Silver Bridge by DANUrB - Story-based community game, series of activities and methodological guide
The Silver Bridge is a series of story-based activities and community games developed in the framework of the international project DANUrB+ (DANube Urban Brand + Building Regional and Local Resilience through the Valorization of Danube's Cultural Heritage). Its aim is to help children aged 8-10 years to discover the intangible, natural and built heritage of the Danube towns and to develop their language skills through stories about water fairies of the Danube Basin.
Cross-border/international
Hungary
Germany
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The methodology has been tested in Stuttgart, Baja, Esztergom and Budapest, but the aim is to apply it in all cities along the Danube.
It addresses urban-rural linkages
It refers to other types of transformations (soft investment)
Yes
ERDF : European Regional Development Fund
It was funded by the DANUrB+ Program, which was part of the Danube Transnational Programme of Interreg.
No
Yes
As a representative of an organization, in partnership with other organisations
Name of the organisation(s): DANUrB International Association (DIA) Type of organisation: Non-profit organisation First name of representative: Szántó Annamária Last name of representative: Orbán, Phd Gender: Female Nationality: Hungary Function: President Address (country of permanent residence for individuals or address of the organisation)<br/>Street and number: Bartók Béla út 10-12. Town: Budapest Postal code: 1111 Country: Hungary Direct Tel:+36 30 524 6857 E-mail:orbanabme@gmail.com Website:https://www.danurb.eu/
Name of the organisation(s): Hungarian Contemporary Architecture Centre (KÉK) Type of organisation: Non-profit organisation First name of representative: Bálint Last name of representative: Kádár, Phd Gender: Male Nationality: Hungary Function: President Address (country of permanent residence for individuals or address of the organisation)<br/>Street and number: Bartók Béla út 10-12. Town: Budapest Postal code: 1111 Country: Hungary Direct Tel:+36 30 522 5994 E-mail:info@kek.org.hu Website:http://kek.org.hu/
Name of the organisation(s): kultúrAktív Association Type of organisation: Non-profit organisation First name of representative: Anna Last name of representative: Szilágyi-Nagy Gender: Female Nationality: Hungary Function: President Address (country of permanent residence for individuals or address of the organisation)<br/>Street and number: Mikszáth Kálmán utca 9. Town: Pécs Postal code: 7621 Country: Hungary Direct Tel:+36 30 589 9784 E-mail:info@kulturaktiv.hu Website:https://kulturaktiv.hu/
"Fairies and humans once lived in harmony in the Danube region. But the humans destroyed the fairies' dwelling place with their disrespectful behavior, so the fairies had to flee from the human world. But now, 777 years later, they may return again if we can prove to them that we know, love and respect the place where we live."
This story, based on the legends of the Danube, is the fabulous setting for The Silver Bridge. It is a complex method (a series of activities, board games and a methodological guide) that allows children to discover the built, natural and intangiable heritage of the places where they live in a fun way, relying on the educational power of personal experiences, stories, games and shared creativity rather than on lexical knowledge.
1. During the two outdoor walks, children use all their senses to search for hidden traces of fairies in their built and natural environment, exploring the natural, built and intangible heritage of the places where they live through playful activities. While creating their own imaginary fairy characters, they actively develop their social, language and critical thinking skills.
2. In the creative activities, the children re-live and deepen the experience of the walks, and using various craft techniques, they create the props of the Silver Bridge board game, i.e. the game boards that give a subjective impression of the walks, and their own fairy puppets.
3. In the follow up board game activity, the children build on their experiences and knowledge from the previous activities and work together to bring their fairy characters back into the world of humans.
The game was developed in the framework of the DANUrB+ Program, which has created a multidisciplinary network along the Danube, where the quest for local identity is fused with a Danube-wide community experience.
Built heritage
Legends
Game pedagogy
Natural heritage
Multi-ethnicity
During the activities, children observe and understand the changes caused by human activity in a way that is appropriate for their age group, and they are introduced to the concept of sustainable development and the related issues of individual and community responsibility in an experiential and attitude-forming way. Through the fairy-tales of conflict between fairies and humans, the activities contribute to children's environmental education by presenting abstract problems and tasks related to environmental awareness in a concrete, local context, in a way that can be experienced personally.
