Let's boost it up in Italy

Let's boost it up in Correggio

Icebreaking on the very first day (15th Feb)

On Thursday 15th February we dedicated the first part of the morning to get to know each other through icebreaker games in a local conference room. In the first activity we were given a sheet with questions, different between French and Italian students. The objective was to interact: the Italians with the French and vice versa, and find someone who could answer the questions reported on the sheets that had been distributed to us and write their name. 

The second activity consisted in standing in a circle and reading the answers to the first activity one by one, in front of everyone, getting up, introducing yourself and then passing the microphone to someone else. In the last game we played the Chinese Whisper by creating two alternating rows of Italian and French students. The words in the game had to be either French or Italian to make the activity more fun and interactive. The last icebreaker activity was the group dances, where all the Italian and French students participated and got involved by sharing music and dances from their country.

The next three hours of the morning were dedicated to project work "Boost the Positive News UP!", where each group worked on their sustainability and positive news project.

Once school hours were over, we all had lunch together at school with pizza, gnocco and Erbazzone, typical Italian foods, spending some time together getting to know each other better. 

After lunch we took a short tour of Correggio organized by some of the Italian students, who presented the main attractions of the city, in collaboration with Correggio culture councilor. The stops on the tour were: the church of San Francesco presented by Filippo Palladino and Eleonora Corassori, the church of San Quirino presented by Emma Steffè, the Torre Civica di Correggio presented by Anna Mariani and Caterina Caffagni, inside which we saw a reproduction in miniature of the 17th century Correggio, the Asioli theater presented by Teresa Napolitano, the Palazzo Principi museum and the statue of Antonio Allegri presented by Cecilia Luppi and Laura Morandi.

In the late afternoon in small groups with our friends we hanged around: there were those who went for an ice cream, those who took a walk through the center of Carpi and those who organized a dinner with their penfriends. 

[Giovanni, Caterina, Alessia 3ESA]

Venice here we come! (16th Feb)

Today visited the beautiful city of Venice. 

The weather was quite bad, it was very foggy, humid, quite cold and it partially ruined our visit. 

We went by bus and we left Correggio at 7:00. We arrived in Venice at around 10:15 in a bus parking in Tronchetto, an artificial island that was built for transportation, and we headed to Tronchetto station to take a train that brought us to Piazzale Roma. We arrived at around 10:50. From there we walked to St. Mark's Square where we visited St. Mark Basilica. It was quite a long walk, it took us forty five minutes, but it was also interesting because we saw a big part of the city and we walked along Canal Grande where we saw Rialto’s bridge which was very crowded but still very beautiful. When we arrived in St. Mark's Square we went to visit St. Mark Basilica so we had to get in the queue. When we passed the inspections we entered and we were all pretty amazed by the reflexes of the mosaics, so we took a lot of photos. When we left the basilica we had lunch. After lunch, we had some free time to visit the city, shops or whatever we wanted. We could go around the narrow streets of Venice and enjoy its beautiful places. Around 3 PM we gathered in St. Mark’s Square to continue our visit. We had a walk through the streets and we arrived in front of Basilica di Santa Maria dei Frari. We entered and we could see some of the most beautiful artistic works in Venice: from Titian to Donatello and other really important artists which worked for the Republic of Venice in the past. After it, we wanted to visit St. Pantalon Church, which is not really famous and big, but it contains the biggest canvas in the world. Unfortunately, the church was closed that day so we couldn’t enter. 

We walked back to Piazzale Roma and took the train for Tronchetto station. 

Here, we took the bus at 5:30 PM and we arrived in Correggio at 8:30 PM.

[Niccolò, Lucio, Gabriele 3ESA]

Up for some basketball? (17th Feb)

It was a tough loss against our sworn enemy but you'll be glad to hear we had a wonderful evening afterward! It's great to see Italian and French folks enjoying each other's company. Sometimes, those moments of camaraderie can make up for the disappointment. 

In the morning during the first couple of hours we did some group activities organized by the italian teachers, activities which involved all the people attending the class, like a discussion about the importance of the proper name or small lessons linked to the subject of those teachers. Then we just worked on our workshop until lunch time. 

