Greece meeting for 'Waterviews' Comenius five-school project

Canon P. Pullicino Girls' Secondary School, Rabat, was recently involved in an educational Comenius project meeting in Akrata, Greece. Ms Anne Vella and project Co-ordinator Maryanne Cassar joined delegates from the four other European schools involved in the second year of the project 'Waterviews'.

It was a very busy five-day visit with a full programme which gave a clear picture of what is happening in schools within the project.

During this visit Ms Vella and Ms Cassar met the staff and pupils of the third Akrata Primary School, which caters for students aged six to 12. Everyone showed great interest in Malta, asking about Malta, the language, habits and culture of the people.

About 20 letters from the sixth class were given to the Maltese teachers. The intention was to start corresponding with Maltese students both using and practising the English language.

Students from Form One now have the possibility to share their educational, social and cultural experiences with their Greek counterparts through letter writing and also through e-mail.

The students in the upper forms are already in constant contact with their pen friends from Germany and Italy.

Excellent work produced by the students was exhibited and exchanged. The creative aspects of, Waterviews, is being tackled by students using different media, such as painting water scenes during art lessons and material appliqué pictures during needlework lessons.

Feedback on the work produced by the Maltese, German, Italian, Finnish and Greek students was presented by each delegate at the meeting in Akrata. The Italians showed an audiovisual CD about Lodi.

Intensive work carried out so far was present and decisions taken on certain areas of the project which have yet to be implemented by the end of this scholastic year.

Photos and information about students' work were to be sent via e-mail to the project co-ordinator in Germany. These will in turn be sent to the other partners and used for the project Website and calendar.

Members from each country will write lyrics in their own language for the two project songs and provide a picture and some text about each student for the project newsletter.

An interesting activity for the foreign guests at this meeting was a visit to the Environmental Education Centre of Akrata, which belongs to the Ministry of National Education and Religion and is totally funded by the EU.

The centre aims to educate people, especially those who work in tourism and agriculture, teachers and students about the need to look after the environment.

The delegates also went to the Town Hall in Upper Akrata, where they met the Mayor and government officials. At Aigon they met education officials and talked about educational topics which are common to all.

This visit to Greece was enhanced by some cultural excursions to museums of archaeology and folklore, and to historical places of interest, like the ruins of ancient Corinth, the Acropolis of Mycenae and the old town of Nauplion.

All partners were invited to the school on the last day for an official farewell. The head of school thanked all teachers representing the schools participating in the project for having accepted his invitation to the meeting and for their co-operation towards the success of the project.

Each school was then presented with a certificate of attendance and a commemorative plaque. Finally, some students performed traditional Greek dancing accompanied by Greek folk music.

In April, colleagues from Greece will be visiting Malta and their partner school at Rabat. The first project meeting for the third year will be held in Malta in November. The five participating schools will be meeting to discuss, plan and evaluate the last year of the project.