The method:

The method’s implementation manner during the project:  

Method’s result:

Workshops

During the stage in the French Guyana, the participants were grouped in several thematic workshops, of 3, 5 or 8 persons, depended on the proposed activity type. For example, the workshop for discovering the decorative activities was split in groups of 8 people, each group having specific tasks.

Working grouped on thematic workshops, the volunteers were better guided by the facilitators, who could work separately with each participant when difficulties occurred. The workshops are very important, because they settled, through practice, theoretical notions accumulated during the training and continuously developed the abilities and aptitudes obtained before.  

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Study visits

The Romanian volunteers realized numerous study visits, such as the field visits together with employees from the Amana Natural Reservation, in order to observe the reservation’s biodiversity, particularly, the bats and birds colonies. 

This non-formal education method permitted the assimilation of new knowledge regarding the biodiversity on one hand, and the other hand, the development of the abilities in working with people. A very important component of this method consists in the bilateral experience exchange, through which the perceptions in front of the reality studied are compared and the personal experiences are shared. 

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Brainstorming

This method has been used during the pre-departure and on-arrival trainings, and during the evaluation.  In the brainstorming sessions, the participants offered key words for the discussion topics, which were written on paper by the trainer in the order they were mentioned.  

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With this method, solutions to the topic put under discussion were found faster than using a regular communication method. 

Facilitated discussions

On the facilitated discussions process, opinions and experiences exchange between the participants or between the participants and persons from different organizational structures which were present in the project during its unfold had been moderated. A very good example in this sense is given by the discussions that took place during the trainings, in which the facilitator prepared the interest sides of the discussion in advance, controlled the timings and noted on the flipchart the important conclusions.  

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The result of this method consisted in the ideas and the conclusions, which came out of it; in this way, the participants in the discussions managed to better systemize the information, the expectations and the interest points.   

Individual interviews

The interviews took place in two steps: the first one while recruiting the participant members, and the second, during the evaluation, when each volunteer had an individual session with a trainer who kept his/her neutrality during the discussions. The opinions and the experiences revealed by each volunteer were used in a better selection of the participants in the project, in the sense that everyone acknowledged the project’s purpose and objectives.  During the evaluation individual interviews, the volunteers together with the trainer evaluated in which manner the aptitudes and the obtained knowledge developed in this project corresponded to the personal learning needs.

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The result of this method can be found in the acknowledgement level of the non-formal learning methods, in which each selected volunteer after the interview applied during the stage in the French Guyana. 

Evaluation questioners

 The participants completed periodically individual evaluation forms, in which they evaluated the list of new competences and abilities obtained or improved, indicating, in the same time, the level of satisfaction or realization on the activities and came up with suggestions and recommendations for further activities.     The facilitators were at the participants disposition for possible questions or vagueness found in the forms   

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This method contributed to a better image on the own aptitudes and competences accumulated during the project, fact realized by their systematization made by each participant on the evaluation questioners.

Ecological activity on the beach

The beach ecological activity was realized in an organized way, together with the employees from the Amana Natural Reservation, who offered the volunteers the support in identifying the manner in which the beach should be cleaned and the physical means necessary for this activity.   

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The method had a very big impact on the volunteers in the awareness regarding the dangers for the environment and the factors, which degrade it. In addition, this method grew the participants’ sensibility towards the environmental problems.

Public presentations

The public presentations organized by the AMICUS volunteers with the help from the Library in the Awala locality, the Amana Natural Reservation and the villages’ administration of Awala-Yalimapo, had as purpose to inform the public about the results of the Action-Reaction-Interaction project, and to inform the local community about the opportunities which the European volunteering programs are offered to the youth, especially to the young people with limited opportunities.       The resources used in this activity were: brochures, photographs that presented the activities realized in the project, materials on optic support (CD) with similar activities in other volunteering projects realized by Millennium Center Association with the help of the Youth in Action program.  The biggest impact was held by the direct communication with members from the local community, who came to the presentations. 