The children apply and practice the scientific knowledge acquired during the activities (e.g. knowledge about plants and animals) in a creative way, through language tasks, social interaction, in an experiential process of artistic creation, in reality. These play-based educational activities are key to transforming children's attitudes into environmentally conscious and responsible behavior.
As a central element of the built environment education methodology, the strengthening of personal responsibility for the place of residence, active citizenship and democracy education are also a key objective of the series of activities. The activities are age-appropriate and raise children's awareness of their responsibility for their environment and their right to have a say in the development of their place of residence. Fostering a sense of belonging in children helps to build a more sustainable society by increasing a sense of responsibility and halting the aging of small and medium-sized towns.
The activities also contribute to the development of children's initiative and entrepreneurial skills. The fairy-tale framework as a whole and the activities that go with it raise awareness of the possibility of change and transformation and encourage personal participation.
Through creative activities, children have the opportunity to express their thoughts, feelings and experiences using a wide range of creative techniques and tools. The series of activities promotes the diverse and creative use of materials and techniques, and the experience of creating individually as well as collectively. In addition to their own creations, the children will learn about each other's work, gain practice in reflecting on the creative process, describing the work of art and presenting the process of creation in writing and orally (in front of an audience).
Through the creative workshops children prepare the various parts of the 'Silver Bridge' board game: the fairy sculptures become the tokens, the map of the neighborhood the board of the game. This makes the finally game-play event more personal and depicts the heritage important for the kids. The customizable activity-like cards of the board game recall the best moments of the natural and urban walks, the favorite fairy tale moments and thus reinforces the positive emotional attachment of children to the local heritage.
In addition to experiencing artistic expression, the children will be introduced to local folklore traditions through story-telling and to many other cultural creations and knowledge (architecture, public art, cultural life of the place of residence, etc.) during the walks. They not only learn about the works they encounter, but the activities also give them the opportunity to develop their own personal relationship with them.
The series of activities was mainly designed for children living in multi-ethnic settlements along the Danube. Settlements along the river, which has been an important transport route for centuries, have always been home to many nationalities living side by side, and multiculturalism and multilingualism have always been an important part of the Danube region's intellectual and cultural heritage. The series of activities aims to bring this linguistic and cultural richness to the children of the target group, who come from different linguistic and cultural backgrounds.
The game contributes to the strengthening of children's social competences through a deeper knowledge and personal experience of the local community, the different social groups living in the town, local traditions, customs and history. Through the various activities, children are encouraged to learn about the cultural and linguistic diversity of the local community, to develop an attitude of interest and respect for their own and others' cultural backgrounds, to view the coexistence of different languages and traditions as an important part of local heritage, and to move away from stereotypes and prejudices.
Our game contributes to accessibility and affordability by testing and adapting the methodology in several multilingual settings, thus gaining a lot of practical experience on how to tailor the session to the needs of different communities in the Danube Region. These experiences have been summarized in a publication that helps teachers to incorporate the natural and built heritage of their own neighborhoods into the programme, to tailor the activities to the children's level of competence (linguistic, social, etc.). The methodological manual and the elements of the board game are available to anyone in printable, editable format on the DIA website.
In a series of heritage mediation activities developed together with teachers and students of the Hungarian Kindergarten Association of Stuttgart, the children learned about the legends of the Hungarian Danube and, through story-based walks, they experienced the heritage of their home area. In the creative activities linked to the walks, the children processed and shaped their experiences and newly acquired knowledge, and together they created a unique copy of the Silver Bridge Community Game, reflecting their own experiences and environment. At the end of the session, the children re-lived and synthesized the impulses they had received during the sessions by playing the game. In the test run with the Primary School of the General Education Center of the Hungarian Germans in Baja, we gained experience of how the community game can be adapted to the context of other municipalities. In addition to the test runs at school, we also had the opportunity to test elements of the activity series at festivals and children's camps.
A total of 341 children participated in the development and testing. Those organizations and educational institutions that joined the development phase of the game were given the opportunity to receive a long-term pedagogical service free of charge. By making the entire methodology fully open source and providing free guides for teachers to use it, we hope that even more children living in the multilingual area of the Danube will benefit from the Silver Bridge methodology.
