Learning experience of the participants of 'DigiYouth'
- Inga Vaickienė
- Sep 8, 2022
- 21 min read
Gyte Kapociute, Lithuania
This project was my first and still in english language.In my opinion, this project is a great experience. The first thing is because of the new things you learn, such as how to use different programs that you wouldn't normally be familiar with. It's cool to learn about new apps because they're useful for learning or doing a lot of work.
Get to know people from different countries. I think this is a good opportunity to find new friends or acquaintances in different countries. I think this is a good opportunity to broaden your horizons.
It was a great opportunity to learn more languages. I think this is a great seminar to expand my knowledge of languages, it helped me especially to expand my knowledge of English, to hear and learn words of other languages such as Turkish, Spanish and others.
I really liked teamwork with people from different countries. I think the work goes faster and more efficiently this way, so teamwork helps to communicate with people, at least to get to know them a little. And to learn more about various programs that were perhaps unknown to me in Lithuania.
in my opinion, I could have participated in such projects much earlier and now I can communicate perfectly in English. I think every young person should take advantage of such an opportunity as the Erasmus program, because this project provides new opportunities to improve basically everything, IT tools , foreign languages, see the most diverse countries and their cultures. I am very happy to have seen the culture of diverse people, learned new words, I am glad that I could participate in such a project and meet the most diverse people.
I am grateful for the new knowledge I gained during the week. I think this is a very useful project for me as a student. Because all the things we did here will be useful for learning on the job.
PABLO PÉREZ (INTERCAMBIA)
The first thing I can say about this course (Digital Youth) is that it has been one of the best experiences of my life, during this week in Vilnius I have learned things that I did not know in a dynamic and simple way.
The first day of the meeting was a bit silent, it is normal, since we were all complete strangers, but as the days went by I have been able to get to know everyone in some way, some more and others less.
During the days, the coexistence with everyone has been very fun, I have had good times in the hotel billiards with Mihai, Silviu, Samuel, Ema, Ela... I had a little outing with Cleo and Sully where we got to know each other better and were able to talk about many topics. We have gone out to have a snack with our Italian friends (Lisa, Asena, Sara) seeing the streets of Vilnius. We had an educational outing to learn more about the Vilnius organization and a very curious castle in the city. This week we have had session around 6 hours a day in which we have learned to use a series of applications that are focused andn communication or educational tools such as Canva or Q.
Also I practise my english which not was the best in the first day but now I feel that I have more skills in speaking.
I would repeat another project like this, maybe I don't have the time because next year I will work during summer but If I have the chance to do another I will join it.
My Erasmus experience in Lithuania has been a great opportunity for me.
I have been able to improve my english skills, practicing speaking and listening everyday. Knows many very useful digital tolls, like creation of music tolls, data college tolls… that will be me very useful.
I also have been enjoy of a cultural exchange and visit another country. Knowing a deferent cultures and points of view.
Also i learned how to create initiatives and projects of a international level, what things are necessary to do it, like financing, a good planification, how to organise a event, recruit volunteers…
One of the most useful things I have learned has been to improve my public speaking skills. Also i learned how to do group motivation and now I know how to do a good teamwork in projects with international partners.
I´m very happy with the methods and materials that they used for teaching us, its dids the time more soft and enjoyable.
My favorite part was the teamwork test, when we was trying to solve the problems that they pose with our different ideas was for my the best of the week.
I enjoyed all the experience of the beginning to the final, definitive i will recommend to other people.
During the contact making seminar in Lithuania, I learned a bunch of useful things that for sure I am going to use in my life and implement in the future projects. Let’s start from that it is Contact making seminar where we supposed to interact with each other and build network. Now at the end of the project I can conclude that I succeed with this goal. I met absolutely different people with various backgrounds and with some of them we became as a family. So diverse composition of participants gave all of us opportunity to know a lot about different cultures, country traditions and practices in various fields which itself gives a tremendous value to this project. Moreover, the seminar became an excellent platform for finding ideas and partners for the future projects either in youth or other fields.
Switching to the practical outcomes I would like to mention some ICT tools that I have became aware of during this project and find out them useful. There are: Strawpool, Jotform, Kahoot quiz, Mentimetr, Jamboard. It worse to mention that collection of this and other tools will be a part of tool kit that are going to be one of the outputs of the project which can be later used by the participants.
As for me the most important and the best part of the following project is the creation of our own project using Q!Mobility website. I think that this activity gave all participants amazing opportunity to try out how to create own projects, develop ideas and working in the team. For some of us it could be a good start in the creation of real projects.
Gabija, LITHUANIA
This week was full of activities, communication and learning. The whole project was based on sharing experiences.
