HELLO AND GOODBYE

For the past three months the Arab Institute, grade 11, have been busy doing many activities to practise their English. Recently they have been learning ways to improve their CVs and preparing for job interviews, in English, for University. Some of the students have also contributed to writing for the annual CADFA newsletter. Grade 11 took centre stage at break time in a rival football match between the Science and Humanities class. Also, a few weeks ago, one of the students offered to take me and Robert, the new volunteer in Abu Dis, around Jerusalem for the day, which we really enjoyed. Today the class were introduced to Lawson, one of the new volunteers here.

More recently Abu Dis has been affected by storm Alexa which has brought heavy snow and rain to many parts of Palestine. For at least 3 days the roads have been closed because they are dangerous or blocked with snow. Ramallah had at least half a metre of snow and the bus station there has been closed. I got stuck in Azuun, a town near Qualqelia because there were no buses back to Abu Dis meaning I missed my class at the Arab Institute.

Unfortunately it is not long until I pack my bags and head back to Britain. 3 months in Palestine has gone very quickly and I have really enjoyed teaching at the Arab Institute. The staff have been very welcoming and have given me a great experience, and the students are full of ideas and are very talented in lots of subjects, including speaking English. I hope you can welcome the new volunteers to your school and continue to improve links between the UK and Palestine.

Grade 11 say goodbye

The view from Arab Institute

ARAB INSTITUTE EVACUATED

Today (Wednesday) the boys at Arab Institute wanted to talk about their experiences of a terrible situation that happened near the school and University in Abu Dis. 

Soldiers came on Tuesday evening to destroy a house that was "too close" to the Separation Wall. By around 9.00 o'clock in the morning the local people came to demonstrate against the demolition of the house. 

In response the Israeli military fired tear gas and fired rubber bullets at the protesters. By 10.00 o'clock the University,  Arab Institute and Abu Dis Boys School, which are located near to the demonstration, had to be evacuated because the tear gas was suffocating the students and it was dangerous to stay.

Some students were in exams at the time and others were in lessons which caused distress and stopped them from learning. This has happened many times this year. 

The students have written a short account of what happened, which are uploaded below.

HELLO FROM ARAB INSTITUTE

Today the students from the 11th grade at Arab Institute were introduced to the twinning project. The class has around 15 students who speak good English and are excited about making contact with students in London. They all wrote a short message to the students in London to introduce themselves and to ask questions. Some of these messages are below…

“Hi my name is Ahmed. I’m from the West Bank, Palestine, and I’m 16 years old. I bet that you’re younger than me… anyway, I like playing video games and many other things.”

“Hi!! My name is Salamey and I live near Jerusalem. I’m 16 years old and I love many subjects in school such as English and Mathematics. I want to ask you what problems you have in your life ? Also, how do you think the Israelis treats us?”

“My name is Yousef and I’m from Jerusalem. I’m interested in sports. I’m 17 years old. I’d like to know how life is in London? I have a friend who is from London and we talk every day on skype. He is living in Bahrain now and he can speak Arabic, so we use Arabic when we are chatting.”

“My name is Amar. I am 17 years old. I live in Jerusalem in Isawia which is 30 km from the school and on the way there is an Israeli checkpoint. It takes me 40 minutes every day to get to school. I would like to know what school is like for you?”

“My name is Saleh and I’m 17 years old. I want to be a photographer like my father to post what happens in Palestine from the occupation. I want to ask the students in London, how do you feel towards Palestinian people?”

The beginning of a new term!

A new, exciting term is starting for the twinning groups in England and Palestine. Yesterday, Matthew and I (Mary), the two new volunteers in Abu Dis, had a tour of the schools where we will be facilitating the twinning links and met with the principals and teachers. We can’t wait to meet the students this week!

Goodbye schools.

Nothing to update this blog with. We with the buddies "usually students who join the Palestinian Lunch Club" were busy in the last two weeks with our Palestinian friends who visited London in a youth Drama exchange.

As it is the last few days of  London schools,  it is my last few days in London as well. I could not say goodbye to the kids because they're so active and busy doing other activities- will go and try to see them for the last time next week!

Our time in your school

Hello, we are Ahmad and Yousef from the Arab Insitute School in Abu  Dis. 

We visited your school Acland Burghley on Friday last week and we love it because it is very different and beautiful. 

We went to different classes. In the first class we spoke about Palestine  and then we went to a dance class and we learned some things. Finally we went to a cooking class and we made pancakes and ate them.  They were delicious.