The methodology itself has the most tangible impact at the local level, as it can only be used with a small group of children at a time. However, in the long term, it can help to strengthen the Danubian identity in Hungary and even at European level by shaping the attitudes of new generations.
The notion of heritage used in the game was formulated jointly with the European countries along the Danube, and therefore reflects the outcome of an international discourse. This commonly agreed set of values was translated into the local context of Hungarian children living in a multilingual environment.
The fairy tale reflects the Hungarian national heritage and combines fairy tale motifs from different regions of Hungary. Since the fairy tale and the fairy tale album can be complemented, other countries and regions can also include their own world of motifs.
The development and implementation, however, was primarily carried out at local level, with the active participation of children. We approached the children and teachers in Stuttgart knowing that we were developing a game with them. The children and their teachers tested the different elements of the game and their feedback and advice was incorporated into the concept of the game. We then tested parts of the game on smaller test days in other contexts along the Danube in Hungary, which were then finalised during the final testing week in Baja.
After the development, the Danurb international network was again helpful to us in how the game could be adapted to different country contexts and in its dissemination and further implementation.
The story-based game concept was prepared by a multidisciplinary development team including an architect, a Hungarian as foreign language teacher, an art historian/museum educator, a kindergarten teacher, and a landscape architect/analog game developer expert. The team consulted a storyteller for the best oral history experiences. The design team came from the field of built environment education, which ensured the planning of a playful and experiential learning process. We were able to respond to the multilingual environment with the help of the Hungarian as a foreign language teacher, thus we formulated the areas and levels of language development based on his professional expertise. With the help of a museum pedagogue expert in heritage transmission, we were able to incorporate a wide range of local values from the areas of built, natural and intangible heritage. The architects and landscape architects represented the development and preservation of the quality of the built environment in the project, and they were the guide in the aspects of mapping and the selection of locations for the walking route. The participating teachers represented the viewpoints and needs of the children in the project, so that a play session suitable for the age group could be prepared. With the help of the storyteller, the basic story of the game could be formed, which was incorporated into the game concept by a specialist experienced in game development, who helped the pedagogy and the idea of the game come together.
The expertise of the developers ensured that an innovative program was created from every point of view, which is able to teach the topic of heritage to this 8-10-year-old age group living in a special linguistic and heritage environment. And the methodological manual ensures that the pedagogic objectives of the Silver Bridge can be successfully implemented by every enterprising teacher in their own locality and teaching context.
In the Silver Bridge, we combined the approach of built environment education and game pedagogy, which resulted in a methodology in which children, instead of receiving a ready-made game, can create their own game. In the Silver Bridge, children take part in a series of activities that explore and record the intangible, natural and built heritage of their place of residence, and as a result of playful exploratory walks and creative processes, they create their own board game. The finished game is not only an imprint of the values of the place of residence that they consider important, but also a means to relive and deepen these experiences. Following the simple rules of the board game - which the teachers can adapt according to the needs of the given group - the children can recall their fondest memories and experiences gained during the sessions.
The methodology developed in the Hungarian community living abroad was tested in Hungary in various locations (Baja, Esztergom, Budapest) and settings (daycare, camp, festival) with the involvement of children and professionals, thus ensuring the broad and flexible adaptability of the method. The target group of the game are the children and educational professionals from regions along the Danube, but changing the story context for different cultures makes it usable basically in any place.
The methodology and adaptation steps of the Silver Bridge are summarized in a free online handbook available on the websites of DIA and kulturAktív Association. All game assets are open source, available in printable and customisable formats. With the help of the downloadable English and Hungarian language support material, any community can create their own game, which we would like to promote in the future by producing further translations and organizing teacher training courses.
The games and activities can be used flexibly with groups of children of different sizes, but the ideal group size is 10-15 children.
Our series of activities is based on the theories and methods of experiential and play education, which play an important role in environmental education, as well as on storytelling and the identity-building effects of language skills.
1 Narrative pedagogy
In the DANUrB+ Program, the Danube is a symbolic link that is often the subject of tales and legends, which are an important intangible heritage of the region. In developing the Silver Bridge methodology, we have therefore given the river an important role: the Hungarian tales and legends related to the Danube form the basis and framework of the series of activities. The stories and tales related to the Danube or other rivers are also an important part of the spiritual and cultural heritage of the Romanian, Slovak, Bulgarian, Serbian and Croatian Danube communities.
