Pachino, Italy (18-23 January 2016)

Three teachers and four pupils took part in this mobility. The main task of the pupils was to make an interview with an early school leaver and to prepare a presentation showing a Hungarian celebrity outstanding in the field of voluntary work.

We made a film about a girl from Hatvan, who told us her story, of course anonymously. The film was made by our students. The teachers gave them help with arranging the meeting with the interviewee (the school coordinator teacher), preparing the English subtitles (the IT teacher) and correcting the English spelling of the subtitles (teacher of English). They also made a presentation on the Hungarian volunteer celebrity Csaba Böjte, who is a Franciscan monk and established and runs an orphanage in Transylvania.

By the suggestion of the Italian team we also had to perform a sketch, which did not belong to the project tasks but our students prepared for it with great enthusiasm. We chose a sketch by the suggestion of the students. All of them had their own task: three of them had a role in the sketch and the fourth student, who did not want to act, was the stage designer. With the help of the English project teacher they had a lot of rehearsals to give a perfect performance.

At the mobility we could see each other’s video films on early school leavers. This is a common problem all over Europe. After watching all the videos on this topic the teachers had a lively discussion about their personal experiences, and also gave their suggestion what  to do against it.  We learnt a lot from each other.

The performance of sketches -of course in English-was a great success and everybody enjoyed it,both the spectators and the actors and actresses. We voted for the best performance. Our team came third in this competition and we were very proud of our pupils.

The presentations of the teams on volunteer celebrities were of a high quality and we could get to know great people from each country.

We visited the Agape and Emmaus Centre, where the Italian pupils did their weekly voluntary service and the video taken there could be seen before the visit.  With the help of the presentations of the host pupils we could get to know a lot of information about the Italian education system and NGO-s. The Italian language course was a great experience for the participants. For the pupils this language is especially attractive because they love Italian pop music and it is a great motivation for them to be able to understand this language.

After the official project programs we could go on tours around the region to see its cultural and historical sights. We took part in a folk show and thanks to the host parents’ voluntary work we could taste the traditional Italian dishes. We also had the opportunity to see Etna, one of the most interesting natural beauties of Italy.

This meeting was a great experience for us, both teachers and pupilss. It was the first time for most of us to visit a Mediterranean country. We could see the local people’s positive view of life and mentality. We can accept and understand each other only if we get to know each other.