IVC Modern Languages Weblog

Our first photos are here!

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Paris...

What a fantastic day!

Paris never fails to make a strong impression on our students during the exchange; today was especially pleasant with a group who had a thousand and one questions to ask.

We started the day early at 7.45 for an 8 o'clock departure. Unfortunately Josh had to stay behind with his host family as he was feeling poorly. We're glad to report that he will be back among us tomorrow!

We hit a spot of heavy traffic once we got close to Paris and arrived just in time for our scheduled ascension of the Eiffel Tower. The view is still breath-taking, with the latest addition to the near-by Quai Branly Museum. The business district is also slowly but surely evolving as the city council is issuing permits to build higher building in the Paris skyline.

After the Eiffel Tower we had a quick lunch and celebrated Beth's birthday. Joyeux anniversaire! Thanks to Mrs Burton who prepared the cake :-)

After the ordinates, we followed the abscissa axis with a boat trip to Notre Dame and back. It had started to rain just before we left, but that did not last and before long everyone was on the deck taking photos and asking Luis questions.

We ended the day with a much deserved crêpe by the Trocadero before leaving back for Tours.

A demain!

We hate to brag but...

England 6 - France 0

This is the score of the boys' football match this morning! It was followed by badminton games and a softball tournament for the girls.

The sporting event was organised by two PE teachers from the collège and was an excellent team-spirit building exercise.

From a teacher's point of view, it was  rewarding to see our students interact with their partners and friends in French. The ease with which most of them slip into French now is really quite impressive.

As French students only go to school in the morning on Wednesdays, all students were with their partners this afternoon, doing a little bit of shopping, playing laser game or getting on with whatever activities the afternoon had in store for them... And tomorrow... the city of light!

Futuroscope

Hi everyone! Another great day!

The Futuroscope was as exciting as it promised to be; we will all remember the sneeze of the tree-man (to be explained by your child when we come back!!!

Gigantic screens, 3D, dynamic Imax, 360° screens, dynamic cinemas, interactive 3D movies, being moved about by a machine designed to assemble Citroen cars, chasing a water worm, the largest screen in the world, discovering animals of the future, following whales... these are a few of our favourite things - at the Futuroscope.

You will see on the photo that "on ne manque pas de ressort"!

Let us also reassure Mrs Moore: the only people who had to put up with someone else's singing were... everyone on the coach, listening to Mrs Burton and Mr Crespy's rendition of Frère Jacques - although 9R1 girls have been heard humming their world-famous hit: Chasseur de gras!

This evening was going to be swimming for everyone; given that it is an open-door (heated!) pool, we will give a count of how many students have got a cold tomorrow!

Bonne nuit!

Bonne Journée au Futuroscope!

Bonjour a tout le monde,

Glad to hear it's all going so well. Have a great day at Futuroscope and I hope you don't have to suffer the students singing for too long!

Mrs Moore

1st weekend + Monday

We were very lucky and had amazing, summery weather last weekend as well as today, Monday.

All our students seem to be having a very positive experience with their partner and exchange families. Some went away for the weekend, most visited Tours and all enjoyed the hot weather.

We did not get one home-sick phone call on Sunday night, which was a first!!!

Today was our first contact with Collège Jean-Philippe Rameau. We were given a tour of the school by Madame Gaucher, the assistant principal, and students went to observe lessons during the rest of the morning. A few experienced first-hand the fact that absent teachers are not covered over here, and ended up back in our room with their partners!

Before we took our coach to Tours, where Mrs Burton was to share her exciting knowledge of the city accumulated over the years, we celebrated the main event of the day; Adam's birthday!

Tomorrow we shall be going to Futuroscope, a very interesting science theme park, where students will see films using cutting edge technology that make imax look like... Well, they'll tell you!!!

We are hoping for more hot weather as there are a few water attractions in the park!

We have arrived!

Everything went according to plan yesterday, we caught the Euro Tunnel on time and did not hit any bad traffic.

We arrived at 8pm sharp, and our students were all very excited to find their partners. Everyone set off to enjoy the sunny weekend; we hope the sun will shine on the other side of the channel as well!

Tomorrow's the Big Day!

Welcome to the IVC MFL blog. Check this page daily to follow your child's adventures in Tours and do not hesitate to comment on the posts!

Y. Crespy