Saturday 18th March 2017
All teams travelled to Lisbon and stayed overnight in a hostel. Those who had early arrival had the chance to explore the city on their own.
Sunday 19th March 2017
During breakfast first acquaintances were made and then by private bus we departed towards Sintra. Sintra lies on a granite mountain and its unique microclimate made it an attraction spot for the kings and nobles of the 18th century who built dozens of palaces with excellent gardens. There, we visited Pena Palace which combines Gothic and Moorish elements as a shining example of Portuguese romance. We continued along the west coast of Portugal stopping at the famous “Praia das Maçãs” which means apple beach. However, we could not see why it is named so, since we should have visited during autumn when it is full of apples brought by the rivers that end up in it after crossing several orchards. In the evening we arrived to Santa Cruz where we stayed overnight at a hostel.
Monday 20th March 2017
In the morning we visited the Cooperfrutas cooperative specialized is collecting and distributing fruit. They guided us to their premises and explained us the importance of continuous research to ensure the control and preservation of the quality of the products according to the standards and requirements of the modern distribution.
We continued to the Golegã area where we visited Mendes Gonçalves a plant producing condiments. In the beginning, when they mentioned that their motto is "Passion, Quality, Creativity and Engagement" we thought that this is too poetic and has nothing to do with food production. Later, when they presented their products we understood that it is absolutely justified since their products have exotic flavors in innovative packaging. They have a wide variety of vinegar with ingredients such as blackberries, mangoes or figs in reminiscent flavors and they even have dressings with secret ingredients special for fondue or shushi!
In the afternoon we departed for Montemor-o-novo a city of 17,000 inhabitants in the province of Evora, where the Portuguese school is based. When we arrived, Portuguese families picked up our students to accommodate them while all the teachers stayed in a hotel.
Tuesday 21st March 2017
Early in the morning, we all met at the assembly hall of the Portuguese school, where the director Idalina Bento along with all the Portuguese Erasmus team welcomed us. The Portuguese students had prepared and presented us two topics: a flashback to our partnership and a presentation of their region. Afterwards, we were guided around the city to see all of the attractions mentioned in the presentation. The highlight of the tour was the 13th century castle that dominates the hill of the city and its monastery which nowadays is used as an art center. In the end of the tour we went to the town hall where Mayor Hortênsia Menino was waiting for us. Besides the warm reception we were impressed by the gifts we were offered.
At noon we had lunch at the school canteen and then we had presentations from 5 teams. According to the agenda of our partnership the meeting in Portugal focused in approaching research as a key aspect of modern entrepreneurship both in the creation and initial steps of a business and in its evolution over time.
The Italian, Croatian, Lithuanian, German and Polish teams researched prerequisites for presenting information in various media such as magazines, internet, etc. Presentations are available at the link R & D Link - Presenting information of our twinspace.
Then, students and teachers were split into 2 groups. Teachers participated in a “future classroom” workshop organized by the company: Promethean. This experiential workshop introduced us how a classroom equipped with an interactive board and smart devices can be organized in combination with a special software called “classflow”. Our impressions for this proposal were mixed, on the one hand we were excited about the possibilities that technology can provide us, while on the other hand some felt that special digital skills and a lot of time for preparation is required by teachers in order to organize their lessons. There were also concerns about the cost of such “future classroom” which is indeed rather high and probably prohibitive for the school budget of some of the partners. Nevertheless, the workshop was an enlightening experience for the teachers that certainly contributed to their professional development.
At the same time students participated in a peer teaching session organized by the Greek and the Portuguese teams. The Greek and the Portuguese students collaborated prior the meeting for about 3 months in order to form educational material and organize a cross-curricular activity in regards to the presentation of a topic in a scientific article. The prerequisites that they focused were how the structure of an article should be, what good practices can be followed while writing an article and what rules should be followed for bibliographic references. The “teaching material” that they produced and used during this session was a brochure called “Becoming a scientific writer” with basic guidelines and some worksheets that the participating students worked on in groups. All this material is available at the R & D - Presenting information link of our twinspace.
In the evening Portuguese families organized a unique night for us. They had cooked and offered us delicious traditional food and they had also arranged that a local choir perform traditional songs for us. Tuesday was indeed a "full" day that ended in the best possible way!
Wednesday 22nd March 2017
We all met at school and by private bus we went to the nearby town of Evora. There, we separated into two large groups who alternately visited the Hercules Research Center and did a city tour. Despite the drizzle, we explored every spot of the astonishing medieval city which is rightfully designated as a UNESCO World Heritage Site.
The HERCULES Center is a research infrastructure of the University of Evora implementing many European funded programs. It is literally a beehive of young European scientists. Scientists toured us around several laboratories with state-of-the-art equipment which looked rather impressive as if they we were part of science fiction movie! Our Portuguese collaborators had also arranged with the center's scientists for us to go to a lab and do experiments! The experiments were related to our program by working on apples and discovering the ingredients that make significant their nutritional value. Through these experiments we were trying to confirm the saying "an apple a day keeps the doctor away".
Our daily activities were over in the evening when we returned to Montemor o Novo.
Thursday 23rd March 2017
In the morning we boarded a private bus and headed to the eastern border of Portugal with Spain. First stop was at Jurofrutas orchards where we saw the organic method of cultivating by protecting orchards from insects, caterpillars and ants through co-cultivation with aromatic plants.
At noon had lunch at the famous cellar: Adega dos Ramalhos and then we visited the medieval town of Monsaraz.
In the afternoon we returned to Montemor o Novo where the teachers had free time while the students worked on creating a scientific article describing the process and the findings of the experiments they did at the Hercules Research Center.
Friday 24th March 2017
After attending a couple of classes students worked again so that they finalize the scientific article they had to write. Then, we all gathered, students and teachers, at the school’s assembly hall and they presented their work.
We continued with filling in the typical questionnaires for the evaluation of the meeting and we had the closing ceremony where participation certificates were given. In a very moving atmosphere, we said goodbye and we thanked our Portuguese hosts for their splendid hospitality.
Saturday 25th March 2017
According to our flights we arranged the time of departure from Montemor-o-Novo to Lisbon’s airport. We left Portugal with a smile on our face and a lot of happy memories. The Portuguese team managed to organize a meeting focused to the agenda of our partnership and rather constructive for both students and teachers while at the same time was also enjoyable.
Author: Margarita Papavlasopoulou
Supervising Teacher: Eleni Zalavra