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Tag - Latvia

06Aug

ESC stories. Anna Kuzmuk

Hi everyone 🙌
My name is Anna and I started my volunteer adventure on the 1st of July this year (2020) 🌍
Two weeks ago, I became a part of a European Solidarity Corps project in Riga, Latvia! And my life changed forever🤘 A new country, a new city, a new language, new friends and a new me 😃
I'm just getting started on my volunteer journey, but I really like it and I'm happy that I made up my mind 😉

During the project, I am working as a volunteer with the youngsters from the Riga Municipal Children's and Youth Center. The main tasks include individual activities, non-formal education and creative workshops, sport activities workshops and etc. 🌅🧘🏻‍♀️📚🌿

Volunteering is not only helping others but also you can upgrade yourself. Volunteering can help you make friends, learn new skills and advance your career 🔝

Now we have a football tournament between Riga Municipal Children's and Youth Centers. I'm rooting for youngsters with all my heart 💚 Healthy lifestyle, respect and fair play these are the basic concepts that we want to convey to the youngsters through the sport activities - football games ⚽

Become a Volunteer and Change your Life and the World ✌️

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14Oct

Thinking habit. Riga, Latvia, 2019

About the project

"Thinking habit" was an international training course that took place in Latvia between 6th and 13th of October, 2019. At this training course, we worked with youth workers to develop their critical thinking skills. We also created workshops to develop critical thinking in local communities. This training course was developed by Logos and Baltic Regional Fund and implemented within Skepsis framework. The project was made under Erasmus+ programme and supported by the Latvian National agency.

Project aim

Our aim was to increase critical thinking skills among youth leaders, youth workers and NGO activists and their stakeholders through learning about tools and methods to improve critical thinking and by creating tools and workshops which later would be used in local communities.

Objectives

  • Increase critical thinking skill which is a relevant skill not only for civil society but for youngsters striving to be employed as well
  • Improve quality of youth work in partner organisations through cooperation between them and/or other stakeholders within the Skepsis
  • Promote active citizenship and and understanding of democratic processes through knowledge on critical thinking and media literacy
  • Create tools and workshops about critical thinking for youth workers which can later be applied at local communities
  • Fight fakes, propaganda, prejudice, misinformation,etc.
  • Develop new activities within the Skepsis to have better continuation and spreading of ideas about critical thinking

How did it go

At the training course, we started with learning about basics of critical thinking and media literacy, diving into the world of fakes, biases, logical fallacies and conspiracy theories. After that participants developed their own ideas for workshops about critical thinking and media literacy. At the end of the training course, we made an open event open for external guests. At this event, attended by almost 50 people, we introduced the idea of Skepsis movement and presented workshops made by participants.

Workshops made by participants

Below you can find results of participants' work - workshops that were created at the training course.

How to make a decision using critical thinking - "Are you well equipped to take decisions". This workshop was originally prepared for the people who are taking leadership roles in NGOs and are looking for a ways to make decisions within their organisations. But as we practiced the workshop we found out that it can be applied to anyone who is in the process of making a decisions, including personal
ones. At the project we tested the method on about 10 people, who managed to take decisions on issues they had.

How to recognise fake news using CRAAP method - "Cut the CRAAP".  This workshop was developed by the group of participants who wanted to have an easy tool to detect fakes in media. It was originally created to be used during the upcoming Youth Exchange that one of the participants was preparing. CRAAP method is about analysing the article with 5 different arguments: Currency, Relevance, Authority, Accuracy, Purpose.

How to spot fake news - "Do you news?". This workshop has its goal of introducing learners to basic concepts of critical thinking and media literacy. It can be used in the class by teachers with some practical examples and debates included.

Applying critical thinking when using social networks - "Mind in action". At this workshop, there were several learning objectives - to present the tool to recognise truth from false, to bring participants attention to the content they consume, to make learners think before they post something in media. Main specifics of this workshop is that it is about social media usage and this is one of the most important topics today.

Affect of media on young people's life - "Should we believe in media?". This workshop is mainly about the media and helps learners to understand that not all that seem true is true and also to identify pros and cons about social media framing. Also this workshops includes many visual examples of fakes and misinformation which would be interesting for young people.

How our background affects how we perceive information - "Tell your story". At this workshop, learners get to see how their background affects the way they see the information. What makes this workshop different is that it can be made for young people aged 7-14.

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16May

Escape Game For Your Rights! Riga, Latvia, 2019

What was it about?

We made training course “Escape game for your rights!” in Riga, Latvia, on 06-15 of May, 2019. Project was implemented by the team of Logos Latvia and Logos Poland and funded by Latvian National Agency.

