Kamelle Relay Race Competition in Spain

Kamelle Competition at Lope de Vega Primary School in Spain has been too much fun for the kids once again. Six groups of three different years participated in this competition and the results were so different, but so close to each other. The age of the students was not a reason to get behind in the competition. I am going to writing down the best results.
You can see these results of the competition in November 2012 below. Thank you so much for the Physical Education Teacher who made students have such fun. And congratulations to the winners:

Team Gold: Costi, Lucía, Mireya, Davinia ----- Year 4, Group A  They did the competition in only 2 minutes and 44 seconds.

Team Silver:  Samuel, Raúl, Juan, Carolina, Nerea ----- Year 1, Group B  They did the competition in only 2 minutes and 51 seconds.

Team Bronce: Manolo, Violeta, Darío, Martín, Miguel Ángel, Luna ----- Year 2, Group A  They did the competition in only 3 minutes.

It is almost Christmas

On 24th December, we celebrate Christmas Eve, it is called in Spanish 'Noche Buena', ---'Good Night'. We have a special meal for dinner with our family. We eat stuffed chicken, stuffed steak or pork. We also eat seafood and shellfood when we live in the South. People living in the North usually eat elver. All the family prepare lots of food. After all that food, we still have room for 'turrón', marzipans or 'mantecados'.
The King of Spain is always on TV making a speech, he speaks about all the things which happened in the current year. We sing carols, the Spanish word for them is 'villancicos'.
After dinner we go to church and we sing and we participate in the Midnight Mass, it is called in Spanish, 'Misa del Gallo' --- ' Mass for the cock', we can have a Carols Concert but it is not always every year, at the end, we kiss the figure of the Newborn Baby, Jesus.
Some villages or towns have a living Nativity Scene (Belén Viviente) that Holly Night. Virgin Maria, Joshep and Baby Jesus, lots of shepherds and the Three Wise Men are over there.

On 25th December, we celebrate Christmas Day, it is called 'Navidad' in Spanish. We can go out for lunch or we may eat at home.

On 31st December, we celebrate New Year's Eve, it is called 'Noche vieja' in Spanish, 'Old Night', the oldest night of the year. We have dinner either with the family or with friends either at home oor in a restaurant, but it is a little bit expensive, believe me!
After dinner, we go to the Town Hall Square and we eat twelve pieces of grapes at twelve o'clock, one grape for each stroke of clock. We always beg that our wishes become true during the coming new year. After the grapes, we open a bottle of champagne, we scatter the liquid in the air, and we toast for the New Year, shhh, if you are not in a ball your clothes can get wet!! We sometimes have fireworks. Then, we go to the disco to celebrate the New Year have started.

On 1st January, we celebrate New Year Day. We may go out for lunch and then,we go to the pubs with friends.

It is a good time to share with family and friends, it is also a special time to remember what was good or bad in your life during the year, and also to wish and hope good things for the new year.

Merry Christmas and a Happy New Year for everyone!!!

More news later!!!

Christmas Time is Coming

On Sunday next to 30th November, St. Andrew's Day (Día de San Andrés), we celebrate The Advent Sunday. It is called in Spanish 'Domingo de Adviento'. We go to church and we start getting ready to wait for the Birth of Jesus Christ, the Messiah. (Nacimiento de Jesús, el Mesías).

For Christmas (En Navidad) we decorate the houses and we make a Nativity Scene 'Nacimiento', some people decorate a Christmas Tree, but it is an English or American custome. We put lights in the streets and we hear or sing Spanish carols at anywhere. We have poinsettias in the house, the streets and squares. We eat 'turrón', Christmas sweets similar to marzipan or nougat, they are made with almonds and honey, we also eat 'mantecados' and drink sweet drinks like anisette or licors (anís or licor) on Christmas.

Spelling Bee. 100 days of learning

The students in CEIP Lope de Vega started getting ready for the exciting Spelling Bee Contest, the Fourth Annual Spelling Bee. One more year boys and girls will have to study new words about different topics. First Cycle (six and seven year old children) and Second Cycle (eight and nine year old children) will have to be able to spell the different words. However, as they did last year in their first time, Third Cycle (ten and eleven year old students) will have to recognize and pronounce correctly the words that the teachers are spelling to them. I have to say that we had a very amazing and wonderful competition last year, children worked so hard and the results were great!!!

           CHILDREN JUST STARTED WORKING TOWARDS 100 DAYS OF LEARNING!!!

