Organizing a welcome ceremony for the BEHAS partners Activities connected to the celebration of the European Day of Languages

BEHAS ERASMUS+ PROJECT

Our school The 6th primary school of Komotini We have 13 classes 279 students in total. A lot of them come from different linguistic environments (Turkish, Russian, Rom, Armenian). 30 teachers of many specialties Subjects that are taught are: Greek language, Maths, History, Geography, Religious Education, P.E., I.C.T., Drama, Art, Music, Environmental Studies, Citizenship, English, German, French

The school building

Our teachers’ team

The students participating in the activities The 47 students of the two classes of the 6th grade

Our students are taught 3 foreign languages in the 6th grade Samples of the English, French and German language coursebooks

We attended an info day on EDL, where we came up with very interesting ideas European Day of Languages: Teaching Language in Primary Education

We started planning our activities on the celebration of the EDL

Preparation-cooperation-invitations We contacted the Directorate and arranged to organize a welcome ceremony for the BEHAS partners on 13/12/2017 in our school premises. The 2nd Minority Primary School of Komotini was invited to participate in the celebration. We invited the Director of the Directorate, the school counselors and the teachers of the schools which participate in the BEHAS project in the ceremony. We specified the content of the activities and how teachers and students will be involved.

Content of the activities We decided to: present our school to the partners. Most of the information was decided to be collected by the students. perform two songs in Greek and English. create gift-cards for the partners. create air-balloon crafts with the flags of each partner. organize a mini-drama activity, in which students welcome the visitors in their language and pin up the balloons on the map around Komotini. the 2nd Minority Primary School decided to perform 3 songs in Greek, Turkish and English, one of which combined dancing and singing. They also created gift-cards for the guests.

The aims of the activities Our main aims were: To develop various skills on the students’ part, such as speaking foreign languages, singing in foreign languages, creating handicraft items and dramatization. To promote experiential learning. To cooperate with another school in order to organize a welcome ceremony. To decrease stereotypes concerning the students’ linguistic and cultural origin, highlighting the equal value of every language and culture. To involve students in using various tools and webtools for classroom activities.