At this training course we had 21 young leaders and NGO activists working with youth, on 8 days long training course. Our aim was to raise awareness about Human rights in such topics as refugees and immigrants, gender equality and domestic violence and special needs. This was realised through constructing Human rights escape room, as well as understanding how to use it as a learning tool in order to create similar projects on Human rights back at local communities by youth and NGO workers who work with young people.

Following objectives were set for the project:

  • To spread ideas of human rights protection among participants, partner organisations and guests of the training course,
  • Equip youth workers and NGO workers who work with young people with tools and knowledge on how to organise escape rooms, to implement human rights education to diverse target groups
  • To create working tools which can be used in local communities
  • Demonstrate that dealing with human rights can be done in various ways through providing participants with ideas and methods on non-standard approach to human rights education
  • Bring an understanding of current challenges in the HR area through providing concrete examples, ideas and theoretical knowledge during project
  • To develop a network of youth workers and NGO workers who work with young people in EU who are ready to use quest rooms on human rights by giving them an opportunity to practice this approach and creating a good atmosphere for connection between participants
  • To raise awareness of human rights topics relating to refugees and immigrants; gender equality and domestic violence; citizens with special needs.

How did it go?

This project was very special for us as it was the first training course that we implemented in Latvia by Logos Latvia. The training course was delivered by trainers Emir Shevkiiev and Marko Boyko and it was organised by Jekaterina Orlova and her team.

At the project, we had a chance to build rooms in the building in the centre of Riga. Our participants built 3 great escape rooms and we invited local people to come and play. At the open event we had around 30 guests, who had a chance to learn and play at the same time.

The rooms that participants built:

FIRED

The educational goal of the room is to highlight gender-based workplace discrimination/harassment and gender-biases.

Main goal for players during the game is to collect evidence that a company is participating in unlawful gender-based discrimination by sneaking into the company office. And to find the key to get out of there within one hour by finding the extra set of keys inside the room.

Desrever Rorrim Yxalag (Reversed Mirror Galaxy)

Educational goal of the room is to give participants the experience of entering a new “culture” and its difficulties: new language, weird logics, new symbols, new way to communicate and a lot of “bureaucratic” procedures. We expect that people will be move sensitive towards the newcomers and more helpful when requested.

Main goal for players during the game is to find the procedure to get asylum and fulfil all tasks to get the final permit.

Classroom of special needs

Educational goal of this room is to let players experience the limitations of a disability. To do this each players gets a random limitation - reduced vision, movement, hearing or touch.

Main goal for players during the game is to escape from the classroom. That is hard to do with all the limitations set by the room, but if players manage to work as a team they will succeed!

Below you can directly access toolboxes on the rooms made by participants

In each "toolbox" you can find following information:

  • Explanation of what is the room about
  • Description of storyline and puzzles
  • Plan of the room
  • Pictures of the room

If you want to build a similar room, but have some questions, don't hesitate to write us [email protected]

Partners of the project

The project was implemented by teams of Logos Poland and Latvia, but we had great partners supporting us with their contributions and members:

  • Lithuania: Visagino sporto central
  • Cyprus: PLANBE PLAN IT BE IT
  • Netherlands: Stichting CAAT Projects
  • Czechia: Asociace TOM CR, TOM21105 DUMANCI
  • Romania: Asociatia "Un strop de fericire"
  • Russia - OPORA

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04May

Critical thinking Youth FORCE. Riga, Latvia, 2019

About the project

Critical thinking Youth Force was a Youth exchange that was hosted by Logos Latvia between 25th of April and 3rd of May 2019. This project was supported by the Latvian national agency as part of Erasmus+ programme and made within Skepsis movement framework. At this project we had 30 young people from Poland, Latvia, Czechia, Slovenia, Bulgaria and Croatia.

Our aim
We aimed to share with all participants the initial idea of the Skepsis movement, and give them an opportunity to be part of it through developing various materials connected to topics of critical thinking and media literacy.

We had the following objectives:

  • To increase understanding of how media and social networks affect our perception;
  • To increase media literacy among the participants;
  • To develop skills of critical thinking among participants;
  • To create the possible activities for the Skepsis movement devoted to the critical thinking and media literacy;
  • To find common ground and innovative ideas for future partnership working using the skills and knowledge of people from diverse backgrounds;
  • To develop future projects on the topic;
  • To raise participants' awareness and understanding of other cultures and countries;
  • To create a comics book.

Project results

At the project participants worked in several groups creating various materials connected with critical thinking. We presented these materials at the open event that took place in Riga in Bambus office. Below you can see the results of their work:

Brochure with basic information about critical thinking

Critical thinking promotion handbook

Debate activity

City quest

Video comics

Music video

Project partners

Logos Poland and Latvia

Modern Youth Academy

Institute of Youth power

Asociate Tom CR, Tom 21105 Dumanci

IYCEIP

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