Abstract:

CultureShake uses Shakespeare’s plays to bring multilingual teaching into the classroom of the 21st century. This three-year research and development project aims to combine the latest findings in multilingual didactics and intercultural communication in order to integrate students from different cultural and linguistic backgrounds, including refugee children. The project is funded through Erasmus Plus and runs until October 2019 (wwwcultureshake.eu).

The fundamental goal of the project “CultureShake” (CUSHA) is to develop intellectual outputs for intercultural communication in multilingual educational settings as an open access online resource. The topics integration of refugees, inclusion and ICT – new digital competences are dealt with reaching these goals in the intellectual outputs. In the strategic framework for European cooperation in education “ET 2020” linguistic competence is seen as one of the key competences to promote mobility within Europe. There is a lack of teaching material bridging the gap between theory and practice in the field of linguistic and cultural diversity. Latest theories of intercultural learning or transcultural approaches have not been considered for teaching in schools yet. Therefore CUSHA is innovative in bridging gaps between theory and practice as well as joining multilingual didactics in the teaching material that is to be designed as open source material online. Concepts for the development of peer teaching material, multilingual cultural sensitive school exchanges, multilingual online dictionaries or multilingual theatre methods are designed and in a next step also hands on activities for the classroom based on these concepts are provided.

CUSHA’s objectives:
• promote foreign language learning, cultural awareness
• promote multilingualism and the use of mother tongues
• enhance digital learning
• develop the European dimension in education particularly through the multilingual focus
• use the transnational expertise of the project members
• encourage the best use of results, innovative products and processes
• produce sustainable development of cooperation between the partner countries and institutions in the field of education

The project is to develop innovative teaching methods based on cultural theories, theatre pedagogy and multilingual didactics. Approaches socializing into a national culture frame are to be shaken. Shakespeare’s “Midsummer Night’s Dream” and “The Tempest” are chosen as the key tool in the project. Shakespeare not only touches different aspects of intercultural contexts but also enriches an understanding of literature and performance. Multilingual approaches in the classroom match Shakespeare’s multilingual settings. To accomplish this there are four institutions involved with complementing expertise and background. The University of Education Karlsruhe (PH), Germany, as coordinator contributes with theoretical background. The Shakespeare Birthplace Trust (SBT) at Stratford, U.K., as culture centre applying culture to everyday life builds as institution a bridge between theory and practice. Primorska University (UP), Slovenia, provides IT expertise. The two schools, i.e. the Friedrich-Wöhler Gymnasium (FWG), Germany, and the English School Gothenburg (ESG), Sweden, support the project with their practical experiences.

Keywords:

Erasmus+, cultural sensitive education, refugees, digitalisation, inclusion, hybrid cultures.