk with other colleagues and write things down. Sometimes also foreign participants asked something about words or expressions in your language and of course some dirty words!!

Digital competence

Digital competencies have to do with when you learn to handle the computer, how to make presentations, or how to work with new programs Think for example of filming and editing or using graphics programs for photos and text Here we can also think about things like learning how to improve our understanding of how a computer or a smartphone work or how to change settings

Sense of initiative and entrepreneurship

Everyone has ideas and thinks about the things that can be done in an exchange project. But are all these ideas being executed? Some people burst with ideas but wait too long, or don't know what to decide and in the end, nothing happens. Others have fewer ideas but they take action and start working They are motivated to reach a result and succeed

Social and civic competences

How do you behave with others? Can you cooperate? Do you ever do some-things for someone else or people in the neighbourhood? These are all things that have to do with this competence If you imagine social competences in an exchange project then you can think of how you handle people both in the preparation as well as when you are abroad. Do you follow the rules or agreements? Do you respect people or could you improve on that? Can you deal with criticism if people make comments bout you? Can you express your opinion or criticism in a good way to others?

Cultural awareness and expresion

Do you know what is typical of your culture? The competence of' cultural awareness and expression has to do with the way we appreciate our own and other cultures in your town n your region, your country, Europe, and the whole world. It also has to do with how we can express our emotions, experiences, and feelings in a creative way thou media or art forms

WORKSHOP no.1

Media literacy & critical thinking

Are we surrounded by lies?!

Breaking news!

TELL ME WHAT WAS HAPPENING?

During this activity we found out more about cases of fake news spread in different countries from this project. Although the cases were different there was something in common in all of them - the invisible power of fake news that affects our society.

Case of Greece: Turkey is invading Greece, again. Because of the long history with Turkey, it is an easy spreadable fake new in Greece but the chaos and fear it may cause in Greece is a serious issue! Here also was important to think critical!

Case of Croatia: Rumour about football player's affair with a president. This case showed us how important it is to check the information before spreading it further because bad rumours might seriously affect others lives.

Case of Romania: War in Ukraine affects Romania!

It is an easy concept how to manipulate people and make them chaos because of the fear. This case helped us to understand how important it is to trust only credible news sources to prevent each of us from unnecessary stress.

Case of Italy: Is pizza invented in Romania?

Fun case abut the misunderstandings about the invention of pizza actually makes us to think - check your facts before sharing information with others!

Case of Bulgaria: Alien has been found!

Case seems funny but actually it teaches us how important is to educate people about critical thinking that would've helped to prevent this kind of information from spreading.

Case of Spain: Marijuana doesn't kill people!

This case made us think twice before believing in untrustworthy sources because trusting them can affect our health and life.

Case of Latvia: Fake news about hate on Russians.

This case showed the power of propoganda and also the fact how easy is to spread hate speach altough the real situation in Latvia is far from this.

Case of Poland: Drinking spirits can help you to protect yourself from infection with Covid.

This sketch showed us how important actually is to read information only on credible information sources and trust only experts!

The workshop that was based on "world cafe" principle was an interactive tool to explore the world of fake news and possibilities to recognize and prevent them.

This "cafe" got four tables, in total for sessions where we had to switch from table to table to discuss the ways how to prevent fake news, what is the impact of them, solutions and causes of fake news spreading.

In order to make conclusions about the knowledge gained during this workshop, we asked the moderators to give an insight of their highlights:

WHAT ARE CAUSES AND EFFECTS OF FAKE NEWS

Lena: At my table we were discussing the causes of fake news spread. For me the most interesting seemed the fact that at the moment when I tought that everything was already discussed, new participants switched and they had completely different ideas. We proposed two cases of how fake news creation could be caused and also several bullet points of causes - I would like to point out the idea of someone willing to be accepted because that is a serious concept people rarely thinks about while discussing about the causes of fake news creation

Karlo: At my table we discussed who is acctualy responsible for fighting and preventing fake news. Some of the answers were repeated in each group, but i was suprised to hear that reasons why they had chosen them as answers were complitely different. There was a high level of self-awareness in each of them and i can tell that from their answers.

Macijek: At my table we were discussing the ways how to prevent fake news. The most popular ideas of preventing them were based on improving the education system to raise awareness about fake news and also to use punishment systems to make people think twice before spreading fake news.

Eleana: At my table we discussed the impact of fake news on our society I also would like to pint out the fact that every group had a different views and opinions on the impacts it can make. I liked the one that might seem like a joke but actually is disinformation - the fact that because of advertising many people thinks that purple cows exist.

HOW WE SPREAD FAKE NEWS

GETBADNEWS was an interesting and new tool for us to understand how easy is to create and spread fake news.

During the activity of exploring this website we could try ourselves in the skin of a fake news creator. In this website you can see how to make up news to polarize society, introduce consipiracy theories etc and also how to spread the information, for example by creating fake news websites, fake accounts in social media

By doing those activities we could watch how the page introduces with the follower numbers that you can gain by implementing your activities as a fake news creator. From all of us, the biggest number of followers was gained by Bubu - more than 21 000 fake news followers. And also it makes us think, how easy it is to disinform people and mislead them. This is why media literacy nowadays is so important for each of us!

