eTwinning UK

What have you done today to make you feel proud?

 

An apt school song for St Luke's Special School, Redbourn. As a linguist I have been put to shame by these students. Performing at their 'Stars of St Luke's Award Ceremony' students with perfect hearing stood alongside their hearing-impaired classmates and demonstrated equality, respect and sheer talent in their signing of their new school song.

Their talent does not stop at their aptitude for sign language. The school is literally draped in the outstanding art work created by students of St Luke's, some of whom have recently sat their Art GCSE. The Awards ceremony also marked the unveiling of another tremendous sculpture which the students collaborated on with artist Philip Melling.

For the first time in this school's history, 3 students have also received their Silver Duke of Edinburgh Award. In addition to a sea of presentations for academic effort and achievement a group of students also performed a mixture of contemporary and traditional dance: a thoroughly enjoyable evening and an absolute honour to have been invited.

Congratulations to eTwinning Ambassador John Warwick for being part of such an inspirational school and for the positive impact of his international work.

In September staff and students of St Luke's will attend the Paralympics... but for now they are the stars.

http://www.stlukes.herts.sch.uk/

eTwinning in North East England

eTwinning attended the recent ATLAS “International School” conference in Durham. This event brings together schools from all over North East England, and is a day long event to learn about the opportunities available, and benefits of, international school linking.

This year’s event was held at the Radison Hotel by the River Wear in Durham. There were about 80 teachers from across the North East present, and we heard from a number of schools and educationalists about their experience in school linking, how this fits into the curriculum, and how it complements the Spiritual, Moral, Social, and Cultural Development agenda, which was the overarching theme of the day.

Some of the teachers presenting their case studies brought their pupils along, and it was refreshing to hear their opinions of what a school link meant to them. Pupils from Langley Moor Primary School talked about their memories of how a Comenius Assistant from Hungary had enlivened their classroom by teaching them about Hungarian music, language, and culture. And we were treated to Indian dancing from pupils from Gateshead who had a Connecting Classrooms link with Rajkot in India.

“Positivity” and “confidence” were two key words that cropped up throughout the day, and it was inspiring to hear how the various programmes - from eTwinning and Comenius to the International School Award and Connecting Classrooms - had helped engender this in both the classroom and the staff room.

If you are a teacher in North East England and want to find out more, you can visit the Europe
Direct North East wiki page here http://europedirectne.wikispaces.com/home

To find out more about British Council school links visit http://schoolsonline.britishcouncil.org/  

 

To get started on eTwinning, register on the site http://www.etwinning.net, or write to us at eTwinning@britishcouncil.org. Your North East eTwinning regional officer can advise, and help you make the first steps

Show(er)ing success in Kent

Isabelle comes to the front of the hall and collects her award with a big grin. The room is filled with floods of applauding parents and students. The students are louder. In the past academic year this 7 year old has read 93 books about water.

It appears at St Albans Road Infant School, Kent, the impact of eTwinning is quite literally measurable; the students have created graphs which prove it. Competing with their European peers, in the autumn term students at St Albans read an average of 5.6 books from their Water library. Unveiling the results in December they discovered that their success had been diluted by higher results achieved by Spain. Motivated by the tough competition St Albans' average rose to an immersing 14.5 in the summer term. Numeracy skills are just as drenched into this project as literacy. The year twos have measured the water meter at stages throughout the year and practiced their subtraction to work out the school's water consumption in a given time period. Shockingly, the 'water saving' posters the students have artistically created have had a tidal impact, as water usage has notably reduced in all participating schools throughout the course of the project.

The award ceremony is a high profile event: parents are not the only guests, the Mayor is also there to award the students their certificates. The students perform songs about water in not only French but also Norweigan.

Award winning eTwinning project 'Treasure Island' has brought together eight European schools and one Chilean. It is undisputedly cross-curricular and is splashed across the majority of the school's dispalys. eTwinning Ambassador Rita  Stoskiene should feel flooded with pride as the impact this project has had on this school demonstrates that it is truely a treasure.

 

 

Get your classroom healthy and active - join Global Children’s Challenge™

The Global Children's Challenge™ is a FUN and FREE classroom—based health initiative designed to get children from all over the world active and instill in them the habit and importance of daily exercise for the rest of their lives.

Open to classes all over the world in the last three years of primary/elementary school, the Global Children's Challenge™ is facilitated by teachers and empowers children to change their relationship with exercise, their bodies and the environment. The benefits extend beyond making exercise easy and fun – an interactive world tour component also complements the curriculum and covers everything from geography and social studies to history, maths and technology. So, besides stepping up their physical activity levels, students also learn about other countries, towns, cities, and the day-to-day lives of similar aged children from different cultures all around the world.

Proudly sponsored by the Global Corporate Challenge®, the Global Children's Challenge™ operates at no cost to child, school or government.

This year’s event starts Wednesday 19 September and is set to be the biggest and best yet! From Melbourne to Minsk, we’ve already had more than 2,000 classes register for consideration! As part of the Challenge, each student will receive a pedometer, personal step booklet and access to the interactive Global Children's Challenge™ event website. Plus, teachers receive access to a selection of program and curriculum support resources.

To put YOUR class in the running to join the fun, register NOW (with your special priority code: activeclass) at www.gccjunior.org/apply.

 

 

 

Congratulations Shaw Wood Primary!

Well done to Patrick Carroll and his class at Shaw Wood Primary, who returned from the Houses of Parliament on 19th June, where they collected a £1,200 prize for winning the Yorkshire and Humber section of the ‘Make IT Happy’. This prize was awared in connection to the work they did on their eTwinning project.

We are really pleased to see that they have had some outside recognition for their wonderful work on eTwinning!

 

Teacher's Account of the eTwinning PDW in Lithuania for STEM teachers

^Group picture of over 20 nationalities of teachers and NSS who attended the PDW. 

 

Thanks to everyone who welcomed us to Lithuania and provided such an interesting, and most importantly, fruitful PDW. 

The level of expertise and experience of the presenters as well as the delegates helped create a meaningful experience and encouraged the creation of exciting links and projects which I personally have started preparing for already. The PDW was enlightening and informative – especially on the use of technologies for learning (a particular interest of mine) – and the opportunity to establish links and get e-twinning started for our school was worth the long journey.

I know the UK party all made useful links and got a great deal from the experience (not forgetting a visit to the icebar!). On returning from Lithuania I was able to communicate my enthusiasm to colleagues at Our Lady Queen of Peace in Lancashire so expect more e-twinners from our IT and geography departments soon.  Hope to meet up again soon –  virtually or in person and give our learners the opportunity to work together.

 

Written by N.Dunbar, Assistant Head Teacher

Our Lady Queen of Peace Catholic Engineering College, Skelmersdale, England