MATERA ONLINE NEWSPAPER

1. MATERA ONLINE NEWSPAPER A bridge among cultures

2. Matera and its region. • Matera (57.000 inhab.) is a town and a province in the region of Basilicata (600.000 inhabitants.) in the south of Italy. • Matera’s province, including the chief town, has got 200.000 inhabitants. • The major part of its villages has got no more than 10.000 inhabitants.

3. Matera: UNESCO WORLD HERITAGE • This town has many peculiar, unique characters: • The "Sassi" are houses dug into the tuff rock that characterizes Puglia and Basilicata. Many of these "houses" are really only caverns. • People still live in the Sassi. Until the late 1980s this was considered a poor people's habit, since these houses are mostly unlivable. But the current local administration, becoming more tourism-oriented, has succeded in making the "Sassi" a nice site, and tuff houses are becoming more livable and attractive.Note: many people in the past believed that people only live in the Sassi; perhaps it is better to point out that the main part of Matera's people now live in the modern town. There is a great similarity with the prehistoric sites of Jerusalem, which are of the same prehistoric age. • It has been selected from the Unesco as a World’s cultural heritage.

4. Newspaper’s birth • We had the first idea of an online newspaper in 2000. • The first edition was limited to the Matera’s province. • A local newspaper (La Gazzetta del Mezzogiorno), published on its website various online newspaper’s local edition.

5. How it works The school partners participate with articles written by the students, complete with images or drawings made by them. The pupils or the schools send their articles via e-mail, or on a floppy disk. The “Liceo Duni’s” editorial staff, that can enter the site’s Administration, receives the articles and issues them online, after providing, if necessary, the English translation.

6. Newspaper’s composition • The newspaper has got an homepage containing 8 articles, with a picture, title and abstract for every article. • Clicking on the picture or on the title, a page opens with the full text of the article. • Obviously, clicking on the flag, everyone can choose his preferred language.

7. Europeannewspaper’s birth • Once we saw the success the local newspaper had, we thought to extend it at an European level. • The response was soon enthusiastic.

8. Languageproblem • Obviously, the first problem we had to face, was the comprehension between us. • So we thought about publishing articles, when possible, in a bilingual version: mother and English language .

9. The project • The project consists in an international on-line newspaper, in network, made by young people from different countries, in different languages. • It originates from the collaboration between LA GAZZETTA DEL MEZZOGIORNO, a local newspaper, which offers a free space in the web, and LICEO CLASSICO "DUNI" - Matera (Italy), and wants to meet the school growing demands of coming out of a traditional isolation to share ideas and projects with other schools and collaborate with the other professional figures of the local area.

10. Project’s aims • By this project we want to promote a use of technologies primarily educational, in order to carry out something really felt and made by students. The project is completely based on the use of technologies. The Internet is the means employed to enable young people, even those living in very far countries, to keep in touch, exchanging and comparing their ideas. • In this way the new technologies become a medium for critical consideration and their responsible use can offer opportunities of cultural enrichment and, why not, amusement.

11. Students • A great number of students are enthusiastically taking part in cultural exchange programmes with foreign countries, because this experience gives them the chance to improve their knowledge of foreign languages and to enlarge their cultural views. • We can notice that the youth are deeply interested in Europe, but, in order to become true European citizens, they should be informed about the most important issues of the Union and, above all, they should have the possibility to exchange ideas and know each other in "a room of their own".

12. Schools • Among other school needs, we have noticed an impelling necessity to test new methods allowing the application of the new technologies to teaching, not contrasting the traditional teaching methods, but as an integrated system in the cross-curriculum. • This is the background of Matera's on-line newspaper. It is a room for young people who can express freely their ideas. Students can test their ability in different forms of writing: articles, interviews, reports, using different languages. Many articles have been published and are visible clicking on “Tutte le notizie”, in the "Archivio" window. • An important aspect of this project is the possibility to debate among people of the same age, offered, thanks to the Internet, also to young people living in the most remote places or in underdeveloped countries.

13. Project’s goals The project goals are: • To promote a positive use of the new ways of communication, as means of meeting, comparison, participation • To acquire the ability of criticism and of independent thought necessary to participate actively in the information society • To teach young people to work in collaboration and to promote the culture of the new media • To train students to express and propose their ideas through non traditional ways of writing • To put school in touch and collaboration with the external world and other school realities • To stimulate students to participate actively in the life of the European society, respecting "diversity" and encouraging a democratic confrontation • To deepen the knowledge of the European cultural inheritance, comparing traditions and appreciating the cultural differences which are at the basis of our common history and civilization • To improve the knowledge of languages through the publication of works written by students in English and other European languages. • To promote the integration in the European social and cultural context of students who are in disadvantaged conditions and of schools situated in remote geographical areas and economically depressed.