International Day for the Elimination of Violence

In Spain every year on November 25th, we celebrate the International Day for Elimination of Gender Violence. Women and also men, all around the world, are subject to domestic violence and other forms of violence. The purpose of this day is to bring awareness to this issue, so, our school and the whole village are making honor this day during all this week, children wrote stories, they created drawings and they read about real stories. The Town Hall also collaborated with the school, and today there is a huge sign hanging in the front of the big building. There is also a beautiful mosaic where you can read:  'NIÑOS Y NIÑAS CAMINANDO EN IGUALDAD' (BOYS AND GIRLS WALKING TOGETHER ON EQUAL OPPORTUNITIES OR TERMS)

Children read a poem so Violence disappears from the planet for ever

Children sing a song to honor people who suffered violence some time.

Boys and girls walking together on equal opportunities and terms.

BONFIRE NIGHT on November 5th

                                                                                                                                 November 5th

          THE  W E E K L Y  N E W S

  HOLY SMOKE

       BONFIRES MARK FAILURE OF GUNPOWDER PLOT

EVERY YEAR, On November 5^th, firework displays across the United Kingdom celebrate the failure of the plot and the survival of King James I. Tradicionally, effigies of Guy Fawkes were burnt on the top of huge bonfires, and November 5^th is still known as “Bonfire Night”.

Drawings made by Year 6, Group C

November’s event of the Kidlympic Games

November Kidlympic Games brought to you from GERMANY!!‏

Relay Race

Deutschherrenschule would like to host November's event of the Kidlympic Games.  

They propose a 

'Kamelle' Throwing Relay Race

'Kamelle' are called the sweeties which the participants of Carnival Parades during the Street Carnival days in their part of the country throw out to dressed up kids and other people watching the parades in the streets. If you like more information about the Cologne Carnival in particular, you may have a look at the following web page: http://www.cologne.de/events/cologne-carnival 

And then have a good laugh at the crazy Germans ... ;-) 

Here are the rules for the Relay Race:

Have 6 kids team up and stand in line at the starting point. Place a bucket with sweets ( like lemon drops, chewing gums, etc) at a distance of 20 metres. Place a hoola hoop ring another 3 metres away from the bucket. When the race starts the first kid has to put on a funny hat or a clown's wig and run to the bucket, take a hand full of sweets and throw them into a ringshouting 'Kamelle', run back and hand over the hat/wig to the next kid. Winner is the fastest team. Note please: any sweets landing outside the ring will add penalty seconds to the time scored by the respective team.

 

This sketch might help with the setting up:

And now have fun!

HALLOWEEN NIGHT on October, 31st

http://www.tumblr.com/tagged/five-little-pumpkins

Halloween is always fun. When Halloween is coming up, people have fun looking at horror books to give to their friends and family. If you want to find out more about this ‘tradition’, go over to the ‘All Hallows Read’. However, even ‘Five Little Pumpkins’ and ‘Trick or Treat, Smell my Feet’ are not either particulary scary but they are keeping with the Halloween theme.

Younger kids also enjoy Halloween at school, this year, they learnt the basic vocabulary:

http://www.learningchocolate.com/node/329

And also they sang ‘Five little pumkins’ song, a very popular song to sing when you are little.

You can see the lyrics below:

Five little pumpkins sitting on a gate.

The first one said “Oh my, it’s getting late.”
The second one said, “There are witches in the air.”
The third one said, “Why we don’t care.”
The fourth one said, “Let’s run and run and run.” And
The fifth one said, “Let’s go and have some fun.”
“Ohoo”, went the wind and out went the light and the five little pumpkins rolled out of sight.”

Welcome Students of Roehampton Church School

In March we got a link with a school in the U.K, Roehampton Church School, it is a primary school in south west London.  There are about 250 pupils.  This school is multicultural, with about 25 nationalities including British.  The children in years 3/4 (ages 7 - 9) learn basic Spanish.  They were particularly interested in starting a link with our year 3 children who are 7/8 year olds and we decided to start a partnership with them last year school. Once again, we started with new students in year 3 and they are writing a letter to new students in England. They are so excited and we are sending the first letter for them pretty soon. 

Here you can get some information about Roehampton Church School:

http://connectedup.com/rcs/index.htm

Welcome Back once again!!

 We guess it is a little bit late to say ‘hello’ but, we could not update this blog earlier, things got complicated at school during the two first months this school year.

Even it is late, we welcome all students and staff at CEIP ‘Lope de Vega’ in 2012-13. We hope all of us have fun and learn a lot.  We will try to share with you all some of the English and bilingual activities that we have already done and we are doing at the school.

This year, we don’t have any American assistant teacher yet, and we don’t know if we will. 

