On Wednesday 05. On July 2023, we organised the first meeting of the Consultative Group of the School of Renewal for New Generations project at the Ministry of Culture in Ljubljana. The meeting was attended by representatives of the Ministry of Culture, the Slovenian Centre for Vocational Education, the Faculty of Humanities at the University of Primorska, the Faculty of Education at the University of Ljubljana, the Faculty of Arts at the University of Ljubljana, the Institute for the Protection of Cultural Heritage of Slovenia, the Municipality of Škofja Loka, and the Association of Historic Towns of Slovenia.
The purpose of the Advisory Group is to monitor and guide the activities of the project Schools of Renewal for a New Generation, to provide suggestions, orientations and starting points, as well as the valuable experience of the members of the Advisory Group, in order to ensure that the new teaching practices envisaged as project content are designed and adopted as successfully as possible in the learning environment of Slovenian primary schools.
At the meeting, the members of the advisory group were presented with the aims and objectives of the project, the project content and the conceptual design of the new teaching practice, which resulted in 18 lesson plans and new teaching approaches, which were implemented and tested during a lesson at the Ivan Grohar Primary School in Škofja Loka and an activity day at the Archaeological Park in Simon’s Bay in Izola. We invited the participants to contribute to the implementation of the planned content for autumn 2023, key among which are workshops for teachers and primary school headteachers and practitioners.
Members of the Advisory Group and representatives of the project partners gave a brief presentation of their role and activities in the field of cultural heritage and, through discussion, gave their views on the concept of the new teaching practice and the didactic tools planned.
Dr Irena Hergan from the Faculty of Education at the University of Ljubljana praised the content and implementation of the project, which addresses the right and necessary content in the primary school learning process. The Heritage Chest as a teaching aid/tool is well chosen because the handling of authentic materials is very important for the pupils, also as a calming technique, calming children is an important topic in the teaching process today, which is also possible with the help of cultural heritage (example: handling of semolina). She stressed the need to take into account didactic approaches that involve the senses but are usually not sufficiently taken into account in teaching, such as smell and touch. She pointed out that a major obstacle in teaching today is the ready-made teaching materials (textbooks, worksheets), which do not offer children the opportunity to express themselves creatively, even though they are the easiest way for teachers to teach. Children are observed to lack manual skills, so it is important to integrate manual work into teaching practice, which can have a very good impact on children as it influences brain development.
Dr Mateja Habinc from the Faculty of Arts, University of Ljubljana, stressed that the complexity of the content of the lessons should be adapted to the individual grades. It is important to adapt the content to what the pupils understand as cultural heritage and to present the years through values and in the context of micro heritage (what is my heritage ?), for younger children it is important to have a family level environment and content, and only for older children to include more broad and complex concepts and terminology.
The Dean of the Faculty of Humanities at the University of Primorska, Prof. Dr Irena Lazar, pointed out that young people usually perceive cultural heritage as synonymous with dusty museums.
The project coordinator at UP FHŠ, Dr Zrinka Mileusnić, explained that the new learning content is designed in a way that it is divided and adapted according to the triads, including didactic aids, including the so-called Heritage Chest.
Špela Spanžel, Director General of the Directorate for Cultural Heritage of the Ministry of Culture, named the Senzorium institute as an example of good practice, which integrates the senses into programmes in the field of intangible heritage, museum discovery and education.
Nataša Ülen, project coordinator at ZVKDS, pointed out that the Norwegian learning system, in contrast to the Slovenian primary education system, benefits greatly from learning outside the classroom, fieldwork, practical learning experiences and learning in nature.
The meeting concluded with an invitation to the members of the Advisory Group to participate in the implementation of the planned content for autumn 2023, among which the key ones are workshops for teachers and headteachers and practitioners of primary schools.