The aim of the text is to present the educational potential of selected books by Iwona Chmielewska - a Polish artist, illustrator, graphic artist. The attention was paid to the content of selected works by the author, which can be treated as tools conducive to work on the development of readers’ imagination and empathy. By analyzing the entire architecture of selected picture books by Chmielewska, they can be seen as an unlimited field that can be used to design „educational opportunities”. The text is an idea of going out to children with an art book, an encouragement to look for others with a similar wealth of metaphors and symbols, so that this type of literature becomes the subject of various forms of school and extracurricular education. The text is structured as follows: explain the meaning of the term picture book; emphasizing the importance of picturebooks in contemporary culture; an attempt to define the characteristic style of Iwona Chmielewska’s books; consider the importance of empathy and imagination for the cultural sensitization of the reader; presenting proposals for educational activities inspired by the books by Iwona Chmielewska. The content analysis method used in the methodology of qualitative research was used.

Empathy of future teachers and their intercultural sensitivity

This article is empirical. It presents the results of a study aimed at determining the level of empathy and intercultural sensitivity of future teachers. Preparation of teachers to fulfil the pedagogical role of school, especially in the current situation caused by the war in Ukraine and the enrolment of approximately 200,000 Ukrainian children into the Polish education system, involves the necessity of adequate training of candidates for this profession. What is significant in this context is the definition of empathy, which should be understood as the ability to respectfully understand the other person and the inner power that guides and motivates an individual to pro-social behaviour. Another important element of that definition is cultural sensitivity understood as an indicator of cross-cultural communication ability, manifested in the readiness to interact with people from different cultures. The study was conducted employing a diagnostic survey with the use of a revised version of the Empathic Understanding Questionnaire by Andrzej Węgliński and the scale of intercultural sensitivity developed by Guo- Ming Chen and William Starosta in the Polish adaptation of Dariusz Majerk and Mariusz Korczyński. The survey involved students in pedagogical faculties from various higher education institutions in Poland. The results of the study reveal the need for pedagogical preparation of future teachers to fulfil their professional role to the highest possible extent.

Game as a tool for developing intercultural competence on the example of the Culture Crossover Project

In today’s world of rapid socio-cultural changes, which also include increased migration movements and the formation of culturally diverse societies, there is a need to implement methods and tools of educational work for the formation of attitudes of tolerance in multicultural communities. One of the effective educational tools used in intercultural education can be game. One of the most valuable types of games in this area are those that allow learning about cultures and the cultural differences resulting from them, referring not only to observable behaviour, but also to the hierarchy of values that form the core of the identity of a given social group – national, ethnic or religious one. The article is devoted to the presentation of an educational game created as part of the international Culture Crossover project. The theoretical and methodological assumptions of the game refer to Milton Benett’s DMIS and Geert Hofstede’s cultural dimensions. The educational goal is to increase cultural awareness and develop empathy towards culturally different people by taking into account various elements of intercultural learning – from information about a particular culture, through knowledge of cultural norms and the ability to adopt local perspectives to critical understanding of the worldviews of other cultures.