Soft skills OUtside of school Learning environment (SOUL Skills) is a project aimed at providing information about the effects of the current social isolation EU countries undertake as a measure to mitigate the spread of COVID-19 pandemic on children age 6-12. The partnership involves 7 entities from 6 countries (GR, ES, IT, FR IS, 2 from BG) with diverse, but complimentary, experiences, knowledge and qualification in training on different education levels. The main project idea is to give information about effects of social isolation due to Covid-19 on children’s behavior and socialization to educators and they to know how to evaluate the appearing deficits and to direct their overcome. The focus is on analyzing the development of soft (transferable) skills after relatively long and unexpected remote education. The project objectives are: 1) to identify lack of transferable skills development of children aged 6-12 years with focus on their development and proper assessment; 2) to create a mechanism (descriptors) for joint evaluation of transversal skills of children aged 6-12; 3) to design a set of methods - Toolbox for supporting development of these transversal skills. The attention is on transferable skills development as it is well known that these skills (creativity and critical thinking, curiosity, communication and collaboration skills, self-assessment and ability to evaluate social situations) are key element for children’s growth and maturity and have to be developed in parallel with acquired knowledge. Engagement in creative and cultural activities during schooling improves a child’s attention and cognition; arts are tools to teach pupils to “envision”, that is, to think about what they can’t see. Remote education in crisis which duration is hard to predict creates lack of schooling culture and environment that reflect on deficits of development of these transferable skills. The 3 project intellectual outputs provide innovative approach to soften the negative effects of social isolation by creating a Joint Evaluation Methodology (IO2) and Toolbox with set of methods based on STEAM approach (IO3), which educators to use to stimulate development of soft skills. The skills that are in the focus of evaluation are revealed in a comparative analysis about effects of different measures taken by Governments to cope with pandemic (IO1). It provides a state-of-art picture about effects of social isolation due to Covid-19 to children socialization in 6 EU countries and the comparative information could be used also for policy and decision making to cope the with pandemic.Innovative elements of the evaluation methodology are: measuring the development of transferable skills to be during non-formal training/activities outside of school during cultural and creatively oriented activities, the two educational processes: generating new academic knowledge and forming transferable skills to go in parallel but at different spaces and teaching/training to be provided by different educators, to establish long-term collaboration between schools and centers for non-formal education in order to multiply resources and acquired knowledge by children. Within the activity “SOUL Ambassadors” 14 partner organisations’ staff are trained to use the assessment methodology and work with the developed tools. The partnership will ensure free access to digital learning environment by publishing the 3 intellectual outputs on the Italian partners’ educational platform. Project branding and identity will be established, 4 newsletters published, materials on partner’s websites, social media and 6 national Multiplier events will be held with 175 attendees.The SOUL partnership has established shared responsibilities between the partners. The cooperation mechanisms include: Quality and Evaluation Board; Communication, Dissemination and Exploitation Strategy, division of tasks according to experience and expertise of the partners for each project activity, setting of working groups, risk management and conflict resolution. “Project management, organization and monitoring” will strengthen the strategic partnership among 4 non-profits (NGOs and foundations) in the non-formal educational sector and culture and 3 for profits (educational and research centers, SMSs) during four live or virtual project meetings.The outputs of the SOUL project will have a long-term impact as the evaluation mechanism for soft skills and the educational Toolbox will be made available in the foreseeable future to all relevant stakeholder groups, teachers, educators in the creative and cultural sectors and parents. The capacity of the partners’ own solid networks of training and research centers, educational institutions, cultural organizations and authorities at local, regional and national level will be enhanced within the current partnership with the innovative methodology, approaches and tools.

The project aim is to develop and present an innovative pedagogical technology based on the scientific results about the learning processes of the individuals. The methodology is intended for educators to enlarge their competences to use the quite different teaching approach. A key element of the new technology is Gardner’s theory of Multiple Intelligences (MI) which revealed that each individual has his own dominating profile through which he can easily learn and memorise new knowledge. There are 8 types of intelligence: linguistic, spatial, musical, bodily-kinesthetic, logical-mathematical, naturalist, intrapersonal and interpersonal and the dominating profile of the individual is a sui generis combination of them. The innovation is that the new approach allows teacher to use the 8 types of intelligence instead of only two - linguistic and logical-mathematical which are the origination of the classic style of teaching. The MI technology will create equal conditions for all learners based on their native potential for personal development. The MI technology requires additional qualifications and skills from the teacher and point out and lay stress on the competences of the teacher to provide effective education foreverybody taking in mind the different dominant profile of learners, regardless of their various social and cultural norms of behaviour. Partners are: GIS-Transfer Center (Bulgaria), TEHNOKRATI (Bulgaria), J&M Synergie (France), CSFVM (Italy), NCDP (Greece) and DEFOIN (Spain). Their missions are to find ways for improving the quality of education during constantly increasing disparities and inequality among learners. Each of the partners has different expertise but they all are looking for an innovative approach to solve educational problems like: early school leaving, decreasing motivation of children to education, graduating with insufficient knowledge and skills for active participating in today’s society. Partners have different experience to use elements of MI technology ( theoretical and practical application) but they all have experience to train different groups of children and adults, experience in transferring knowledge and creating innovation in education. The project activities are to unite their know-how and experience about MI methodology and applicable toolkits to transform the knowledge into finalized product. A Curricula for training pedagogues and a Handbook to give an essential information and guidelines for using the MI technology will be produced. They will provide information about the additional qualification the teachers have to obtain and how to increase their capacity. The focus will be on the analysis of the difficulties faced by teachers as a result of the rapidly increasing disparities between scholars, including children at risk and with special educational needs (SEN). The intellectual outputs: (1) Analysis of Contemporary Learning Problems – Readiness for Change, (2) a Model of a Curricula for the qualification of teachers and students from pedagogical majors and (3) a Handbook: Multiple Intelligence – Methodology and Instruments, will be produced in 6 languages with open access through the Internet and the EPALE. The intellectual products will be developed by formed working groups with experts from all partners. A group of experts (21 people – teachers, school principals, knowledge transfer specialists, etc.) will be aquainted, during 3 short-term joint-staff trainings, with the MI methodology and tools for its application,each partners will share achieved already results and together will collaborate for its upgrading. The trainings follows the logic of presentation of the MI technology and tookits and will integrate them with social intelligence techniques. All partners will be involved in the preparation of the trainings and the logistics for each session will be arranged by the host partner. Each partner will disseminate the project results in its own country by organising multiple events - seminars and conferences, press-conferences, publications, etc. To attain the project objectives the partners will adopt common principles for the organisation and management of the project, the project management team will perform monitoring and ensure the quality and keeping to the planned timetable, will inform the Erasmus MA in due course about any risks if necessary. An important long-term impact will be that the collaboration of the partners will increase their expertise as well as to establish a core of a network of experts oriented to improve the teaching and learning processes using the new scientific results. In the long-termn, the project results may have an impact on the educational environment in two aspects: enhancing the qualification and competences of teachers in order to improve the quality of the education process and achieving higher results of the education based on easy and friendly learning process for everybody.