Lugg class enjoyed some Spanish cooking during European Week recently!

I am really excited to be able to tell you that for the majority of this term we will have a resident Spanish teacher assigned to our school. Ana Garcia will be joining us from Monday 17 January and will be taking Spanish lessons in every class as well as supporting other activities and events in school, including an after school club. Ana is a Spanish teacher and will be visiting Hereford as part of a project led by the Spanish council. Look out for a Global Newsletter for more details.

This week has been Concern Universal week and on Wednesday 6th October Wye and Frome classes welcomed Jenny & Debbie from Concern Universal as they came to talk about the importance of water in Africa.



The children were able to see photos of Ghana and the water pumps that CU help to install in villages.  They also had the experience of carrying a heavy bucket of water around the school to gain some empathy with children in Africa that have to walk long distances to collect the water that their family needs that day.  Then they had to prioritise what they would use the water for.

This work also linked with the Key Stage Collective Worship this week.

Then to end the week we welcomed Agostinho, from Mozambique into school.  He took a whole school assembly and told the children about how many children in Mozambique don't go to school.  The children had lots of ideas about why this was the case and why education was important.

He then taught us all a dance, which we had great fun doing.

After the assembly, Agostinho, Mrs Broadbridge, Beth, Maggie and Jenny (from Concern Universal) were interviewed for Hereford & Worcester radio.

Then Agostinho spent time in Pentaloe and Frome classes answering questions from the children.

Mrs Broadbridge, Mrs Davies and Mrs Cooper went to Italy aspart of our Comenius Project. They were accompanied by children who stayed with local families.

We have come to the end of our two year Comenius project. We have had some fabulous experiences working with our partners across Europe. In all we have; exchanged information about our heritage and culture, contributed to a global calendar, created a collection of playground games, hosted 17 adults and three children at our school in February 2009, staff have visited Turkey, Spain and a school in Redditch, staff and children have visited Sweden and Italy and we have made many new friends. I would like to thank Mrs Broadbridge for co-ordinating the project for our school. The benefits to staff and children have been immense. By the end of this term we should know whether our application for another project has been successful. I will let you know in September about any further projects.

Mordiford School recently learnt about Project Mala at a wonderful assembly with Robin Garland.

Project Mala is a charity which started in 1989 to help children who work in the hand knotted carpet industry in north east India. Project Mala provides schools for working children so that if they do work to help out the family income, it will not be at the expense of their education.

The charity run six primary and two middle schools with over 1,200 children in full time education. The sponsorship fee of £9 per month for primary children and £15 per month for secondary children, covers the total costs of an individual child, including schooling, uniforms and midday meal.

We have sponsored a child, having raised money at our Harvest Festival last term.

Mrs Broadbridge and Mrs Parrett went to Spain as part of our school Comenius partnerships. They stayed a week and thoroughly enjoyed their time at the local school.

On Friday 16th October 2009 Mrs Broadbridge travelled to London to receive our prestigious Full International School Award.  This is awarded to the school as a recognition of our International Dimension work which we are embedding and promoting throughout school and the local community.
 

The award was presented by TV journalist George Alagiah and is valid for the next 3 years (2009 - 2012).