"EU-READ&ART. The first European Digital Library of Book Trailers and Creative Expressions" was born from the synergy of 7 partners representing 6 Countries that are facing the same challenges teaching and training adult learners, low skilled at the level of basic literacy, languages, and digital competencies with the direct consequence of very high level of demotivation, isolation and unemployment. Quoting our main point of reference, the Council Recommendation for Lifelong Learning, "Literacy is the ability to identify, understand, express, create, and interpret concepts, feelings, facts and opinions in both oral and written forms, using visual, sound/audio and digital materials across disciplines and contexts. It implies the ability to communicate and connect effectively with others, in an appropriate and creative way developing literacy forms the basis for further learning and further linguistic interaction". A survey among partners underlined the presence of another worrying phenomenon affecting adults in our nowadays society: the so-called functional illiteracy. Despite having a successful formal education career, adults can become functional illiterates.
Functional illiteracy means that a person cannot use reading, writing, and calculation skills for his/her own and the community’s development. Functional illiteracy has considerable negative effects not only on personal development but also in economic and social terms. Adult educators and trainers need to be equipped with new digital skills after more than a year of pandemic and "on-off" lockdowns, forced to teach online using video conferencing tools. There's a strong need to meet again students, in our case, adult learners, who suffered isolation and evidently decreased the level of learning success especially in basic skills like literacy and languages. Everyone has become more digital in the use of devices and mobile phones, most of the time, social media addicted. Texting messages, chatting, living between a lesson and another, connecting with links created the effects that the level of illiterate or functional illiterate increased. Reading is extremely important and books are precious but they are at risk of disappearing. Thanks to the guidelines of the new Erasmus Program and of the EU Strategy 2021-2027 this project is in line with the three pillars: Green, Digital, and Inclusive. Green because it's based on reading books which are ecological and represent culture. Culture is at the base of being ecological, respecting nature being aware of the importance to building “sustainability”. Inclusive because Reading is an inclusive process if facilitated and animated by professional educators and book lovers. Being literate is an exercise of “citizenship” and inclusion. Digital is another keyword: the final result is "The first European Digital Library of Book Trailers and Creative Expressions''. As said, books are precious but realizing book-trailers permit the development of important digital, literacy and communication skills very useful to be spent in the labor market. Its teamwork and media products are powerful tools for Dissemination and Valorization of the project. Book trailers are smart, sharable and they help to promote books, their writers, the same video-makers, the Erasmus Plus Program and the mosaic of cultures around the world.