Everyone got home and ate different things. 

In the early afternoon we planned to go to the basketball match of some of our classmates and almost the whole class showed up with their French pen pals. Unfortunately Correggio, our team, lost the match by 1 against our sworn enemy, Carpi. We were lucky enough to have our biggest supporters cheering for us in the crowd. That defeat fortunately didn’t compromise the rest of the day. In fact to comfort ourselves we went out, around the city and ate all together and just chatted until late at night. As last we can say that during the entire evening everyone had so much fun just enjoying each other's company, and at the end that's what is important.

[Matteo, Matteo and Mohiu 3ESA]

Many Sundays into One (18th Feb)

On this Sunday people did different things: some of them visited Florence, others went to Verona and some people also preferred resting at home. The weather was not the best… It was very foggy and, for this reason, the Brennero highway was closed. Going to Verona was really difficult… we had to do the country roads so we wasted a lot of time. In fact we left Correggio at seven and half and we arrived at 12 o’ clock. But the more the time passed, the better the weather became and it became a sunny day. After lunch, we had a walk to see the most iconic places of the city: the Juliet balcony, the Arena and the center. We also went to some shops. At five p.m. we were too tired so we decided to go back home.

The highway had already been opened so the trip was not so long (we slept all the time). When we arrived at home, some of us decided to meet up also in the evening.

So we went to a piadineria in Correggio to let the French guys taste this typical Italian dish too. They liked it a lot and we had fun together. After the meal, we went to Laura’s house and other French guys joined us. We spent our time listening to Italian and French music, playing cards and getting to know each other better.

At the end of the day we were so tired because of the long day yet happy to have spent time together!

[Matteo 3ESA, Laura and Emma 3BS]

A Day in Bologna (19th Feb)

During the morning we had normal classes and spent some time working on our projects. After lunch we got on two different buses to go to Bologne.

It took us around an hour to get there. After we just went around the city a little bit and saw some of its particularities. We saw the “finestrella” which is literally just a window on a river between two palaces. Then we walked to the center of Bologna where we saw the statue of Neptune. We visited the anatomical theater in the university of Bologne; a room in which they used to teach med students about anatomy: it was really interesting.

We also visited two churches; the Basilica of San Domenico inside it there is a sepulchral monument dedicated to Domenico di Guzman. We tried to get into the Basilica of San Petronio but we were too many so just a few of us went inside. 

Then we had some free time during which some of us got bubble waffles, some went shopping and then we listened to a musician who was playing some famous music. 

We got back to the buses around 7pm and we arrived to Correggio at 8:30.

[Teresa, Carlotta and Eya 3ESA]

Wrapping everything UP (20th and 21st Feb)

On Tuesday 20th we were at school all morning to complete the project divided into different teams and participate in the Italian lessons. For the first two hours each team hectically went looking for an empty classroom to record the video or podcast to present the positive news. Afterwards we were divided into classes and the French students attended the Italian lessons in small groups. Before starting the lesson a group of French students made a presentation of their country and at the end did a quiz about the presentation and gave to the other students salty candies. Then we did the last hour of the project. 

At 12.55 we left school and everyone went home with their partner student to spend the last afternoon together and prepare for the Farewell party. In the afternoon some went out with the other students to spend the last afternoon together and visited nearby cities or stayed at home to rest and say goodbye to their French friend. For example some of us went to Carpi to take a stroll in the city and eat ice cream.

At 19.00 the party began at the Sala 25 Aprile. At first the Headmistress greeted and thanked the French students and teachers for this incredible experience. Then the party started and we all ate, danced and had a lot of fun until it was time to say goodbye and go home at around 22.30, because we needed to get ready for the last day. 

Wednesday 21st was the last day and before going to school the families thanked, said goodbye and gave some gifts to the French students. Once we had arrived at school, we had three hours of Italian lessons and had the last chats before departure. During the morning we were all very sad to have to end that unforgettable week. 

From 11.00 to 12.00 we all had lunch together before we accompanied the French students and teachers to the bus station where the bus was waiting for them to take them to the airport. We said goodbye, hugged and created the last memories of this great experience.

[Anna and Tommaso 3BS]