During this week, firstly, we learned about each of us, our different cultures, how to work as a group, how to adapt to new places and people. We have to overstep our comfort zones and be able to work together as a group in a completely new environment.
Secondly, working together and sharing our different experiences, we delved deeper into ITC tools, learning how to apply them in different situations and projects. I have realized that involvement in such activities and trying them on my own helps us to assimilate information better.
Thirdly, this project helped us to know more about Erasmus+, its aims. How to write projects like this. We were able to try to write it and feel what is like.
Overall, this was a colorful week. I have gained a lot of experience, new ideas, and inspiration to not stop learning from people and not lose a path of growing as a person.
I arrived to Lithuania on the 1.9. 2022 after I took two trains, spent the night in Hungary and then took 2 flights to Vilnius. Even though the journey was not the easiest one, I was really happy and excited for the project and new people. I think that the first day everyone was tired, so the fact that I couldn't remember a single name was not surprising for me. I really liked to spend time with my Slovakia team however I enjoyed even more talking to people from other nationalities and learning some words from other languages. I have always LOVEd icebreaking activities and energisers and you did not disappoint me. I probably liked the most the activity with building tower, directing our own play and trying to find common things about us. I was always excited about who I am going to be in the group with and what are we going to do. I love to make the powerpoint presentations and I also like to edit videos so I was lucky i got to group about editing. I wish I enjoyed the other presentation more but unfortunately I was too mentally tired but i still got to know so many cool digital tools and I am starting to love Canva! For me alt he activities were perfect even though sometimes too long. After the week I feel in vilnius city almost like at home and I will miss all the concerts and artists very much. I will bring home some nice new playlist 😊. The Trakai castle was beautiful and I wish i would have had more time to look in the city also. I learned how to play Russian biliard and i am still amazed by the Into music webpage. All in all this week was very beneficial for me and i will be happy to include youth-pass in my CV one day.
Ema Horská-Slovakia
This week was really beneficial to me. The location of project - Lithuania was also perfect to me, because thanks to that I visited a new country. Capital city- Vilnius had a great impact on me. I really liked this city, full of amazing architecture and amazing nature. The topic of project was "digitization" what is really interesting to me. We learnt about some new programs for communication, design, cooperation and so on. Thanks to research we did in this area we learnt new things we can use in our daily life and it can make our life easier. We were discussing about ICT, of its history and usage. These debates were really intense and beneficial to me. Except that, we made a project in Canva, what was a great experience to me. But our project was not just about gaining skills, but also about getting new friends and learning different cultures. Thanks to "Cultural night" we met culture of different countries and tasted its cuisine. It was really tasty! But as I mentioned, I also met a lot new friends from Lithuania, Italy, Spain, Romania, France and Turkey. These people were really nice to me and learnt me interesting things about their country. I thinks thats the point of project- to connect people from other countries and to show them, that they are not so different, but they are so similiar in many ways. I am really glad that I could participate in this project, because gained skills I can use in my daily life and it will be also beneficial for my CV. Last, but not least, we also learnt, how to write a project Erasmus+. This part was the most interest thing to me, because I have always wantef to do something like this. We discussed how to choose the right partners, location, learning methods, finances ane of course- topic.This project showed me, that is really important to educate myself and spread knowledge further. I hope that I will meet these pople again on another project and we can learn something together again.
Natália Lehocká-Slovakia
We began our journey in Budapest Airport. At first, we flew to the Berlin and from Berlin, we continued to Vilinius. The first thing that surprised us was weather. We didn't expected to be that cold here. But it didn't matter because we were extremely happy to finally be here. After we arrived to the hotel we took a shower and then we took ashort nap, because we were tired from travelling. At the beginning, we did some ice breaking games and team building exercises. It was beneficial, because after that, it was easier for us to work together as a team, without any shyness. During the week, I gathered a lot of information about digital tools, which I will definitely use in the future in my daily life. The thing I haven't expected was, that I realise how different some topics seems when you get different points of view. I loved that we got the chance to visit historically important places in Lithuania and also that we met with local youth. I expanded my communication and teamwork skills. Also I got the chance to use English outside of classroom-in real life. I am a city lover and Vilnius will stay in my heart as one of the most beautiful place that I ever visited. I liked that it's not only picturesque but also it seems like a practical place to live and who knows, maybe I will move here in future. The overall experience was amazing. I learned a lot. I don't mean only in project itself, but also from people here, culture, journey and everyday situations. I hope I will return someday.