HOW TO SPOT FAKE NEWS

In this workshop, we first learn about the CRAAP method and how to use it in our lives and spot fake news. Even if this information is from a trusted platform you need to check or think logically is it really possible?

Some teams made posters, some made theatrical performances. In this, we could learn how easy is to make fake news even from real trustful news Also, it was very fun, and interesting because we all did a very good job and between all of us some people are born to be actors After some examples like videos, we split into groups Each team got a different topic like a war in Ukraine, COVID-19 vaccines, 5G towers, etc. We had time in groups to explore our topics and prepare for any kind of presentation.

FAKE NEWS AND POLITICAL CORRECTNESS

The topic we worked about was "political correctness". To make the debate more dynamic and organised our facilitator created three different parts in the common room: agree, neutral and disagree.

First motion was "is it political correct" to show a prince kissing a Snow White in cartoon. We debated a lot on this first question, there were different opinions, ones rather enjoying the moment from the outside perspective and others were so passionate to say out loud out they point of view.

The second motion was "it's political correct to do a referendum?" The people on agree, said it's so important to do a referendum to listen to all of the people to do the rules, and the disagree said better not to do a referendum because some people might get hurt.

The last one was surprising for us: "What it is more useful to give a girl, a rose or a cauliflower?" They were a lot of different opinions about this topic: the rose is useful to "win a girl"; getting rid of the stereotype that man gives a woman a rose; you can cook a cauliflower as relationship builder.

FROM FAKE NEWS TO

CYBERBULLYING

To learn more about cyberbullying, all of our groups received a case description - on real events based situations that showed us the harm that cyberbullying may cause. By creating a theatre sketch, we made an insight in specific situation and proposed the best possible solution for it.

Case: leakage of drunk person's pictures on the internet.

After party where the main character had been consumed too much of alcohol, pictures with his painted face can be found through the internet.

Solution - when this person asks, offer your support and have a chat if he's worried about this situation.

Case: leakage of women couple's sex tape. Someone has leaked in the internet sex tape of a women couple, worth to mention that one of them was married, with kids.

Solution - employer and both women are supportive to each other in this situation, also changing the environment where they live might help.

Case: bullied student in school stabs his offenders.

Radu, a new student in his class is offended by some bullies in his school, one day, when he has enough of offence, he stabs his offender.

Solution - inform teacher, school principal as soon as possible to prevent this situation.

Case: students leak innapropriate videos of their teacher in schools e-mail.

Solution - principal should not blame the teacher for students wrong decisions but to be understandable between the harmed teacher and have a serious conversation with students to prevent this kind of situations to happen again and also to educate about respect to teacher.

Case: intimate pictures of a lady leaked on internet.

Because of an intimate pictures leakage on internet, lady loses her job.

Solution - employer could be more empathic and focus forgivable about persons past if it has nothing to do with job responsibilities.

Case: young dancer with dream about professional dancing has been human trafficked to strip club.

Solution - check twice on your employer, how trustworthy they are before leaving to another country, it might be a trap.

Case: a friend of a guy tells to his girlfriend innapropriate messages that leads to their brake up.

Solution - communication is the key, in this case angry person hit his friend because of the unlucky joke. If they would've discussed it before and after, it would help them to get out with unnecessary aggression.

Case: Turkish guy has been bullied and called an immigrant, he almost kills himself.

Solution - bullies should think twice before making silly jokes, what might seem just an innocent joke to someone, could be a serious emotional harm for others, also if you notice that your friend has been emotionally harmed by cyberbullying, be a good friend, support them!

BUZZ

Finally, we come to the main workshop of this project - "Buzz". Participants and group leaders were divided into two large groups, which were divided into smaller teams. Both groups had a unique task. In the first group, each team had to make a mini-film on a topic that had been talked about for almost a whole weekfake news and cyberbullying. While on the other hand, the teams from the second group had to design a forum theater. it is a type of theater in which, after the original story is presented, the play is performed again from the beginning, but with the intervention of the audience trying to find a solution to the problem that was originally performed. Here are some pictures with progress and short description of each masterpiece.

Story of BLUE

MEDIA CAMPAIGN

The few participants who volunteered for this team were tasked with putting together and designing posters to promote the campaign to stop fake news, create a brochure about the project, create memes about the project and finally create the magazine you are reading right now.

brochure about the youth exchange

memes based on fake news and critical thinking topics

posters made for project topic

official poster of the project

BUZZ IN BUZAU

In the morning all the group met in a nice hall where we evaluated all the work of last 3 days and then prepared for the show that took place in the atmosphere of a fair of projects developed in Buzau area by our host organization. Some of us met participants from other projects, we visited the exhibition and interacted with local students, yungsters and teachers

Our show was more than appreciated and some people became very interested in forum theater as a method. Then we had time to enjoy a bit the city and to do the final evaluation together with leaders for youthpass and individual in the google form that was provided Last evening came with the final "pizza party". We enjoyed pizza, denaced and got our certificated from our secret friends.