14. Activities management • The activities have been carried out with laboratory methods. The students have taken part in journalism workshops, under the guidance of journalists of the web editorial staff of LA GAZZETTA DEL MEZZOGIORNO, acquiring among other things the bases of web writing. A group of students, directed by computing teachers, learned to use programmes for processing images and inserting them in the web pages. • Contacts with the other schools involved in the project have been very close and, thanks to e-mails, there has been a useful and frequent exchange of opinions and materials. In the last school year some topics of great interest for students have been discussed with classes of foreign schools in chat meetings during morning classes with the help of the English teachers. • The students, individually or in groups, have made articles, interviews, surveys, with the help of English and Italian teachers.

15. Impact on our territory • Many schools of towns situated in the inner areas of our region, Basilicata, one of the poorest and isolated in Italy, have joined the project, seizing the opportunity to enter a network of communication and to collaborate, exchanging information and ideas with schools from all over the world.

16. Overcoming cultural diversity • Matera's on-line newspaper is completely made by the students of the schools involved in the project, under the guidance of their teachers. They are young people from five to nineteen who use this place to confront and exchange ideas. • It is a sort of "virtual square" where the youth from all over the world can meet and debate, overcoming cultural diversity. From the collaboration of students belonging to different schools there comes out a real newspaper, a real editorial staff who can choose subjects, images, titles of articles. They express their opinions, carrying out articles dealing with culture, traditions, habits, environment, music, sport, politics.

17. Schools and Matera’s newspaper • Schools have understood and greatly appreciated the value of the project and have inserted it in their educational activities. • So, the on-line newspaper has become an integral part of the core curriculum in many schools. • The project has created a wide network involving a great number of schools, both from Europe and from other continents. • Teachers and families alike have noticed a remarkable improvement in the students' writing and communication abilities and so they are urging us to go on with this work. • The support of LA GAZZETTA DEL MEZZOGIORNO, the most qualified local newspaper, and the numerous requests arriving from schools all over the world make us hope for the best in the future development of the project. At the moment we are enlarging more and more the network through contacts with schools situated in France, Germany, United Kingdom, Norway, Canada, Chile, Egypt, Sierra Leone and many other countries. • MOL = Matera On Line Newspaper MOL

18. First correspondents First correspondents from abroad were: Rumania Poland Hungary

19. Today’s correspondents are: • Istituto Tecnico Commerciale "Loperfido" – Matera (Italia)  • Istituto Tecnico Commerciale "Olivetti" – Matera (Italia)  • Istituto di Istruzione Superiore "Isabella Morra" - Matera  (Italia) • ITIS "Pentasuglia" - Matera (Italia) • Scuola Elementare IV Circolo - Matera (Italia) • Scuola Elementare e Media - Istituto Comprensivo - Accettura (MT) (Italia) •  Istituto Professionale Alberghiero "A. Turi" – Matera -(Italia) • Scuola Media “Ilvento” – Grassano (MT) - (Italia) • Scuola Media –Ferrandina (MT) - (Italia) • Scuola Media “Nicola Festa” – Matera – Italia • Istituto Comprensivo -  Salandra (MT) - (Italia) • Scuola Elementare – Ferrandina (MT) – (Italia) • Vocational Academy Bilingual Primary and Secondary School of Economics - Győr – Hungary  • Zsigmondy Vilmos Secondary School - Hungary •  Gymnasium N4 Smorgon – Bielorussia  • Technical College “Maria Baiulescu” - Brasov – Romania   • Economic College ”Emanuil Gojdu” - Hunedoara (Romania)  • High School "Izmir Balcova" - Ephesus (Turkey)   • Escola Secundária da Sobreda – Portogallo • Grup Scolar Avram Iancu- Sibiu- Romania • Kindergarten of Kaparelli – Thiva – Grecia • Colegiul National "Stefan cel Mare" - Suceava (Romania) • Gimnazjum Numer 47 - Warszawa (Poland) • Private Bati Primary and High Schools Semsi Pasa Uskudar - Istanbul (Turkey) • Riihenmäki Comprehensive School – Mäntsälä – Finland • 34 Nicholas Copernicus Elementary School - Katowice (Poland) • Kaunas Santara Gymnazium - Lituania • St. Paul's Missionary College - Rabat – Malta • Center for Education-Zelenogorsk  (Russia) • Lyceum N. - Moudania (Greece)

20. ARCHIVE • Old articles are not eliminated, but kept in an Archive, where they can always be consulted. • They are visible clicking on “Tutte le notizie”, in the "Archivio" window. • A precious news database is so constituted, containing a small correspondent’s personal encyclopaedia.

