Project description

Traditional regions are an example of a complex type of region that starts from the process of socialization of the population in a certain area during a long-term intergenerational process of transmitting specific value systems and patterns of behavior characteristic of a certain area.

An individual’s regional affiliation refers to the experience of a space according to its unique elements, which also become distinctive elements in relation to other areas, especially neighboring ones.

In the Croatian education system, traditional regions, as bearers of regional identity, are not taught due to the lack of a single principle of regionalization, although forms of subnational identification are based precisely on them. The modern education system does not sufficiently emphasize local identities and regional cultural diversity, which leads to a weakening of the sense of spatial belonging, especially among young people. The names of traditional regions continuously appear both in textbooks and professional literature and in public discourse, and more recently, through the process of commodification, traditional regions are presented as tourist products on the globalized, especially tourist market.

The issue of national, regional and cultural identity is of utmost importance in contemporary Croatian society and the education system, especially in the context of globalization and European integration. This project is highly relevant because it directly responds to the need to strengthen awareness of one’s own identity and cultural heritage among students and teachers, which is also recognized in national curriculum documents. The results will provide the necessary scientific basis for shaping future educational policies and practices in this area.

The project will be carried out in several phases. In the first phase, the emphasis is on analyzing the representation of regional identity and heritage topics in the national curriculum and analyzing the methods of their teaching, the potential for creating student research papers and school projects. Interdisciplinary research of traditional regions (geography, history, natural sciences) will also be undertaken, including field research in selected pilot regions to gain insight into the perception of identity. In the next phase, a theoretical model will be developed for the isolation and analysis of traditional regions (analysis of identity elements of spatial identification) by synthesizing geographical, historical and natural science knowledge. Innovative, interdisciplinary educational materials for primary schools will be created to help empower teachers in connecting identity-forming elements with formal education (speech, customs, heritage, architecture, history, landscape, biodiversity). The emphasis should be on active learning methods, and the team’s experience in developing textbooks and didactic materials is crucial for this phase. The final part of the project includes implementation and evaluation, i.e. the developed educational model and materials will be piloted and evaluated in partner schools in selected traditional regions.

The results of this project will be presented at scientific conferences and published in scientific journals. The created educational materials based on the theoretical model will be included in the professional education of a larger number of teachers, and then piloted in schools in selected regions.