The Italian teachers replicated in the Infant school a Kitchen and a Music activity after the first short-term join staff training event (Istanbul, Turkey)

After visiting Metin Sabanci Special School and taking part in different workshops and sessions, the Italian teachers of the Infant school in Nerola replicated two activities done during the 1st short-term joint staff training and learning event: a Kitchen and a Music activity.

Teacher Anna Maria and her pupils prepared orange juice. Children had the opportunity to use the senses of touch, smell, sight and taste. During and after the activity children orally retold all the steps to obtain the juice  and then they illustrated them. The teacher pointed out the importance of circular motion. She  let all of the children exercise fine motricity and circular hand motion, mostly used in everyday life (in cleaning a table, glass windows…). In the National Indicators of Curriculum one of the objectives kids have to reach at the end of Kindergarten in the field “Exploring, knowing and planning” is: touching, seeing, hearing, smelling and tasting something and telling what was touched, seen, heard, smelt and tasted,  using appropriate words. The teacher combined this activity with those planned in the infant school curriculum.

3-6 -year-old kids took part in a Music activity with teacher Catia, who was trained in Turkey. Her pupils replicated music patterns with body percussion and percussion instruments. Some of these instruments were realized by the children themselves using simple and recycled material. Children had the opportunity to exercise the sense of hearing. Moreover they had the possibility to implement attention, concentration and had to respect school and behaviour rules. Through this activity kids worked together and in harmony.  Harmony is a situation in which people are peaceful and agree with each other. Harmony is in fact a term that derives from music: it means a pleasant  musical sound made by different notes being played or sung at the same time. A harmonious class is an environment where  children play different instruments giving their personal contribution to obtain the final results: knowledge, skills and competences.

In “School blues” Daniel Pennac wrote: “Each student plays his or her instrument, there's no point in arguing with that. The tricky part is knowing our musicians well enough to play in harmony. A good class isn't a military regiment marching to the same beat but an orchestra working on the same symphony. And if you've inherited a triangle which can only go ting-ting, or a jew's harp which can only go bloing-bloing, what matters is that they do it at the right time, and to the best of their ability, that they become an excellent triangle, an irreproachable jew's harp, and that they're prove of that their contribution fringe to the group. Since they’re all inspired by a taste for harmony, even the triangle will end up knowing the music, perhaps not as brilliantly as the first violin, but to some level of familiarity at least”.