Celebrating #Erasmusdays Part 2

This week five Year 3 students, accompanied by two teachers, Dr Polyviou and Mr Demetriou, are visiting the College Jules Ferry at Chambery, France, another Erasmus+ group student and job shadowing mobility funded by the Erasmus+ Accreditation Program. 

The five students aim to learn more about the French culture, develop their French speaking skills and stretch and challenge themselves in Maths while engaging in activities with five students from the local school. 

The College Jules Ferry is a Science and Maths oriented public middle school in France, which promotes and celebrates diversity. 
Our students are hosted by the families of five gifted French students and have been attending lessons and participating in projects and activities with them since Monday 10th of October. They are also enjoying the opportunity to practise their French with their hosts and teachers and learn about the history of Chambery, a beautiful medieval city which has been the capital of Savoie since the 13th century. 

Mr Demetriou is engaged in job shadowing at the school during this week and his aim is to find out about how the project-based learning methodology is used in different disciplines at the school to stretch and challenge gifted and talented students. Here are some of his impressions: 
‘There is no time pressure on covering a syllabus and they spend more time on projects. They play games like puzzles and labyrinths. The desks are arranged individually, handouts are at the back of the class where students go to collect them. Some students are engaged in group work while others work individually. The teacher observes and facilitates. Every student has a small whiteboard, glue, and scissors and all the handouts are pasted  into their exercise books. The games are created by gifted students and in the class there was a university student assisting the teacher.

In French lessons, they have sports equipment in class and students sit on gym balls. Bicycles in the class are a great idea as students exercise and listen as well. The teacher paid for this equipment but she has her own class, and the equipment is stored there. Students are allowed to draw as the teacher is reading a book aloud. Some students exercise while others are listening. They do not have books. 
 
In Art, the students work in groups of four, and using the project-based learning approach, they have 4 months to prepare a newspaper, which they will present in class and then to the whole school. 14-year-old students are marked using two different grade systems, colors and grades out of 20. In the last year of middle school, they have exams. During each presentation, the teacher gives feedback. 

Gifted and talented students move at a different pace, and they can skip a year, having the approval of the school’s Headmaster.’ 
 

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