From Classroom Activities to Student Participation
This event is part of the European Skills & VET Week 2026, an initiative of the European Commission organised by Cedefop.
Francesco Bruno from APRO Formazione during the Summer School in Athens at the beginning of october presented several practical examples illustrating how European citizenship education can become part of students' everyday school experience.
One example was “Foreign Friends”, a virtual cooperation activity involving APRO Formazione and KPEDU in Finland. Through English lessons, students introduced their schools and countries, exchanged information about their interests and traditions, and worked together on small international projects.
Other activities used playful learning to make European topics more accessible. These included a quiz helping students discover European mobility and participation opportunities, a Taboo-style game exploring the EU Green Deal, and simulations of EU decision-making processes.
Particular attention was given to activities connecting democratic education with real participation. At APRO Formazione, the project contributed to the introduction of elections for student representatives through universal suffrage. 334 students voted and four representatives were elected, creating opportunities to experience democratic procedures directly within the school environment.
Francesco also presented the school's Europe Day celebrations, which included student mobility testimonials, educational games and intercultural activities. Significantly, the celebrations continued after the project ended, illustrating how project activities can become established school practices.
The presentation was followed by a practical workshop in which EUCLASS participants explored educational games developed through Europeans of Tomorrow.
Working in international groups, teachers were encouraged to examine how existing activities could be adapted to their own educational contexts.
The exercise, based on the approach “Choose, Analyse, Adapt”, invited participants to select a practice, assess its strengths and limitations, and consider the changes needed to respond to the needs of their students.
An important message emerged from the EoT experience: successful EU education requires not only engaging activities but also adequate teacher preparation and long-term integration into school programmes.
Francesco shared both the positive aspects and the challenges identified by the project, providing useful lessons for EUCLASS Alliance as it develops and tests its own approaches to European citizenship education.