Stories

Lycée Elie Cartan in La Tour du Pin, France, was thrilled to welcome 15 students and 2 teachers from St. Mark’s Girls Senior Secondary School (SMGS), Meera Bagh, New Delhi, India, from 25 September to 2 October 2016.

This was the first meeting after Mrs Anjali HANDA and I met at the 2015 conference in Sofia and started collaborating, initially on her ‘Language – A Mantle of Communication”, an online collaboration under the ASEF Classroom Network.

This collaboration hinged on languages as all the SMGS students study French and all the French students learn English; hence our idea to mix all our languages into a song, composed by my colleague Pierre-Yves Barnier and written by the whole group in French, English and Hindi. All the voices were recorded during our guests’ stay but it will now take some time to finalise the project. We will be happy to share it with everyone once it is completed!

During the visit, the students from SMGS attended French, Spanish, English, Art, Science and Maths classes. In addition, they also learned to play Pétanque, a very popular French game, and made “baguette” (French bread). On a cultural side, they visited the city of Lyon, its basilica and old town, and were taken to the Choranche caves in the Alps.

Obviously, this exchange goes far beyond language and cultural discovery and is first a great human adventure, full of emotions. Staying with a host family gives a real insight into the other’s way of life, and is a step towards understanding and tolerance. The bonds created during that week between the students (and their families) are strong already and will undoubtedly grow stronger in the coming months as we prepare to visit SMGS in April 2017. Special thanks to my colleagues Ms Anjali HANDA, Ms Jeetu BHALLA and Mr Pierre-Yves BARNIER for their work and generosity for making this exchange a great success.