Bordin Lisa, Italy
I decided to take part in Digyouth project because I wanted to learn more about ICT tools and use them for my volunteering activities back in Italy. From the very beginning I enjoyed the positive atmosphere among all the participants and got great feelings from them. Unexpectedly, it has always been very easy not only to relate with all of them but also to work as a team with them, even with the youngsters. I enjoyed all the activities scheduled, even if sometimes I would have preferred to go more deep into the main topic.
For sure I gained digital competences and discovered several apps and tools that I will share to my volunteering colleagues. I had also the chance to improve my english language level and public speaking skill. I challenged my team working abilities and sometimes even my team leading skills. But for sure, the most challenging part was the one about project management.
I also enjoyed to have had free time to visit the city (which is lovely) and to interview the locals. Getting to know so many different people and sharing experiences with them empowered me with brand new strength, energy and inspiration to start new things.
My overall feelings from this project are pleasant. This has been first Erasmus+ project that I have taken part of. I decided to join this program because I wanted to learn more about the new possibilities in the IT world. This was a great opportunity to do just that. We discussed many ICT tools, made presentations and teaching others. I am already thinking of various ways I could use them in the future. I find it necessary to know many ICT tools to be modern and close to younger generations. Generation gap is one of the main problems people have to face and trying to get better at ICT tools is great way of closing this gap. Contact making seminar DigiYouth has taught me about different cultures, various ICT for several uses. I especially enjoyed the ones we used for daily evaluation they were easy to use, brief and elegant.
When it comes to the contact making part of the seminar I really enjoyed the different cultures that have gathered here. I have made a lot of friends and learned a lot about their culture. I hope to meet them again and to spend more time with them. (I think that it really helped that during the weekend we had the festival)
If I had to pinpoint one thing that I really liked it would be the study visit. As architecture student and fan of history it was truly enjoyed the visit. But more than the historic or architectural part of our visit I liked the program in the Širvintos youth centre. It was funny, relaxing and I have learned a lot about community work.
All in all, I have really enjoyed my stay here. I learned a lot about ICT tools and how and when to use them and I have to say that I will definitely miss Vilnius and Lithuania.
Samuel, Slovakia
My name is Roxana Ticuță and I am a volunteer from Romania. I participated in DigiYouth project for 7 days. During the project I have gained a lot of information about Erasmus projects and how to create a project. I participated in many international projects before, but have had no experience in writing a project so far. This experience impacted me so much that I would really like to try to implement my ideas, my thoughts, my dreams and my values in a project in my own country and to share everything that I have recently learned with other people.
Another important aspect about this project was that we developed our skills because we had the chance to improve our team working abilities, we developed our digital skills (we have used a lot of apps that I’ve never heard about), we communicated in a foreign language.
We had activities about formal, non formal and informal education which made us aware of the necessity of having all types of education in our lives.
I also liked the study visit which gave me the possibility to discover the socio - cultural background of Lithuanian people.
Ever since I received the positive answer that I had been accepted as a participant for this project, I felt the excitement of coming to Vilnius – Lithuania and get in touch with the cultural, social and historical experience this beautiful country has to offer. Driven by the desire of learning to write, implement and overall create a successful Erasmus + project, I was already thinking about ideas that I had and wonder if this seminar will help me achieve my purpose. Knowing that the association who implemented this project can offer a good learning opportunity, I came here with high expectations and I am not disappointed with the results. The experience I had here helped me learn and understand how important is communication between people, partners, participants and stakeholders in the preparation, implementation and evaluation of the project , as well as in exchanging ideas and experiences with the other participants.
Another part of this project that had a meaningful impact on me was the cultural visit in Trakai and Kernave because I learned more about the kings that lived here and overall the history of Lithuania in different times of the years. I especially liked the legend of how Vilnius city was created, involving a wolf, which is connected to other countries like Turkey and the Roman Empire.
As I mentioned in the last paragraph, communication is important, especially in this century where information is abundant and is traveling at lighning speed, making use of the ICT tools is must. Since I was born in the time where internet and Google were just a theory, I did not know which programs or applications are the best to use in different situations (communication, organisation of tasks, working in teams etc.). For this reason, I am grateful that I had the chance to be part of this project with participants from other countries and learn about their culture, history and language. Thank you for your hard work!
First of all Im so thankful for the way Serdan and Zivile took care of us during these 8 days.They are amazing people, all time smilling, laughing and ready to help us
when we struggle but also to motivate us. It was an experience from which I improved myself first professionally I can say, because
I learned how to use different tools according to my needs and how to search for information myself rather than just asking from somebody else, and personally, because
I had the chance to spend time with people from all over EU and to talk to them. Never in my life have I been so energetic in mornings and so tired at the end of the day but
thats just a statement of the work we did here as a group.From going in treasure hunting in Vilnius and seeing touristic or historic places, steady visit in
Sirvintos and Musninkai to activities in the youth center, I learned about the local people and about the identity of Lithuania which made it to be my
favourite country. Ive made friendships and connections with a few people that I know will last beyond this project
and eventually will bring us together in future ones. The food at the hotel was good, besides the mayonese-meat-fruit salad. The thing I liked the most was working in teams to achieve a common goal, but also the debates and discussions.
