Lifelong Learning programme - Comenius actions

Objectives and description of the action
 

Assistants receive grants to enable them to undertake an assistantship of three to ten months in a host school of another country participating in the Lifelong Learning Programme. The host school designates a fully qualified and experienced teacher to act as a supervisor for the Assistant. The tasks to which an Assistant may contribute include:

• assisting in classroom teaching, supporting pupils' group work and project-based teaching
• improving the pupil’s comprehension and expression in foreign languages, teaching the Assistant’s mother tongue
• providing support for pupils with special educational needs
• providing information on the Assistant’s country of origin
• introducing or reinforcing the European dimension in the host institution

Assistants should be fully integrated into school life. They are not supposed to act as fulltime teachers but to assist in teaching and other school activities (max 12 to 16 hours of school based activity are recommended).

Comenius Assistants may be based at more than one school, either to give extra variety to their work or to meet particular needs of neighbouring schools. Assistants may not work in more than 3 schools during their assistantship.
Assistants are selected by the National Agencies in their home country. They receive a grant which contributes towards travel and subsistence costs. No candidate may receive a Comenius Assistantship grant more than once.
 

Who can benefit?
 

• Persons who have studied for at least two years towards a qualification leading to a career as a teacher
• Future teachers of any school subject who have finished their teacher training but not yet regularly worked as a teacher