The school is different from our school because it has boys and girls and also it is very big. The children to from one class to another. In our school, the teachers go between the classes not the children. The time in school is more. In Palestine we have six hours in school and a break of twenty minutes. In London thy have eight hours and a lot of break. Also they make food in the school in London but in Palestine they don't do this. They learn more subjects in London like dance, music and drama, and cooking. But in Palestine we don't. In London the children have lockers to keep their things in, we don't.

Another thing is that the summer holiday in London is six weeks and in Palestine it is three months.

We liked everything in your school. Thank you for having us. Please stay in touch.

Haverstock yesterday

The girls and their teacher, Ms Nadia, at Haverstock are really passionate about sewing and embroidery. Well, they started working on small purses for their oyster cards. Some of them want to do their original country's flag, others want to do their names. Pictures will be uploaded next time!

Camille's quiz

The time has come to do the Palestinian English French quiz. Camille prepared a quiz for kids in schools to see how much they know about Palestine, France and England.

The girls were divided into two teams where each team has 2-3 minutes to answer a question. One of the questions was about food, and another was about famous mosques in each country.

Announcement about the kids visit in the notice board at Acland Burghley

Palestinian lunch club- from Acland Burghley and Haverstock to Arab Institute.

Schools in London

Hello from Camille and Ibaa, CADFA volunteers in London. We have been working on the twinings and links between schools in London and schools in Abu Dis a few weeks ago. We are happy to hear about your activities with the kids in the Arab institute and would like to update this blog with pictures and information about activities we have been doing with kids, in Acland Burghley and Haverstock, whose ages between 13 and 15 years old from 7th and 8th grades mostly.

As for Acland Burghley school ..

Acland Burghley school is one of our favourite schools in London for many reasons. First, it is a very collaborative school where everybody earns respect and shows respect to all. Second, our contact teacher there Mr. Stainsby is so nice, helpful and welcoming. He has been to Abu Dis before and visited different schools there. Finally, the kids in the school are creative kids who love learning and embrace challenge. They are keen to learn about Palestine and be in touch with their twinning school in Abu Dis.

Haverstock School

At Haverstock, we enjoy our time with having two amazing contact teachers who support us during the lunch club. Miss Nadia and Miss Sabah are very keen to help to enhance the links between their school and schools in Palestine. That's why they encourage students to join the Palestinian lunch club each Wednesday.

The work in both schools is mainly about sticking to a plan and a couple of rules that has been provided by Our work person Cristina and our director Nandita. Both the volunteers and the kids in schools are happy working on this plan that contains various activities and things to do.

In the few sessions we had with the kids at the Palestinian lunch club in both Acland Burghley and Haverstock, we introduced ourselves and clarified our roles through some simple ways like using an icebreaker or a game. Then we showed the newsletters and blogs, discussed them with the kids, observed them online and talked about their twinned school in Palestine.

For a kid who lives in London, it might be a little bit hard to know how Palestinian kids live in Palestine. In the process of preparing the kids here for the Palestinian kids visit, we discussed the differences between the lives of people here in London and there in Palestine. For that purpose, we urged the kids to expect the differences which were mainly talking about the culture, food, weather, safety, education system and life under occupation.

Another thing, we answered a questionnare that contains 10 questions about Palestine. The aim of it was to let kids discover things about Plaestine and to see how much we all know, so we work on the gaps. In fact, the kids did very well. They answered many questions correctly. Meanwhile, they wanted to ask kids in Palestine many questions about London to let them know how London is before they come.

We together looked at different pictures of sights in London such as London Tower Bridge, Big Ben and London Eye as well as some places in Palestine next to a checkpoint or the seperation wall.

Peaceful nights in London ..

Meanwhile in Palestine ..

Finally, we wanted to tell the Palestinian kids who are coming in a couple of weeks that people in London are so excited to meet them.

Cheers,

Camille and Ibaa :)

Maps of Abu Dis

In the short amount of time we had with grade 8 we tried to do as many activities as possible. In one of our sessions we thought it would be a good idea to ask the boys to draw up maps of where they live, and their school, to show the students in Achland Burhley. We began the lesson by asking the class all about maps and what they are used for and what important landmarks might be on a map. The boys worked in pairs and produced some beautiful maps. Both classes took to the activity very well and seemed eager to present their hometowns.. 

It would be great if Acland Burley could draw some maps of Camden so that we could show the boys in Arab Insitute. This would be a great way of strengthening twinning knowledge. 

We hope to bring the maps to Acland Burley when we get back to London! 