From the participant POV it was a great experience and cant wait to come back here in the future.
From my personal experience, it was a gift to come here and after activities , in our free time, to spend time with a few persons that love so much.
When I will come back to Romania I will tell my friends and family how this experience was and guide my friends, if I can, towards the same direction so they could
enjoy themselves these moments.
I dont have enough words to express my gratitude towards the people envolved, so hopefully its not a goodbye and rather a see you soon!
My name is Maria Cristea and I am a volunteer from Romania. In July I was announced by my teacher, Roxana Ticuta if I want to participate in a project in Lithuania in September which is named 'DigiYouth'. I accepted immediately and I was very happily to be part from this project. The duration of the project was from 1 September to 8 September and there were seven countries which participated: Lithuania, Romania, Slovakia, Turkey, Italy, France and Spanish. Now I am wanting to tell you what I discovered here. The Romanians arrived on 2 September at 1 o'clock a.m. On last Friday I knew each other people from different countries and we played some interactive games. After that, we had a treasure hunt. This activity was amazing because me and my team discovered a lot of new places which offered me the chance to notice the Lithuanian culture and history. On Saturday I discovered some ICT tools which are very useful when you work on a team. On Sunday we had a lot of activities and we talked about the digitalisation. I think the best day was on Monday when we went to the Trakai Castel, a historical monument which was built since 14 century. The island where is located the castel was amazing. After that we went to Karnave where we saw the 'highest' mountains of Lithuania. Around 2 o'clock p.m. we went to Sirvintos. There we played interesting games with the local people. On Tuesday we learnt about ICT tools. On Wednesday we had to write a project which gave me the chance to be more creative. At the final of this seminar, I can say that the project was wonderful, Vilnius is a historical place where I would like to come back. The local people are very interesting. I take into consideration to be more active in the social issues as a real volunteer because we can change the world. So, I want to thank you for helping me to discover myself and offering me the necessary support which I need in my life. Thank you for everything!
My participation in this event was a by chance. One day I got a message that there was a training in Lithuania called Digi Youth and asked if I wanted to attend. I checked its contents and thought why not? I already like to meeting new people and learning. Thanks to this project, I saw a new country, I made many friends from different countries. Meeting so many people at the same time was an experience that I couldn't have in the outside world. The atmosphere here was very warm, friendly and non-judgmental. I felt like I was in English prep class and 18 years old again. I had never been involved in a project like this before so Digi Youth was a great experience for me. About ICT tools, many of the tools that we are talked about, i was already using them. Also i have learn many of them too. I have improved my team building and communication skills. I really enjoyed our treasure hunt and trip day. Thanks to this kind of activities, we had a chance to know each other well. I really impressed by Cleo and Sully’s project. They opened a new door in my mind. About Project management session, I am very happy that we were given training on project management and that we were able to write our own project. Zivile and Serdar explained very well to us the important points about what we should pay attention to when writing a project.
To sum up, i am grateful to attend Digi Youth.
Sara Darman
In July, I was scrolling through my Instagram when I saw the Comitato d'Intesa' post about this project. Thinking it was interesting, I checked the program and so I chose to participate. During the interview I wasn't told exactly what we were going to do but I was still very curious. In fact, the title Digi Youth had already impressed me. I was really pleased with the topics, I was a bit hesitant at first, but I found everything interesting, especially the last part. To create a project, to completely put ourselves into it is no small thing, and apart from the effort, I felt a lot of satisfaction in doing it. Of course, this was possible thanks to my teammates who allowed me to learn something new from each of them. Compared to the other experience I had; I enjoyed the group work much more. In fact, I was able to challenge myself more, even though I know that you can always improve. I also appreciated the fact that there were people who were more 'adult' and, therefore, more experienced in different areas, from music to teaching. I'm at that point in my life where I'm finishing university and starting to work, so knowing people like them gave me a lot of inspiration. I also really enjoyed the cultural moments. I am passionate about history, so I found it very nice. The only thing I would have liked to do more is to actually create something with the youth centre. In the other experience I had, we had to create a workshop for high school students, and I was thinking of doing the same here but through the famous ICT tools we talked about.
In conclusion, I am definitely happy to have participated in this experience which, in different ways, allowed me to grow in many aspects.
