In the Spotlight this week are the schools in France attended by Olympic gold medallist mountain biker Julien Absalon, and their UK partner schools.
GROUPE SCOLAIRE ROUTE D'ARCHES, RAON AUX BOIS, TWINNING WITH MILL VIEW PRIMARY SCHOOL, CHESTER
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Pupils from Route d'Arches film a tour of Julien Absalon's hometown for their Olympic Dreams twin, Mill View Primary
Rémi Margaine, Teacher, Route d'Arches
Raon aux Bois is a hilly little rural village near Epinal and Remiremont.
Today around 1,200 people live here; there are 160 pupils at the primary school; so a new school was built three years ago, as the number of local people increased.
Most of people are interested in Julien's career and support him.
My classroom has a contact with Mill View Primary: Rachael Rowe, Mill View's English teacher.
We have decided to communicate on the web via webcam. The subject will be... the London Olympic Games!
We have also found this picture of Julien when he was at school:
An archive image from Julien Absalon's class at Route d'Arches - Julien is standing next to the teacher
Rachael Rowe, Teacher, Mill View Primary
We have had an assembly to celebrate winning the competition and to honour the children who contributed to the bid.
Our year five class is putting together a video together about our school which we will share with Route d'Arches school.
We are also planning to put a box together with things in that will represent our local area and our country, which we will send over to our partner school.
LYCÉE ANDRÉ MAIRAUX, MONTEREAU-FAULT-YONNE, TWINNING WITH THOMAS LORD AUDLEY SCHOOL, ESSEX
Benjamine Tazi, Teacher, Lycee Andre Malraux
Our partnership is going well so far!
Having a partner makes our teaching more authentic
Our pupils have exchanged letters - they are very much interested in the differences that exist between our educational system, and they are also very interested in the town of our partner.
We are now sending boxes with objects representing our schools and region and we have recorded a message for our partner schools from two of our pupils who practice capoeira.
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An Olympic Dreams message from Lycee Andre Malraux
We have also contacted Julien Absalon in order to interview him for the Olympic Dreams project.
We look forward to continuing our partnership next year!
Jonathan Else, Assistant Headteacher, Thomas Lord Audley School
The most successful part of our partnership has been keeping the idea of the Olympics alive.
As part of our twinning for Olympic Dreams, we have sent a box to the Lycee (Andre Malraux) in France containing a number of objects which describe our school and surrounding area - a sort of "time capsule".
The School Council is leading the Olympic Dreams project
Our high achievers in athletics have been interviewed on our flip-cam - these interviews will be sent to Lycee Andre Malraux, along with a film about our school made by our Media Studies group.
And every week, The Key Stage 3 Tutorials contain the questions/films from the BBC World Class Website.
As part of our future plans, a teacher from Lycee is to come over to our school for 2 weeks during the next academic year.
I would also really like more of our work to be linked to the preparation of Julien Absalon for next year's Olympics.
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Having a partner makes our teaching more authentic
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