Coordinator: AGIS – Associazione Generale Italiana dello Spettaccolo (IT)
Partners: Vizo Institute (SI), IULM University (IT), County Museum Dundalk (IE), International Short Film Festival »In the Palace« (BO) in Romanian Film Promotion APFR (RO)
Project duration: 1. 9. 2017–1. 9. 2018

High School History Classes are to Become More Interactive Due to a New Cinema Education Program – TEHC.

Teaching European History through Cinema (TEHC) represents a new educational program which is in school year 2017/2018 implemented in 5 European countries – Italy, Ireland, Romania, Bulgaria and Slovenia. The project aims at increasing the popularity of European film among high school students and at the same time at bringing a considerable contribution to improving the quality of history classes and deepening the understanding of important historical events for Europe, through cinema.

This is the first film education project that focuses on a particular subject from the school curriculum (history) and proposes the use of fiction to deepen it, alongside cultivating cinema education. Another distinguishing element of TEHC is the pedagogical approach used: the project is not based only on the transmission of information, but also on the development of the practical skills necessary on the long-term for students, skills that will enable them to grow into active and informed citizens.

A comprehensive catalogue of European films focusing on Europe’s history – revolutions, wars, migration, social movements, important figures, cultural trends etc. is being developed within the program. The catalogue includes both recent productions and heritage films.

The new cinema education program, which will be accessible to high school students in Slovenia, focuses a lot on practical activities. Thus, movies will be teaching tools not only just to exemplify certain historical moments, but they will be also a starting point for creating other audio-visual materials: video essays.

In the spring of 2018, an online contest will be launched to challenge students from all the 5 participating countries to make a video-essay. Audio-visual materials created by them will be uploaded to an online platform where they will be voted. At the end of the program, on the basis of the votes and jury evaluation, a finalist video-essay from each state will be chosen, and then the big winner.

The main objectives of TEHC are to reach, in each of the countries involved, at least two high school classes, of about 20 high schools, involving 40 teachers and 1,000 students in the process.

Conatct: rok.govednik@vizo.si ali dasa.lozar@vizo.si.
Photos: Gimnazija Murska Sobota, Srednja vzgojiteljska šola in gimnazija Ljubljana, GEPŠ Piran.