INTERCULTURAL NIGHTS

Italy

Spain Latvia Croatia

Poland Greece

Bulgaria Romania

TESTEMONIES

During the project I gained skills about fake news and media literacy that I didn't know anything about before. Also it's worth to mention that I learned a lot about leadership and connections between people, to be more kind and respectful, emphatic to others. One of my key takeaways is a knowledge how to work in a group. I enjoyed the people in this project who also showed me how to better understand different cultures.

Ana from Romania

From this project I really enjoyed the intercultural exchange because I learned a lot about other cultures, interesting was to gain knowledge about Latvia, the country I knew almost nothing about before, also about other countries, their traditional dances, food etc. From all the workshops I enjoyed the most the world cafe because I could express my opinion and listen to others, improve knowledge about fake news by learning from different situations and cases. It was a nice and professional approach for non-formal education. Also, during the project, I improved my English that was one of my main goals for this mobility. I loved the topic, meeting new people and not gonna lie – to have fun as well!

Alvaro from Spain

TESTEMONIES

During this project I improved my english by speaking every day to people from different places, also I learned about new cultures, even a few words in other languages. For me was interesting to gain organizational skills, because we worked in teams a lot, and this also helped me to be a better tram player. This is the best project I have been to, I loved and enjoyed all the workshops. I loved all the games and intercultural activities. Also I learned some fun things from other cultures that I'll teach my friends from Romania. I am just grateful for this experience.

Crina from Romania

I enjoyed the people in this project, I built new friendships with people from different nations. For me is important that I felt like I’m home, I didn't feel afraid, atmosphere was really good. I loved the theater playing by which I could show your passion, I had never done this kind of activity before. This project helped to find new talents in myself. Project also made me "stand on the ground", it helped to find reality, understand the world better and opened my mind.

Nour from Italy

TESTEMONIES

It as been great, I ve been meeting new, amazing people, learning new things about others around me. Workshops helped me to understand what fake news really are, also I found ideas to prevent them. Intercultural evenings have shown us so much about differences and similarities that people have, it was a great experience I’m looking forward to meeting every person thatI met here afterwards as well!

Tasos from Greece

I’ve learned a lot about other cultures, I liked to hear new music, new song, also I liked latvian traditional dances. I enjoyed working in groups, during this project I learned better how to manage my time. I really enjoyed world cafe because it involved a lot of discussion, but my favourite workshop was a land art, loved it. I liked meeting new people and seeing their different skills.

Jakov from Croatia

TESTEMONIES

I was happy to find out more about fake news, about ways to prevent them and also to spread this information to others. I’ll use tools that I’ve learned here to spread awareness and help others to think critically. Also I’ve learned a lot about different cultures, especially the host coutry –Romania – at first I didn’t know much about it but this project helped me to discover one amazing, beatiful and in culural means different country! Experience was great! Beate from Latvia

I liked everything abut this project except from debate because people started to argue about the Snow White case, I think it was too much since it’s for kids. It’s fun to talk with different people, to improve english, I was afraid because my english is not so good but now I’ve learned to speak better, people understand me and it’s the main thing. I’ve learned to work in a group, workshops helped me to get to understan people and their opinions. I liked intercultural evenings, I tried new things and flavours.

Natali from Bulgaria

TESTEMONIES

Even though we went to a small village in the middle of Romania I was literally amazed because of the mountanious landscapes and the fact that there are functioning oil mines around. I am definetely a person who enjoyes the nature and peaceful atmosphere the most but I still can point that people around are sharing their positive energy and making me comfortable within our community. Regarding the workshops my favourite one so far was a debates.

Michael from Latvia

I really enjoyed the fact that I got in touch with people from different cultures with different habits, I tried new flavours, also different food. One thing that’s important - I feel like I got in touch my inner self, I’m exploring myself by getting out of my comfort zone. Project workshps made us easier to understand topic and gain knowledge by doing everything in practice. About fake news, I think that there was nothing that I dodn’t know at all, but I would say that I improved my knowledge, for exapmle about the effect on other persons. Now I’m someone who can help others, escpecially victims of fake news to raise awareness. Mostly I enjoyed theater, it’s my favourite technique.

Lena from Greece

TESTEMONIES

In this project I met wonderful people from different cultures. I would like to point out that the energy is really good, people are really open minded here. Also Tolea is a great moderator and I'm sure he is in his real place here. From workshops I mostly enjoyed the theater playing that was something new for me.

Karolina from Poland

I got more comfortable with myself being in the spotlight, for example in theater. I improved my language by speaking english on a daily basis. I got to understand how easy it is to create fake news and now my critical thinking has improved, now I’ll be to able to debate about it with my friends. I explored my creativity for example with outside activities – land art. I’ve met many new friends, I larned about differences and things in common with all the project countries. I made an amazing connections with others and got to explore different kinds of having fun as well!

Natalia from Poland

‘This project has been funded with support from the European Commission. This publication [communication] reflects the views only of the author, and the Commission cannot be held responsible for any use which may be made of the information contained therein.’