Getting creative with twinning

To introduce twinning we ran a number of activities in our classes. To start off we brainstormed everything we knew about England, Palestine, Camden and Twinning and encouraged the boys to draw and write what they knew about each place. See photos below….. Some of the boys drew Big Ben and wrote the Beatles and lots of them drew the Dome of the Rock and the wall. This activity worked well and the boys were very enthusiastic about drawing and seeing the other groups present what they had drawn.  In the next lesson we turned this into a group quiz, in which the boys had to answer 10 questions about Palestine and the UK and about twinning. Although they were very confused at first they welcomed the new idea with enthusiasm.

Introducing Twinning to Grade 8.

For the past few weeks we (group 7) have been working with both 8th and 11th grade classes in Arab Institute. Our time here has past so quickly and we are very sad to leave  the teachers and boys behind as we feel we have made a strong connection with all of them. 

Working with both grade 8A and 8B has been very interesting as this grade is new to the concept of twinning. The past volunteer groups have been working with 9th grade, but Moein (the head of the English department) thought it would be a good idea to start the idea afresh with the younger groups. 

Here is a photo of Grade 8a boys saying Hello!

Grade 9 Topics

Over the last few weeks the Grade 9's have been working on some interesting topics covering sport and people they admire.

In our sessions about sport we have discussed issues regarding racism in sport and women in sport, and gave them articles to look at. In the follow up sessions we told them about what it was like to have the Olympic games in London and asked them to imagine what it would be like if the Olympic games were held in Palestine. They came up with lists of positive and negative ideas and debated whether it would be a good or bad thing. Here are some of their ideas:

Positives	Negatives
People would come and learn about the Palestinian culture.	It is very expensive to organise
People would come and take photographs of our country.	People’s homes may be destroyed in order to build the Olympic stadium. They may have to move.
We would learn about other people’s cultures because people from around the world would come here	In Palestine there isn’t the transport to support that many people.
It would be very exciting.	There is not enough hotels to accommodate people.
It would improve the Palestinian economy.	Everywhere would be really noisy
It would bring different sporting events to Palestine.	There may be fighting in the streets or chaos between fans.
We would get to see famous people.	Empty shopping centres, people not going to the shops.
Disabled people have the chance to compete.	Not everyone can get tickets to go to the Olympics, it is expensive.

Following from this they produced some creative writing about someone they admire. Many wrote about their favourite football player, Cristiano Ronaldo came top! But others wrote about singers, like Adele or actors and actresses. Some wrote about family members they admire, and our favourite was one of the students who wrote about their Mum.

Conscience Died

At the beginning of our sessions with the 11th Grade they often like to share videos or music with us. They recently shared this song with us called 'Conscience Died' by the Palestinian singer Ibrahim AlDardasawi. The lyrics are strong and powerful and particularly draw on the Palestinian struggle, yet how the rest of the world remains silent. Thanks for sharing.

Grade 11's work about Prisoners

It is interesting to see that students from Acland Burghley have been discussing the prisoners situation in their film club, as Grade 11 students at the Arab Institute have also been producing some work about the same issue.

The prisoner situation in Palestine currently has become a very prominent issue with the recent death of Arafat Jadarat and the continuing case of Samer Issawi who is in his seventh month of hunger strike. 

Last week we discussed types of peaceful protest against violations of human rights and the follow up session involved them producing some creative pieces about political prisoners and hunger strikers. They produced a variety of work from posters, to cartoons and poems. Their work speaks for itself.

Poems about Prisoners 

Maybe I’m gonna die
But one day I’ll be able to fly
I’ll be in the history
And I’ll have my own melody

One day I’ll be free
And I’ll be banging on my chest
I’ll be breaking rocks
And maybe I’ll rule the world

And as long as we’re aiming for freedom
We could be starving and we could be homeless
But one day we’ll be free
We could be starving and we could be homeless
But one day we’ll be free.

                 

                       ---

Behind the prison columns there is a man
Trying to stay as strong as he can
He wants to have it since he came
He wants to be free like the others
He doesn’t care about the price, it doesn’t matter
He wants to see his mother and father
He wants to get out and scream
And nobody knows how that feels

Acland Burghley Film Club

A film was shown to Acland Burghely students for 14 min and had a big discussion and debate with the students which is really interesting to listen to different points of view.

Invitation for the Prisoner film

Mr, Rob and Noor, open the discussions for the student and explained more about the prisoners and how most of the get arrested on their way to school, Noor also mentioned about the difficulties that the children prisoner are facing in the Israeli jails L