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Education for peace project description Education is very significant since it shapes self-identity and ideas about the world that individuals live in. Regarding this, as it mentioned in the first project of Education for Peace, the textbooks in the north side of the island used to have many nationalistic themes and elements that encourages the mutual distrust between two communities in Cyprus. However, as the outcome of the first project pointed out, it is also important to notice the fact that although the textbooks had many nationalist themes and elements, relative autonomy of the teacher has been giving a chance to minimize this nationalist discourse. Nonetheless, this does not mean that children do not read these books and not influenced at all but what the first project reveals, it is also significant to realise the importance of teacher’s teaching methods (including pedagogy, or critical pedagogy if used), examples that are used in the class, supplementary teaching materials, and the ideology of the educational system. Nevertheless, approximately last two and a half year, there is a visible changing in the educational system in the north side of the island. The first visible attempt is the fact that history books are revised in secondary schools. Since 2004, the Cyprus History book has been revised two times and these revisions mainly dealt with either correcting the information that were written wrong historically or eliminating some nationalist drawings or words. Regarding these, the main aim of this project is to re-evaluate and analyse this current attempts by questioning the whole educational curricula. Of course, this questioning, as it was mentioned before, includes analysing the teaching methods of the teachers, tools that are used in class and more significantly the teaching materials. In other words, the current project will illuminate the fundamentals of the curricula. Main theme of the documentary is the differences and similarities, and similarities in differences between the traditions in usual daily life of Turkish Cypriot and Greek Cypriot people. In order to create this theme, recordings will include children who are playing games in the street, the wedding ceremonies of Turkish Cypriots and Greek Cypriots, celebration of the Bairam of Turkish Cypriots and celebration of Easter of Greek Cypriots, common foods, and usual Sunday picnics of the families. Additionally, some interviews will be made with children who and learn their observations about the similarities and differences between the life of Turkish and Greek Cypriots. For the interviews; children who had the opportunity to meet with other children from after April 2003 will be used and also Turkish Cypriot and Greek Cypriot students (and may be Armenian Cypriots) who are studying together in English School, Falcon School and Grammar School in southern part.
Project Outcome The revision of school textbooks in the north is a major attempt to change the official policy and the narrative of the history books. This project is a comparative study of this ‘changing’. This project will analyze “is anything changed with the revision?” With the revision, is the “eternal enemy” has changed to a neighbour, or to a fellow inhabitant? As the first project focused mainly on the textbook analysis, screening and encoding the ethno-centric and nationalistic themes in the primary school history and social science books, “Education for Peace II” will be a comparative analysis of the textbooks before and after the revision. Yet, it will concentrate on the secondary school history textbooks since they were revised two times with a great effort. The project plans to find out the improvements and the shortcomings deriving from the narrative and the sources used. In addition, the project will focus on the teaching methodology in class and evaluate whether revised textbooks and the teaching methods of the teachers contribute to the elimination of stereotypes, help for building mutual trust, tolerance and understanding. Preparation of the documentary will give a visual power to the project to show the differences and similarities between the Turkish Cypriot and Greek Cypriot people. It is a fact that, children keep visual information more than written information. For that reason the documentary will be a useful tool for the project to reach the students.
Organizational capacity: POST’s mission is to prepare projects that envisage the participation of the members who are involved or interested in social and cultural matters. This project will be the continuation of the first leg of the Education for Peace project which has been carried out by POST through the financial support of UNOPS last year. Last year, POST has involved in the project of Education for Peace by analysing 5th grade Primary School books and its’ extra curricular activities to figure out the elements reproducing nationalism, hatred and prejudice against the ‘other’. The study then published as a book and it is largely disseminated to the interested parties such as academicians, educators, teachers, social NGOs, researchers, local authorities, unions etc. and presented to all the libraries in the North. No similar study or product of collaboration between Turkish Cypriots and Greek Cypriots has been published until now, in a way that its final goal was the reformation of the educational material used in schools, by erasing those elements that reproduce the nationalism and promoting the mutual respect and conciliation.
Sustainability: Sustainability of the project will be possible through the large dissemination of the findings of the project as well as taking active part in educational activities in order to make contributions to the matters discussed relating to the issue and extending the scope of further projects on education for peace. The activities of the project members of Education for Peace would be a typical example for this. - Four members of the project team (Murat Kanatli, Dilek Latif, Hakan Karahasan and Mehves Beyidoglu) were involved in the Education for Peace- Pilot Application for the History and Social Science Books of the 5th Grade of the Elementary School- sponsored by the USAID and UNOPS that was completed in December 2004. - Three members (Dilek Latif, Hakan Karahasan and Mehves Beyidoglu) presented the findings of the project in a bi-communal seminar at Ledra Hotel. - One of the project researchers (Dr. Dilek Latif) was invited in February 2005 to the seminar on Teaching History in a Divided Society – Methodological Problems at Georg Eckert Institute for International Textbook Research in Braunschweig, Germany. She presented a paper entitled “Historical Perceptions and Education for Peace after an Ethnic Conflict: The Case of Cyprus (Reporting on the UNOPS Project on History Teaching)”. - Dilek Latif and Mehves Beyidoglu are affiliated to the Council of Europe and regularly participate to the scheduled seminars of the Council with the Historical Dialog in Cyprus. - Dilek Latif and Mehves Beyidoglu were assigned as rapporteurs in the seminar “The use of sources in teaching and learning history” organized in Ledra Palace 12-13 November 2005 by the Council of Europe together with Historical Dialog. - Hasan Karahasan was invited to Intercollege in December 2005 to a lecture to present the findings of the Education for Peace project in the South, which attracted great interest. - Three articles, namely; “Individual Rights and Education” (by Mehves Beyidoglu), “Education for Peace after an Ethnic Conflict” by (Dilek Latif), “Yeni Tarih ne Kadar Mümkün?” (by Hakan Karahasan) were published in two dailies that the circulation rates are the highest ones in the north (Kibris Newspaper and Yeniduzen) and a weekly newspaper. - Dilek Latif and Mehvež Beyidoglu presented the findings of the Education for Peace project in the Ministry of Education to the textbook revision commission in January 2005.
Gender Dimension: Our team has a gender balance (2 men and 3 women) will give their best to promote peace and conflict resolution between the people of Cyprus. |
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