International Primary Curriculum "IPC Olympics around the world"

La inauguración de la unidad de "Olympics"  realizada en el mes de abril  en el Estadio Cuscatlan aun sigue ocupando portadas. 
La Academia Británica Cuscatleca junto con otras Instituciones Educativas como: Lamington and Coulter Primary, Scotland; Saint John's International School, Ladprao, Bangkok; British International Primary School, Sweden; Campion Junior School, Athens compartieron su experiencia.


Este fue el articulo publicado en el Sitio Oficial del IPC  sobre nuestro colegio.

Academia Británica Cuscatleca school in El Salvador

Head of Primary, Amanda Dickson at Academia Británica Cuscatleca in Santa Tecla in El Salvador describes the launch of the IPC Olympics units for the school:

“The school began using the International Primary Curriculum (IPC) this year and pupils in all Mileposts will be using the Olympic units as the basis for their learning in the summer term. We decided to do our entry point as a whole school and to make it a really memorable and motivating occasion for the children, staff and parents.

Ours is a large primary school, there are approximately 840 children aged 3 to 11 ,every child and every member of staff was involved in the event. We deliberately chose to do a whole school entry point rather than an exit point as the rainy season here usually begins at the beginning of May and trying to hold an outdoor event after this is always liable to disruption. We were thus a little taken aback when, in the week before the event itself, it rained every day! We did manage one practice on the school field between downpours which allowed us to iron out a few problems.

I lay awake early in the morning of the 20th listening to the thunder and the pouring rain. I thought about hiding under the duvet and staying at home. By the time I arrived at the stadium at 6.30am the rain had cleared away and whilst still cloudy it was at least dry. and remained dry throughout the event. Staff members arrived at the stadium early to get equipment set up and get a first look at the stadium. One or two members of staff even took the opportunity to score goals in the nets of El Salvador’s national football stadium!

The children began to arrive early as traffic at this time of the morning in San Salvador is awful. The stadium has a capacity of around 40 000 so even with our 840 children, 90 members of staff and around 900 spectators it still looked awfully big. The children, even the youngest of them, appeared undaunted, and enjoyed watching themselves and their friends on the big screen.

By 8.30 am we were ready to begin and the flag parade, in which each class represented a country seen at the Olympic Games, was led by our Pre Kinder class of 4 year olds. As the children processed in their year groups around the stadium our Head of PE read information about each country’s attendance and successes at Olympic Games in the past. The children lined up on the field and listened to the Salvadorean and British National Anthems. Our Grade 3 children used mosaics made by them in school to display the flags of El Salvador and Great Britain whilst the anthems were being played.

Mr Palomo, the President of the Salvadorean Olympic Committee, had flown in from Russia the evening before but still managed to give an inspiring opening speech which encouraged the children to develop an ‘I can’ philosophy in life and to be determined aim high.

A child from each grade from PK to Grade 11 had been chosen to represent their peers in a torch parade. They were chosen because of their success in a variety of sporting activities. in and out of school. The torch ( no real flame, but it looked genuine) started its journey in the tunnel , from where the home players emerge during a football match, carried by a four year old who was actually smaller than the torch! He passed it on to the next child and so on around the stadium until it was finally placed on a podium flanked by the Salvadorean and British flags.

Children in each grade then performed a choreographed dance, march or gymnastic display often with a sporting theme and using flags, ribbons or paper to signify the Olympic torch and rings. We invited some children from a local special school to come to take part in our ceremony to represent the Paralympics and enjoyed their gymnastic display. Our choir sang ‘Hello to all the children of the world’ and ‘We are the world, songs exhibiting our awareness of the international nature of the Olympic Games both for us in El Salvador and nations around the world.

Throughout the event narrators from Grade 5 explained in both Spanish and English the history of the Ancient and Modern Olympic Games and the significance of the torch, rings and Olympic Oath. There were some pictures and information about Salvadorean Olympians past and present. and in between events the large screen displayed pictures and videos from our own school sports days, Olympic assemblies and pictures and information about London and The Olympic Games 2012.

The finale of the event was all of the children and staff members taking part in the 20 past 12 dance, this has become popular in our school this year as an alternative to Brain Gym and PE warm ups! Mr Hobson, the Headteacher, closed the ceremony with a few words of thanks to the staff and pupils for the teamwork displayed, the children went home with their parents and the staff returned to school with a huge sense of relief but also a great sense of achievement. It was an event that we, and the children, will remember forever!”

“Our whole school entry points for our Olympics units at the Cuscatlan Stadium on Friday was brilliant, We had a stressful few days earlier in the week as the rains have started early this year but it was OK on the day. All of our 840 children took part and an audience of well over 1000. The President of the Salvadorean Olympic Committee opened the event (having come back specifically from an Olympic meeting in Moscow!) and was completely blown away by the whole event. He is very keen to recruit my teaching team for the organisation of the Salvadorean Olympic team but I said we were too busy! It really was a special event. We have, as you can imagine, thousands of photos. We are putting together a DVD of video and photo's for our parents. The kids loved it! We’re having a wonderful, inspiring, exciting and exhausting time with the IPC here in El Salvador!”

Latest update from Academia Británica Cuscatleca

Still lots more to come with our Olympics unit including visits to school next week by the Salvadorean cycling team and Cuban athletes who will be talking to the children about Olympic values as well as their own events and training schedules. All children in KS2 are also being taken out of school in the next two weeks to visit sporting venues around the city to introduce them to activities which they may not have come across before - cycling at the Velodrome, gymnastics, table tennis, diving and synchronised swimming being just some examples... Great learning, Great teaching, Great fun!