2 Built environmental education
Built environmental education aims to strengthen the link between people and their living space. To achieve this, it uses thematic and interactive activities such as treasure hunt walks, creative activities and playful community planning. Built environmental education is aimed at children, young people, adults and the elderly, as it can be important at all ages to develop attitudes and orientation skills, to learn about place, to identify with the place where one lives and to actively participate in shaping the environment. The methodology of environmental education is based on three successive and interdependent steps: experience, understanding and participation.
3 Experiential pedagogy
Experiential pedagogy is an important element of the methodology of built environmental education, so we have tried to incorporate experiential elements in the Silver Bridge series of activities. In the context of built environmental education, the experiential approach is based on the direct discovery of the values of the place of residence in its interior or exterior location, with a multidirectional sensory and social experience
Whether it is indigenous minority groups or diaspora communities of migrant origin, the situation of children in multilingual environments is often not easy. There is less language space and therefore less time for these children to use and practice their mother tongue. Knowing and using several languages naturally goes hand in hand with learning about the traditions, customs and values associated with those languages, which undoubtedly has many advantages, but can also be a source of identity conflict. When we started to develop the Silver Bridge fairy-tale-based heritage community game, our aim was to make the natural, built and intangible heritage of the Danube region tangible and experiential for 8-10 year old children living in multilingual environments, while developing their language competences. In this way, we wanted to contribute to children's knowledge, ownership and integration of the different values and heritages linked to their place of residence and origin.
The development of the methodology started in autumn 2021 in Stuttgart, in close cooperation with colleagues from KÉK and DIA in Budapest. When the first draft was ready, the testing phase could start in Hungary in several contexts: a summer camp in Baja, a cultural festival in Budapest and a children's festival in Esztergom. The last test took place in September 2022 in Baja, in cooperation with the General Cultural Centre of the Hungarian Germans.
After the tests, the methodology and visual identity of the game were finalized and the Silver Bridge was presented publicly on 12 December at the "A Journey Connecting Communities - DANUrB+ Closing Conference'' in Budapest. Since then, the full package has been available digitally on the DANUrB International Association's website www.danurb.eu, but we also produced some hard copies which were presented at the conference.
Although we didn't use the final version of the Silver Bridge in the testing phase, we were still able to achieve a lot of our goals with local communities. We have received very positive feedback and we are already looking for resources and opportunities to continue working with stakeholders in Baja, for example.
Our very important goal is to translate the game and the handbook into 6 more languages and to organize teacher training courses to make it accessible to all Danube communities. In addition, we would like to start a summer camp-like student exchange program for children living along the Danube along the silver bridge game.
1 Native and foreign language communication: Children practice expressing concepts, thoughts, feelings, facts and opinions both orally and in writing. They encounter different language use situations, genres and types of texts and gain practice in using them.
2 Natural science competence: Children acquire knowledge about their living environment in a way that is appropriate for their age group, based on the fairy tale frame story and their own experiences. They encounter the concept of sustainable development and the issues of individual and community responsibility related to it in an experiential way.
3 Intercultural, social and civic competences: The program encourages children to approach their own and others' cultural backgrounds with interest and respect instead of stereotypes, and to regard the coexistence of different languages and traditions as an important part of the local heritage.
4 Cultural competence: children have the opportunity to express their thoughts, feelings, and experiences using a variety of creative techniques, as well as the experience of joint creation in addition to individual creation. In addition they encounter the local folk poetry tradition during the storytelling session, and many other cultural creations and knowledge during the walks.
5 Entrepreneurial competence: The fairy tale framework draws attention to the possibility of change and encourages personal participation in it. During individual and group planning tasks, children gain experience in planning and implementing solutions to tasks.
6 Relating competences to the ‘Sustainability competences’: These competencies are connected to sustainability competencies at several points, since the program translates the topics of sustainability into the language of 8-10-year-old children through fairy tales and illustrates them through concrete, local examples. In the fairy tale, Danube Fairies moved out of the human world due to the loss of their close-to-nature, idyllic world.
