The Beit Project

Core features of the practice

• Organisation:

  
  Institution name: Beit Project Association
  Institution URL: thebeitproject.org
  

• Format:

  
  Workshop, Extra-mural site visit, Other
  

• Target population:

  
  Students, Young people, Educators in formal settings
  

• Cost (per practice):

  
  Free
  

• Setting:

  
  Your institution, Other institution, Designated extra-mural memorial or historical site
  

• Themes:

  
  Remembrance education and/or history education, Citizenship/democracy education, Racism, Human rights/discrimination, Critical thinking
  

• Core activities:

  
  Group work, Group discussion, Creative activity, Other
  

Additional information about the practice

Target population

• Number of participants:

  
  Up to 34
  

• Age of target population:

  
  11-15
  

• Additional specifics:

  
  Other:, Groups coming from very diverse contexts
  

Components of the practice

• Topics and objectives:

  
  The Beit Project aims at transforming heritage sites into educational platforms for dialogue and debate linking history and contemporary issues. The project was launched in Paris in 2011 working at first on urban heritage sites linked to local Jewish history. Since then it has widened its scope to revisit the memory of heritage sites in general. To date it has also been held in Barcelona, Roma, Brussels, Ixelles, Berlin, London, Lodz, Marseille, Sofia, Tangier and Skopje, Nice and soon Athens. We create an open school in the middle of the city, a nomadic school which converts urban spaces into profound learning places. The idea of bringing together young people from across a city who live in both different and similar worlds – be they from different religions, classes or cultures – is a particularly strong element of the project’s philosophy. The project’s focus is on encountering the city, the people in it, the buildings, the history, the issues it raises for us today and, by the way, of new friends. ‘Encountering the other’, is made possible through the various stages of the project. The students are encouraged to work through the values of autonomy and interdependency, freedom and responsibility, democracy and participation, as a complement to traditional curricula.
  

• Materials used:

  
  Written or other published material, The "nomadic classroom"
  

• Material produced:

  
  Written material, Audiovisual material
  

• Sequence of activities - methodology:

  
  The project gathers in the middle of urban heritage sites two groups from different schools with a maximum of 16 pupils. They have to build together a temporary site of study. This dynamic process which takes place during two full on-site days enables each group (half a class from each school) to develop skills linked to the fields of History, Geography, Civic education, Arts, Sciences and Technology. The building of their own “house of study” is the first shared activity of the two pupils who interact for the first time. It is a fundamental part of the pedagogical methodology as it engages a strong intimacy building process and encourages collaboration among pupils who had never met before. The dialogue initiated with the two pupils is followed by the engagement of the entire group and the contribution of people in the street during the process of the educational activities of the project. The dialogue inspires children and youth to listen to each other, understand and debate on different interpretations. It starts from the diversity of the students, enables them to accept each other and, eventually reach a common goal.
  

• Length of activity:

  
  More than 15 hours
  

• Is the activity digital?:

  
  Yes:
  

Accessibility and replicability

• Language(s) in which activity can be delivered:

  
  Bulgarian, English, French, German, Greek, Italian, Macedonian, Spanish, Other
  

• Is specialist knowledge or professional training required?:

  
  Yes
  

• If yes, which type?:

  
  Experience with public engagement, community work, or grassroots activism
  

Qualitative Details

• Has this practice been evaluated?

  
  Yes
  

How many times?:


10


• By whom?:

  
  Participants, Informal non-participant observer, Instructor delivering the practice, Internal evaluator, Formal external evaluator
  

• By what means?:

  
  Formal verbal feedback, Qualitative written feedback, Quantitative survey
  

• Core content knowledge and transferable skills:

  
  There are many skills that benefit participants, among them: - the capacity to discover and interpret urban space and its memory -the understanding that the "other", with whom I am doing this process, is not an obstacle but an asset, with its different perspective and understanding
  

• Indicators of success:

  
  Almost all participating schools and institutions repeat whenever it's possible, since 2011. We now address much more diverse publics ("target populations")
  

• Educational coordinator contact details:

  
  Name: David Stoleru
  Email address: davidstoleru@thebeitproject.org
  

Scalability

The RETHINK project is concerned with bridging formal and informal education. This section explores the factors that make a practice adaptable.

• Key factors for successful implementation:

  
  Subject expertise of presenter/instructor
  

• Main challenges to teachers adapting this practice for their students:

  
  Openness toward new educational settings
  

• Availability of guidance/training/replication materials (and in what language/format currently):

  
  We have created quite a lot of material in many languages, but training should be through personal workshops
  

• Other comments or details:

  
  Thank you for your interest and please contact us for any further questions!