21. Topics • Everyone can take part in the newspaper with any topic. • After a time many schools showed the need to work on a specific topic. • From time to time we indicated some topics, we constituted a survey with (e.g. culture, society, human rights, sports, etc.).

22. Participants’ age groups The project is addressed to young people from 5 to 19. • Up to now the estimated number of participants is of not less than 1000. 1000!

23. The editorial staff • Editorial staff is composed by: • Teacher in charge: Maria Teresa Asprella • 8 teachers: (Information technology, English language, Italian language, Technology) • 20 students

24. Transferability • The project, if former conditions are verified, is totally transferable at any context, linguistic or cultural reality. • Our project inspired: • Riihenmäki Comprehensive School Mäntsälä– Finland: ”A Golden School Day”www.mantsala.fi/sivistys/riihen/schoolday.htm • Videouno - Matera www.ilmiotg.it

25. Sustainability and funds Our school has provided a small amount of money to finance the project for the future. We’ve got some contributions from local administrations. At the present time our yearly budget is of about 10.000 €

26. Awards • 2001: • NETDAYS EUROPE 2001 - fourth place ex aequo European Citizenship on the Net category • 2002: • In 2002 the NEWSPAPER was chosen among the 12 best contributions of schools, among those accepted for the exhibition at TED, the most important Italian meeting about teaching technologies, whose scientific organization is arranged by CNR (NATIONAL COUNCIL OF RESEARCH) in collaboration with MIUR (MINISTRY O F EDUCATION, UNIVERSITY AND RESEARCH) • 2003: • CABLE & WIRELESS CHILDNET AWARDS 2003 - third place in the school category • 2004: • Finalist in the Stockholm Challenge Award 2004/education • Winner of the Centoprogetti (One hundred projects) for the innovative use of technologies in the Public Administration – Rome • Selected among the finalists in The Global Junior Challenge in Rome.

27. Noticed problems • There have been some problems in the contacts with those countries whose access to the Internet is still very expensive. For example, in some coun tries of the former Soviet Union, schools have some difficulties in finding the funds for connecting to the Internet, and therefore sometimes they have been compelled to drop the collaboration.

28. Impact of the project • The impact of the project into the targeted community has been very strong, in fact it has been able to break the traditional isolation in which schools used to work. The students of the various schools involved in the project got the impression of belonging to a large community and even parents and families have come closer to the world of the Internet and information. This new way of communicating has been greatly appreciated mainly by the most remote towns, for example those situated in the inner areas of our region, because it enabled young people to get in touch with same age people from other parts of the world. The visibility offered to the project by LA GAZZETTA DEL MEZZOGIORNO has aroused a growing interest also outside the school community. The local media, press and TV; have often talked of the project in a positive way.

29. Evaluation The experience has been evaluated by the following methods: • questionnaires filled in by students at the end of each year, in order to check the difficulties met by them and to receive their proposals • analysis of the "logbook", to check the attendance of students at the afternoon classes • number of articles produced by students • participation of schools of the network • request to join the project on the part of other schools • number of accesses to the site • acknowledgements and qualified judgements obtained in national and international contexts.

30. To know themselves to understand each other The newspaper was first directed to: • 1) Our Province, then to, • 2) Europe, and now to the • 3) World Technologies can be an efficient means to overcome geographical limits and to put people in touch. They can offer everybody the possibility to speak and communicate. It is possible, at a relatively low cost, to promote exchange and knowledge among different cultures, religions, traditions. New schools are welcome!

31. Technological level of correspondent countries Computers and Internet host x 1000 inhab.

32. Digital divide • As you can see, not all countries are alike and have the same technological opportunities. • Our newspaper has got a simple , but effective structure, and has as well a good diffusion in countries with scanty means. • One of the newspaper’s major objectives is just getting over the digital divide.

33. Possible developments • Exchanges with schools all over the world • E-twinnings

34. Thank you! Maria Teresa Asprella: mariateresa.asprella@email.it Eustachio Guanti: eustachioguanti@hotmail.it Liceo Ginnasio “E. Duni”: liceoduni@email.it

35. Present address • The present address is: www.molnews.it