The Benefits of Bilingualism

The U.S. newspaper, The New York Times, has a great piece on the benefits of being bilingual.  It turns out that not only does it increase the number of people you can communicate with, but it generally just makes you a smarter person!  Writes the author Yudhijit Bhattacharjee, "The collective evidence from a number of such studies suggests that the bilingual experience improves the brain’s so-called executive function — a command system that directs the attention processes that we use for planning, solving problems and performing various other mentally demanding tasks. These processes include ignoring distractions to stay focused, switching attention willfully from one thing to another and holding information in mind — like remembering a sequence of directions while driving." Wow! So being bilingual helps you focus, helps you remember, and may prevent the early onset of diseases like Alzheimer's and dementia.

All of us here at C.E.I.P. Lope de Vega already knew that being bilingual is totally awesome, but it's great to know that we're helping our brains stay fit, too!

Read the article here.

- Robyn

(Photo via.)

National Capitals

"But what does 'D.C.' stand for?"

This week, in Fifth Level, we're learning about cities and their sites.  We've been practicing our vocab for museums, monuments, cafes, cinemas, libraries, and everything else our towns and cities have to offer.  But why not learn a little bit about national capitals?!  The students have prepared posters and presentations on London, Belfast, Cardiff, and Edinburgh, as well as Madrid - their own national capital city.  So I thought that I'd share a bit about my capital city, Washington D.C.

The students loved seeing all the sights that D.C. has to offer, and were amazed at just how big all of the monuments were!

Check out the slideshow on Washington D.C.

- Robyn

B-E-E

Oh, spelling. It's tough. It's embarrassing. It never gets any easier.

Some of my earliest memories are of learning how to spell in Mr. Takuda's first grade class, the most vivid being when I finally tackled that tricky word, computer.  Maybe I'd be a bigger fan of spelling if I'd gone to C.E.I.P. Lope de Vega, where we regard good spelling as the coolest thing someone can do by participating in the annual Spelling Bee!

We've been practicing all year with different types of spelling - phonetic, letter guessing, dictation, and good ol' letter-for-letter.

Stay tuned for updates on the Spelling Bee!

- Robyn

Three-Legged Race

For the next few months, C.E.I.P. Lope de Vega will be participating in a Kiddie Olympics put on by one of our sister schools in the U.S. Along with C.E.I.P. Lope de Vega, schools from all around the world have joined in to compete - Belgium, France, Italy, England, Germany, and Canada. We will be participating in a range of activities that each school is submitting. For the month of January, we participated in the "Wellie Wang", where each student had to toss a rain boot (or 'wellie') and measure the distance. For February, we are partaking in the Isle of Man Three-Legged Race!

Now, learning just how to compete in a Three-Legged race is MUCH harder than one would imagine.  Think back to the first time you ever ran one - maybe at summer camp or after school or at a family reunion. A lot of falling, sidesteps, and befuddled communication was involved, no? It's just the same for the kids here at C.E.I.P. Lope de Vega! In the first grade, we've been practicing all month during P.E. and have come up with a few key rules to follow during a Three-Legged race:

1. Always step together, not apart!
2. Communicate! Talk to your partner to make sure you both know where you're headed!
3. Hold hands with your partner while you run.
4. Help your partner up if they fall (because falling is inevitable!)
5. Remember that everyone is a winner, because whether you came in first place or last place, Three-Legged races are a challenge!

If you want to learn more about the Kidlympics, as well as see photos and videos from all the different schools participating, check out this great webpage put on by our sister school. Keep up with our stats and try some of the games out for yourself! Go Spain!

- Robyn

Día de Andalucía

Here at C.E.I.P. Lope de Vega, we're already  gearing up for Día de Andalucía (Andalusia Day).  As an auxiliar, I've been looking forward to this holiday since my arrival in the autonomous community.  Every February 28th, students throughout Andalusia practice traditional dance, games, and songs. They even cook up traditional Andalusian food!

One such game that they play, Pañuelo, has become a first grade favorite during bilingual P.E.  I thought I'd share the rules so that you all can participate along with us this year!

You'll need the following:
- one old scarf, cloth, or piece of fabric
- one field, gym, or open space for running
- two teams of eager, energetic, and genuinely adventurous people
- good counting skills

1. Elect one person to be the "caller".
2. Divide those remaining into two teams of equal numbers.
3. Each team should count-off, making sure that each number is matched across the field (for example, each team should have a 1, 2, 3, etc.)
4. The "caller" stands between each team, who have all lined up on opposite sides of the filed.
5. The "caller" raises the pañuelo loosely, at an arms distance away, and calls out a number.
6. For whichever number called, that person runs to grab the pañuelo before the other team. This is when the "caller" needs to brace themselves and remember to let go!
7. Whoever grabs the pañuelo first must turn around and run back to their side, with the pañuelo-less person chasing after.
8. If they make it to their team, they win. If not, they don't!
9. Repeat until the "caller"'s voice gives out, team members forget their number, or general exhaustion sets in.

I love pañuelo because you can always change the rules a bit - from numbers to colors to animals. It offers hours of fun!

