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International Visits
All
about Me, All about You, All about Us
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Meeting in Iruñea |
Meeting in
Falkansee | Meeting in
Manchester
Meeting in
Manchester: May 2009
Wednesday 20th May
We met up again for the
second time in 2009 at Beaver Road Primary School in
Didsbury, Manchester.
It was great to see old friends and new. The children of
Beaver Road had prepared a welcome for their visitors with
posters and displays on corridors and walls. There was lots
of excitement about seeing all the bears together in person!
In the morning our visitors spent time in different
classrooms and with various age groups – Year Five and Year
Three - watching (and joining in!) collaborative teaching
methods (Kagan Structures). They also watched a performance
by Reception Class children who had been studying
‘Minibeasts’ and observed the Year Sixes experimenting with
forces and gravity in making Marble Runs.
Our visitors saw how reading through phonics was taught to
Year Ones.
At lunchtime we visited the highly rated local Jem&I
restaurant for a meal, calling in at Harriet and Dee’s gift
shop.
We then discussed our plans for the Partnership for next
year.
Later that afternoon Natalie Marshall the Chair of Governors
invited all our visitors to her home in Didsbury for a
traditional tea of scones and cups of freshly brewed tea.
Natalie lives in a Victorian house very typical of this part
of Manchester.
In the evening the staff of Beaver Road joined our visitors
for a traditional drink at a local pub – the Metropolitan in
West Didsbury – before a delicious meal at the Gurkha Grill,
a Nepalese restaurant owned by Raj, a parent at Beaver Road.
Thursday 21st May
Time to learn more about
the history and culture of Manchester.
In pouring rain (very typical of Manchester – the ‘Rainy
City’!) our visitors met at the Town Hall in the centre of
Manchester. The inside of the building is lavishly and
richly decorated, with mosaic floors bearing the "bees",
symbols of Manchester's industry, and has wall murals by
Ford Madox Brown. A statue of the Roman Governor, Agricola,
surveys Albert Square. He had founded the original fort of
Mamuciam, from which the city began, and is thus honoured by
a statue over the main front entrance to the Town Hall. The
building dominates the square, with its monument to Prince
Albert, Queen Victoria's consort.
We were taken on a tour of some of Manchester’s famous
historical sites – Central Library, Town Hall, Victoria
Station built in 1844, John Rylands University Library, Free
Trade Hall (site of the Peterloo Massacre in 1819), GMex,
Midland Hotel and shown examples of the modern architecture
springing up all over the city following the IRA bombing in
1996 – Spinningfields, Arndale Centre, Northern Quarter.
Back at the magnificent Victorian Town Hall which was
completed in 1887 in the neo-gothic style by Alfred
Waterhouse, we were invited to the Lord Mayor’s rooms to
meet Alison Firth the new Mayor of Manchester.
The Lord Mayor warmly greeted our visitors and was very
interested in our Comenius project spending over an hour
talking with her guests.
From here we moved on to Castlefield, the historic old
industrial centre of Manchester with its canals, railways
and warehouses.
In the afternoon our visitors were given a guided tour
around the Manchester Museum of Science and Industry and the
very first passenger railway station in the world. The
Museum is a celebration of how Manchester became one of the
richest cities in the world by the beginning of the 20th
century – its wealth built on the cotton industry.
The Museum also focuses on the other side of the city’s
industrial past – poverty, slum housing, poor food and water
supply, factory exploitation and high mortality – and how
radical politics and great reformers helped alleviate the
worst of these.
In the evening we celebrated the visitors with a visit to
the Teppanyaki Restaurant for a flamboyant display and
tasting of the best of Japanese cuisine.
The evening was rounded off by a visit to the Cloud Bar high
up in the Beetham Tower, at 47 storeys the tallest in the
city – giving a 360 degree panoramic view over Manchester.
Friday 22nd May
More history and culture
as we travelled away from Manchester to Lyme Park on the
edge of the Peak District to the south east.
Lyme Park is one of the great English country houses now
owned by the National Trust but once the home of the Legh
family whose wealth came fro ownership of coal mines in
Lancashire.
The House was the location for the film ‘Pride and
Prejudice’.
A guided tour around the House and a light lunch in the
restaurant brought our visit to an end.
Many thanks to Julie
Mellish and David How and their colleagues at Beaver Road
for hosting our visit.
On to Marseille in
September!
Timetable for Comenius Visit
Participants in the
Comenius Group
From Coleraine Ruth, Bertha + 2 others
From Marseille Vera, Genevieve
From Irunea Pello, Oihane, Nerea
From Falkensee Katrin H, Katrin B, Henry
Wednesday 20th May
9.30 Meet at Beaver Road Primary School
Shown around the School by David
10.30-11.00 Morning break
11.00-12.30 In classes to observe teaching and
learning
11.00-11.30 Early Years (3 to 6 year olds)
11.30-12.30 Year 3,4,5,6 (7/8 – 10/11 year olds)*
12.30-1.30 Lunch with our staff
1.30-2.30 Around our countries – meeting the
children who have studied each of your countries
2.30-3.30 Discussion on what we have observed today
and on the Comenius Project.