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This method improved the communication and the organizational abilities of the participants in the project, through their active implication in the organization and the support of the presentations.

“Door to door” Information and distribution of promotional and informational materials

The volunteers developed an information campaign regarding the prevention of the risks generated by the abusive use of alcohol and drugs, campaign which was headed especially towards the youngsters from the local communities of Awala-Yalimapo. The impact of this campaign was spread towards the other age categories, since the youngsters disseminated the received information even further. During this campaign, the Romanian volunteers realized the action of distributing promotional materials in the villages of Awala and Yalimapo, these got in direct contact with the villagers by approaching and discussing with them directly to their houses.  

The method improved the relational abilities with actors from the local community, in the same time, putting in account their linguistic competences.

Photo exhibition

As part of the project, the volunteers realized two photo exhibitions, one at the Mediatec in the Awala locality, which kept its’ continuity in the Amana Natural Reservation’s centre and another one as part of the information stall on the AMICUS program present at the Kalin’a games in the Yalimapo locality.  Through this photo expositions, the volunteers emphasized the actions realized during the project, stimulating and encouraging similar initiatives among the visitors, who were pleasantly surprised to see that the authors of the activities shown in the photos are present at the exposition and manifested their interest in individual continuation of some of these actions, especially the ones that facilitate the cultural artistic exchange and the opportunities which the European volunteering programs are offered to the youth with limited opportunities. 

With this method, the volunteers developed their teamwork skill through tackling appropriate measures to put in account the visibility of the activities realized in the local community. 

Promotion on the web

The participants in the project had to their disposition a web site, where they presented the result of the realized activities, through articles, video and photo materials, structured on the type of the activity. The created and presented materials had been processed by the volunteers during the stage and offer a good image on the realized activities.

 The presentation of the activities on the website increased the level of visibility towards the activities and the results of the project in the virtual space. Through the realization and the systematization of the information uploaded on the site, the volunteers formed new organizational and time management abilities, and improved their capacity in the selection and process of the materials. In this section, new aptitudes were obtained for processing and editing materials on the computer.

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Public projection and visualization

As part of the campaign for the prevention of the abusive use of the alcohol and drugs, the volunteers facilitated the public visualization of some video materials with the purpose to attract to targeted public’s attention to the risks the abusive consumption of the alcohol and drugs have on the young people.  

The volunteers developed the communicational skills with the public present, of speaking in public, in the same time increasing their level of awareness to the risks that the abusive consumption of the alcohol and drugs can appear among young people and growing the level of sensibility among the present people at this meeting regarding this problem.

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The realization and transmission of press releases

The volunteers realized and transmitted weekly press releases in the mass-media environment, in which they presented the activities carried until that point in the project, informing and disseminating, in this way, information related to the opportunities the young people have through the European youth programs, like the AMICUS program.  

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The transmission of press releases raised the project’s level of visibility with the help of the mass-media means and implicitly they informed the wide public on the opportunities offered to the young people by the AMICUS program. 

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Mail-boxes and the “angel” system

At the beginning of the stage in the French Guyana, there were posted mailboxes made out of paper for each participant and trainer, in order to facilitate the feedback during the stage. In addition, each participant, by drawing of lots, received an “angel” among the rest of the participants, responsible with small presents which to correspond with the unwillingly expressed wishes of the protected one throughout the stage. 

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This method increased the number of the received feedbacks by teach volunteer and contributing to the good atmosphere among them in all the cases.

The matrix of expectations, fears and contributions 

At the pre-departure training, the volunteers realized a matrix of the expectations, fears and contributions they will have in the project. The facilitators confronted this matrix with the reality, all along the project’s process, the personal implication of the each participant in the project being controlled in a better way. 

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This method contributed to the efficient task attribution during the project, fact that was realized according to the expectations and the list of contributions that each of the participants could have in the project.