Happy Día de Andalucía!

 - Robyn

Carnival!

It is Carnival season in Spain! Unlike Spain, the United States doesn't celebrate Carnival much, but many Americans would love Carnival. The US city of New Orleans is famous for its Mardi Gras party, a French-inspired celebration of Carnival, which includes a street party, a parade, and plenty of drinking and crazy costumes. Some American cities and bars host one-day or weekend Carnival events, but they are never as huge as the Spanish celebration.

This was my first time experiencing Spanish Carnival and I didn't realize that the celebration was so big. Throughout the week, I experienced Carnival in school and in different pueblos and cities across Andalucia. Carnival was incredibly fun! It will always be a great memory for me and I'm thankful for it.

On Friday, our school celebrated Carnival with a short play, songs and full costumes! After practicing all week, two teachers played the music while the older students sang for all of our school. It was a special and fun performance. I really loved the costumes! Here are photos from our celebration. Happy Carnival! :)

Happy President's Day!

Feliz día de los Presidentes!

 "True friendship is a plant of slow growth." - George Washington

Today at C.E.I.P. Lope de Vega, we're celebrating the American federal holiday of President's Day.  We're reading legends about George Washington and his wooden teeth and Abraham Lincoln's log cabin, plus some interesting facts about U.S. presidents (did you know that President Hoover had a pet opossum?!).  We're also learning about Mount Rushmore, the White House, and other cool presidential monuments in the U.S. What exactly does it take to be a president?

Leer un poco sobre los presidentes!

- Robyn

My Daily Routines

While most of us are trying to avoid the pitfalls of daily routines, in the fourth grade we are embracing them! We've been working on some key vocabulary this year - time, food, places, and action verbs - and we're finally putting them all together to talk about Our Daily Routines.  Like one big English vocab puzzle, it's nice to see everything we've learned so far fall into place.  We're brushing our teeth at 8.45 after eating breakfast at 8.30.  We do our homework at 17.00 and eat our dinner at 20.30.  The most-loved routine seems to be when we head home after school at 14.00.

However, when talking about our daily routines, a discussion on differences in routines between Spain and the U.S. is inevitable, with a classroom of perplexed students to follow.  There's always an audible gasp when I tell the students when I eat lunch back in Oregon (What?! TWELVE THIRTY IN THE AFTERNOON?!) or at what time I go to bed (TEN THIRTY?! HOW EARLY!). Quite possibly my favorite daily routine to talk about is when I eat dinner (6.30pm). I sometimes feel like I might as well be speaking Pig Latin when my students sit in disbelief at just how strange my own daily routine is. 

Check out our finished artwork! Que chulo, no?

- Robyn

St. Valentine's Day

I never would have guessed it, but St. Valentine's day seems to be much more of an American holiday than Spanish.  Now, that's not to say that everyone in Spain has a Grinch-sized heart, but that they take love and romance much more seriously.  When I think back to my time in elementary school, I have (fond) memories of making valentines for all of my classmates, teachers, and relatives (sorry, Mom, for all the glitter I must have spread through the house). At school, we would make little mailboxes out of lunch bags and spend time going from desk to desk, or class to class, handing out our cards, chocolates, and the ever-amusing conversation hearts.

This, however, is not the case in Andalucia.

While discussing the story of Cupid (fact: sometimes Cupid makes bad decisions because he's a baby! Why had this never occurred to me before?!), one fourth grader asked how many valentines I usually receive each year.

'Tons!' I exclaimed. 'We pass them out to everybody - our classmates, our workmates, our teachers, neighbors, mailmen.' 

In Spain, according to my students, love is taken a bit more seriously, with only one or two valentines given out, perhaps to your best friend, your teacher, and your significant other. There aren't conversation hearts, Hershey's Kisses, or the onslaught of Valentine's Day cards, stickers, teddy bears and balloons. Perhaps the Valentine's Day images that live in my head come straight from Hallmark, but I still love it. And so did the kids!

Check out our Valentine's Day cards!

Hope you had a great Valentine's Day!

- Robyn

International Day of Peace (Día de la Paz)

This past week, we celebrated International Day of Peace (Día de Paz), which occurs in Spanish schools on January 30.

Last week, the students worked on a variety of activities to honor this day. The fifth grade students created digital collages, using images and quotes that they found on the internet. Other classes made arts and crafts, including a tree of doves, peace flags, and a balloon of the world with all of its diverse people (shown in the photo above).

All classes learned the beautiful song "Mensajes del Agua," by the artist Macaco, in preparation for singing it together as a large group. To celebrate today, our entire school performed this song together, as we also released doves into the air.

Here is song by Macaco - "Mensajes del Agua":
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hbgsKHqn5fU