Visibility of eTwinning Projects Group July 2014 Newsletter
-----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------audience and that they had a purpose for their
learning. We also had a “students’ area” within the
blog, where pupils could communicate with one
another more freely. In my opinion, this was one of
the most successful aspects of the projects, as
pupils helped one another out with their language
learning, my learners supporting the French
students with their English and the French students
helping out my students. At the end of the project,
many classes had benefitted from the project,
learning about life in France as well as improving
their French language.
Once aware of all of the benefits that eTwinning had
to offer, I was keen to involve as many students as
possible in international projects. The following
year, we worked on projects that were aimed at
widening pupil cultural knowledge as well as
improving their foreign language use. We
established a link with a school in the Netherlands,
even running an exchange to work on a history
project about life in the trenches during WW1 and
life in Victorian England. I know that this project
had a profound influence not only on the students
involved but also on me. Some pupils even returned
to the Netherlands on their summer holidays with
their families. We also ran another English
Language project about local environmental issues,
again something that students were keen to take
part in and see what other countries were doing to
be environmentally aware.
What does eTwinning hold in store for us in the
future? Well, we have a centenary WW1 history
project with a school in Normandy on the horizon
next year as well as a cook book in German.
Furthermore, we have a new member of staff
joining us who has run eTwinning projects in the
past and plans to involve his classes in more
projects, so it looks like eTwinning will continue to
grow in this area of the northeast of England. For
me, eTwinning has become an integral part of my
teaching and has given me opportunities and
experiences that I could never have enjoyed
previously.
Thank you, eTwinning!
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In more recent years, Michel our school bear, went
on a trip around Europe whilst completing a wiki
diary in French. He had a really great time in
Spain, Poland, Romania, Turkey and Scotland and
my students were able to keep up with his travels,
while improving their French at the same time. The
work they completed as a result of the project was
fantastic. We also took part in the highly successful
Rainbow Village Project, which has also led to us
creating a unit of work within school where pupils
create their own country in French or German.
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