Strategic Partnerships
for School Education
1st Project meeting in Greece – Primary School of Mesimeri
Saturday 24 of January – Saturday 31 of January 2015
The first meeting in Greece was successful. The Greek school “Primary school of Mesimeri“ in Edessa organized the whole program successfully and we followed it absolutely. The participants were: from Turkey Mr. Fikret ÖZNALÇIN, Mr. Recep AKÇAKAYA, Mrs. Sema AKÇAKAYA and two pupils Zeliha Nur Ayranpinar and Ipek Polat, from Spain Mrs. Amparo Torrens Bario and Mrs Marta Manzadena Garcia, from Portugal Mrs. Guiomar Silva, Mr. Bernardino Carvalho and two pupils Diogo Silva and Miguel Monteiro, from France Mrs Severine Louat, from Poland Mrs. Anna PAKURA, Mrs. Renata DOMACHOWSKA and three pupils Julia RUTKIEWICZ, Agata DWOREK and Magda GRZELAK, from Lithuania Mrs. Edita Montvilienė and Mrs. Ingrida Kačinskienė. The Scottish partners could not be with us in this meeting.
Here you can see step by step all the activities. During Saturday 24 and Sunday 25 of January have been the arrivals of the participants. We took all our guests by bus from Thessaloniki HOTEL TELIONI and we went to Mesimeri village to give the pupils to the hosting families they were waiting for us. After it we went to Edessa and the colleagues settled in Hotel Alfa. We organized also a light dinner.
On Monday morning, the first day of the project, we went to school and we welcomed our guests with local drinks and snacks. We had a welcome speech from our Director Giannis Hatzoglou. The Greek pupils sang and danced for the guests and then we had a lot of presentations and videos from all the countries and partner schools. Some women from Mesimeri village showed to our guests how to prepare traditional meals, like “tiropita”, which is a cheese pie, “tzatziiki” salad and “trahana” soup. The parents association prepared a lunch for all guests with many local meals, salads and sweets. In the afternoon we went to Edessa and our guests had a free time.
On Wednesday, the third day of the project, we had an excursion to important, historical areas of North Greece – the land of the Macedonians. We visited the archaeological museum of ancient Pella and then the archaeological museum of Vergina. We also visited the Monastery of St. Johannes the Baptist in Veria and a monk explained us the history of the monastery. For lunch we went to Veria town and we had a nice meal.
On Thursday, the forth day of the project in the morning, we had another teaching activity at school, learning traditional Greek dances and after the activity, the local cultural association performed an imitation of traditional wedding. We also learned a Lithuanian dance.Later, we went to Edessa and walked at the Bazaar and had a guided tour to the waterfall’s area. Late evening we had a nice farewell diner with traditional music and dances from all participant countries.
On Friday, the fifth and last day of our project, we went to Mesimeri’s church, to celebrate and honour the Three Hierarchs, the Patrons of Education and Literature. Then we went to school and had a speech about Three Hierarchs. The project meeting was coming to its end so we exchanged gifts between us and we gave their certificates of participation in the project to our guests. In the afternoon, we went by bus to St. Athanasios traditional village having a walk around the village and the last dinner to a traditional restaurant. Our guests and project partners received their pupils that had been hosted from the families and prepared the return trip to their countries.
RESULTS
During the first meeting in Greece we discussed the following:
What we have to do every time by the meetings?
· The coordinating school will manage the first night hotel in the
city is located the arrival airport. Then will manage a bus for the
transportation of the guests to place is located the school.
· Of course we need and the reservation in the hotel for the guests
during all the week will be the project.
· Organizing the Welcome at school with traditional drinks and foods.
Need to have a buffet with coffee and tea and snacks for the guests.
On Tuesday, the second day of the project, we went to school and had a teaching activity in a classroom about Greek language and learning Greek with dialogues. We visited all the classes in our school, the kindergarten and also the old school, were the exhibition of “Aristotle”, the cultural association of Mesimeri takes place. At noon, we went to the square of Mesimeri and had a short tour around.In the afternoon, we went to Pozar – Lutraki thermal, spring waters by bus and our guests had a healing bath. We also went to Orma village and enjoyed a traditional dinner. In the evening we went back to Edessa and had a meeting at Alfa hotel and we discussed and organized the activities of our next meeting.
Dear partners!
I need to thank all partners for expressing flattering words for the Greek meeting. It was really hard work from all colleagues and parents of Mesimeri school, but the result was compensative and completely satisfactory.
My colleague Antonis, has emailed you the results-review of our decisions about project activities, following the Greek meeting. Off course all actions referred to the review have to be accompIished. I need to underline though, that we must concentrate to the spring and summer celebrations/traditions book activity, which we all have to start working on it soon! It's one of the main activities of the 2nd half of the present project year. Best regards - Sotiris
· Each school have to bring a presentation for their country (better is NOT to be a touristy DVD one) and for their school. So,
all the local teachers and pupils can be informed about their guests.
· The coordinating school have to collect all the material (presentations, articles, photos and videos etc) and will create a whole DVD about the meeting was health during the week.
· All the info about the meeting will be in our website with the most important material and the results.
· Each participant school has to send to the coordinating school all the articles from newspapers (jpeg or pdf) and to me (Antonios)
for the website.
· During the meeting should be traditional meals, drinks, music and dances (showing and learning the dances), meeting with local authorities and cultural associations, teachers of the school and parents association. So, each partner will learn the culture and the traditions of the area.
· Of course the coordinating school has to teach the language and the most important values of their country.
· I need from all the partners the timetable of your holidays and special events and days (national and religious holidays).
· The info about the first meeting in our website is: http://erasmusplusproject.wix.com/mesimeri-school#!1st-meeting/cqzd .
Please send me the links for your presentations.
· I added some of you in facebook private group “Erasmus plus project”. So, please create a profile and I will invite you too.
· For the meeting in Portugal we have to be ready with our “common traditional book” the first two seasons, 3 to 5 important
events each country. It means that during the meeting in Spain we have to show and discuss exactly how it will be.
· During the meeting is Spain we have to propose and decide how and what we will do with the dissemination. We have to be ready with proposals for learning two common songs for our pupils (each one in their language) like: clap your hands or Silent Night etc. We need to discuss of course about what kind of DVd’s or CD’s we will create for the next project year too.
If I forgot something, my dear friends, please let me know and I will add it! Best regards from Greece! Your friend Antonios