4.00-5.00 Afternoon tea at David’s house (optional)
Free time
6.30 Meet at the Metropolitan Pub in West Didsbury
7.30 Gurkha Grill (Indian/Nepalese Meal) –
restaurant owned by one of our parents
Thursday 21st May
9.30 Meet at Manchester Town Hall and hopefully with
Lord Mayor!
11.00 Tour of city of Manchester
1.00 Lunch at Dukes 92 pub/restaurant (approx £10
per person)
Visit Castlefield (Roman Fort, canals and railways)
2.30-3.30 Manchester Museum of Science and Industry
Free time
7.00 Meet at Teppanyaki’s in Manchester, a famous
Japanese Restaurant
(approx £25 per person)
Followed by drinks in Cloud 23 bar (highest building
in Manchester)
Friday 22nd May
9.00 Meet at Beaver Road School
Leave to visit Lyme Park
Glorious mansion house, surrounded by stunning
gardens, moorland and ancient deer park
-
A Tudor
house transformed into a huge Italianate palace
in the 18th century
-
Tranquil
Victorian garden, with roses, reflection lake
and sunken parterre
-
Vast
medieval deer park, moorland and woodland estate
to explore
-
Famous scene
in Pride & Prejudice (1995)
10.00 Morning tea
10.45-11.45 Tour of the House
Time to explore the gardens
1.0 Lunch - Farewell to our visitors
*Celebration hour at
School (11.30 to 12.30 on 20 May)
All about You!
Year 3- Ireland
Year 4- France
Year 5-Spain
Year 6- Germany
Songs, crafts,
Children’s questions to our visitors
Food tasting session
Meeting in
Iruñea: March 2009
Wednesday 25th March
Early in
the morning we met up at school and visited all the building
and some classes. All the kids loved to see the bears and
they all wanted to have kiss and hug them.
At the break time, there was a special brunch ready for
getting the foreign and the local teachers together. For all
of us a nice time to try and use the little English some of
us know and to make as many gestures as we do when we are
teaching.
All the tasty food (potato omelette, txistorra and ham) was
accompanied by the charming melody of the txistus (typical
Basque instrument).
We got on a bus at midday to move towards the Town Hall
where they were waiting for us to make a reception to the
project members. Emotive words were said there that
encouraged us to go on doing our best.
After that the lovely sun shine made our visit to the city
very warm and nice, even though we needed to rest a bit.
The Navarre Counsellor of Education welcomed us in the
Palace of Navarre, giving us a wider view of the county and
congratulating us for running the project.
After such a tiring day, there were some of us that still
felt like meeting for having a drink at night and some
others rested, because the following day was not less
exciting.
Thursday
26th March
The
programme for Thursday was absolutely different from the
previous day. We took off our smart dresses and suits and
put on our casual clothes for this trip day.
Firstly we welcomed Molly and Marius and took them to visit
some other classes, as the kids were looking forwards to
seeing them.
Once we were all at school, we got on the bus that took us
to Otazu vineyards. We did not only have the opportunity to
know about the process of making wine, but also to taste the
products and sit a bit in the sunshine. Our red chicks
showed that the wine and the sun were making us feel
cheerful.
Some of us felt asleep on the way to Astitz where a guide
was waiting for us to show us the magical caves. We were
astonished by the prettiness and peace that it could be
breathed in that place.
It was about 15:30 when we arrived in Oderitz. We were
starving by that time but it was worth waiting because the
thick beef sticks were gorgeous. At the sound of “txotx”
everyone stood up to get the “sagardo” and that is how we
spent the meal.
Afterwards, we asked the waiter for a handball ball (Basque
traditional sport) and we hit it with our hands. There was
no way to cure our pumped and painful hands. In was good
fun, though!
Friday
27th March
We spent
the morning at school working hard and to end up the meeting
Amaia shared with all the teachers and bears a lovely
performance she had prepared along with the year 6 students.
It was lovely to have you all in Iruñea during these days!!
Thank you very much!
Meeting in
Falkansee: November 2008
On 10
November 2008 teachers from the five participating countries
met up for the first time in Falkansee, Germany.
Our hosts were colleagues from the Europaschule am Gutspark.
These photographs were taken by Beaver Road Primary School
in England.
We visited classrooms around the Europaschule and met many
staff and children.
In these photographs you can see the children greeting their
visitors with a special song for the occasion (sung in very
good English!).
We were
very impressed with the language skills of the children - we
have a lot to learn in England about the teaching of modern
foreign languages to children!
A much larger proportion of children come to school on
bicycles compared to England.
The children were without exception bright, polite and
really interested in their visitors.
The
first meeting of any new venture is probably the most
important meeting of all. Most of the teachers and
Headteachers in the Comenius Partnership had not met before,
although three of the schools did have previous Partnership
experience with other schools in other countries.
The purpose of the meeting was to decide on the initial
activities to be undertaken in each of the schools.
We also needed to agree a calendar of visits to each others'
countries.
And (perhaps most important of all!), everyone was
introduced to their very own bear.
Our colleagues from the Europaschule were fantastic hosts.
They gave up their own time to make sure we felt welcome in
their country and together we learned much about the
culture, geography and history of Berlin, Spandau, Potsdam
and Falkansee itself, during our few days there.
Contrary
to the evidence from the photos we did not spend all our
time eating and drinking! Just some of the time!
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Colleagues from
Ecole Parc de Bellevue celebrating their visit to
Falkansee. |
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