„DigiYouth“ was my third Erasmus+ project, and I am really glad to have the opportunity to be part of this project. The main project aim was to develop international Cooperation with potential partners and to upskill youth workers/youth leaders on ICT tools in youth work. During this project, I learned a lot of new ICT tools like Jamboard, Notion, Strawpoll and learn more about tools that I already knew. The real struggle for me was to write a project because I have no idea that writing a project is so challenging. All the time until we finished our project we need to think about plenty of things: aim, objectives, partners, what resources we need, etc. This seminar was a pleasure but at the same time challenging. After this project, I feel that I improve my digital competencies, improve my working in international partnership skills, teamwork, and communication skills. One of the most important results of this seminar was the formation of trusting relationships among the participants, between the participants and the project organizers. These relationships constitute a basis for future non-profit activities.
Ieva
Lithuania♥
Cleo Andreou
As an active member of an association and youth worker I am always very interested to participate in trainings and learn new ways to apply projects with young people. The opportunity to participate in Digiyouth was very exciting since I have a particular interest in the subject of the training as well as the destination.
Discovering Lithuania and its culture and people was a great opportunity to broader my knowledge and understanding of this country. The opportunity to make this trip through a Erasmus+ project was a privilege since it gave me the possibility to meet persons and organisations from other countries as well. This will facilitate future projects that will be born through the connections made here during the Digiyouth project.
ICT tools are in the center of my interests since 2020. Our organisation is currently developing two Erasmus + project around this subject but specifically on ICT tools linked with music education. Into music (intomusic.info) and Music Community (musicommunity.eu). We had the opportunity to present during this meeting to all the youth workers present the results of these projects up to now, take feedback and hear comments about the future usage of these tools by them. This opportunity helped us to asses our projects and it was very encouraging to see that our work was recognised and had real impact on youth workers.
During this week I had the opportunity to discover ICT tools in a broader sense. My knowledge on ICT tools on project management, using them as collaborative tools and even interactive ways to engage participants and youth for future projects has broaden my horizons and given me inspiration and ideas for future projects and their implementation.
Lastly, my expectations concerning the participants and networking aspect of this training were also met. During this week I had the chance to meet and collaborate with inspiring persons from different countries and exchange knowledge and experiences. I am thrilled to have participated in this project and I am looking forward to use the knowledge I learned in my every day work and future projects!
Ačiū!!!
Sullivan Lépine, Lyon, France
I was first very excited to discover a city and a country I've never been to before. I wasn't disappointed.As I always do before I travel, I've read a few books about Lithuanian history and Lithuanian novels (Ricardas Gavelis, Vilnius Poker). So as I knew a few things on the history and the culture here, I went to specific places in town I wanted to see and feel the atmosphere and observe how people live. For sure I've also randomly lost myself in the Vilnius streets which is also excellent to visit a city. It was a very interesting experience and I definitely want to come back to Vilnius and hopefully visit more cities in Lithuania like Kaunas or Klaipeda.
I have a two years experience in Erasmus Plus projects as a partner and organiser so it was the first time for me as a participant. For sure it was less stressful this way so I took the chance to learn from my peers and observe the way they work in leading a project. I've learnt a lot of things and tips and I already know I will use them to improve the way I lead my own project. I found the organisation and animation very efficient and fascinating especially when we did some exercices to generate debates and conversations. All of the people (NGO's and participants) were very engaged in how to be a better (if I can say so) and more engaged citizen in our society and it is very pleasant and powerful to meet people from different parts of Europe that share the same values. It personally gave me some strength to carry on this way.
I'll definitely want to stay in touch in the future with the people I've met here to collaborate on some new projects but also for some friendship reasons.
Digiyouth project was very enriching. Congratulations to all of you and be sure I'll be back to my own country full of gratitude.
Thank you so much for everything.
Hello, I was informed about this project by the executive of my sending organization. Since there was a need of a group leader for the project, I got interested in taking part in it to improve my team management skills. On the other hand the title and the content of the project drew my attention that would enhance my information and competences about the digital tools. The project so far met my expectations in that response by learning about new digital tools which are useful and helpful during my daily and working life. While gaining competences I was able to contribute the activities within my previous examples as well. Finally the project ended with a simulation of project writing after the EU Youth Strategy and Erasmus+ opportunities were presented. It means that the participants came together with such ideas and aims to follow the upcoming process with collaboration and ongoing contact. Overall, I put a lot of things into my storage that I will definitely benefit in the future by continuing to be in touch with the representatives of partner organizations. I will try my best to disseminate the outcomes and moments of the project in my social media accounts for sure.
Ayhan, Turkey
Comments