CEIPES – International Centre for the Promotion of Education and Development – successfully organised the local Multiplier event for the promotion of the Gymkhana 5.0 app for the project “Gymkhana 5.0: Cultural heritage for young people”.
The project “Gymkhana 5. 0: Cultural heritage for young people” – number 2019-2-ES02-KA205-013467 – is co-funded by the European Commission under the Erasmus + programme, Cooperation for innovation and exchange of good practice, Strategic partnerships for young people and involves 5 partners from 4 different countries: The Youth Council Castilla y León, coordinator of the project that together with the organisation Aspaym Castilla y León represented Spain, with their respective cities Léon and Palencia; Rosto solidario, Portuguese partner that represented the city of Santa Maria de Feira; CEIPES that represented the city of Palermo and Dione Youth Organisation, Cypriot partner representing Nicosia, capital of Cyprus.
The project stems from the need to create a new tool that can be used in a free and accessible way by the youth population, and not only, of Europe, to improve and deepen the knowledge of the artistic and cultural heritage of Europe.
Nowadays, it is very difficult to involve young people in traditional learning systems. Digitisation is certainly one of the most important reasons for this and it is one of the main goals of the school, to open a more direct channel of communication with young people. There is an increasingly urgent need for new methodologies in education that can bring young people closer together. Concerning the field of art, the need is even more pressing because we risk, through the classical learning systems, setting aside one of the most important factors of art, namely the intrinsic emotional factor. The main objective of Gymkhana 5.0 is to improve and broaden European heritage education for young people, in particular young people with fewer opportunities (refugees and migrants, people with disabilities, young people with social and economic obstacles, etc.), through the development, testing and implementation of innovative educational tools based on the use of Gamification. The project has therefore developed a new methodology which aims to help young people discover a new, more direct approach to art and which can, above all, protect the emotional component of art to rediscover the beauty of their own territory: the GYMKHANA 5.0 app.
The GYMKHANA 5.0 app consists of a set of custom paths in the cities chosen by the partners, namely Palermo, Santa Maria de Feira, Léon, Palencia, and Nicosia. Hence, the name is also explained; as in a real gymkhana, the participant goes through itineraries visiting representative places of the cities of reference and playing to deepen his knowledge of the cultural heritage. Each route tells a story intrinsically linked to the city. The special feature is that each route has been gamified by introducing challenges, games and much more to motivate young people to complete this itinerary and improve their learning.
The event took place in Palermo on Thursday 7 October 2021 from 14:00 to 16:00 involving 30 participants. Among them, there were young people, tourist guides and tourism and youth organisations in the area. And it is to the latter that the focus is on, promoting the app and making it an alternative and functional tool.
The event was divided into various moments:
1) Presentation of the project “Gymkhana 5.0: Cultural heritage for young people”.
2) Presentation of the methodology used.
3) Presentation of the Gymkhana 5.0 app.
4) Presentation of the Gymkhana 5.0 local network.
The event was very important to disseminate the results of the project and to make everyone aware of the possibility of a new tool for young people that can also be used by those who work with young people to enhance our territory.
The app is anyway free to download from the playstore, if you are interested in learning more you can find it here!
https://play.google.com/store/apps/details?id=com.cjcyl.gymkhana50&hl=it&gl=US
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