REPORT OF THE VISIT TO GERMANY (27th November to 1st December 2013)

Köln, from 27^th November to 1^st December 2013

This was the second visit of the Comenius Project “European Passport to Employability”. Participants arrived in Cologne on Wednesday 27^th of November. The school was the meeting point for all the arriving countries. Students were collected by the families while teachers were brought by the hosting teachers to the hotel, which was in the city center.

On Thursday 28^th all the participants met at the school by 8:00 a.m. First of all, the headmaster welcomed all the participants. After this, a guided tour through the school was made for teachers and students. Then, teachers and students could attend some classes. As a special activity to be mentioned, an ICT teacher showed us the new technologies that the school used for teaching. Lunch was held in the school. After that, some local teachers prepared some funny activities for students. There, some teachers participated too! In the afternoon, Irish students did the presentation that couldn’t be done in Ireland. After the presentation, a logo contest was made in order to create the project logo; to do that students made groups from different countries. Then, each country began to prepare the products they brought for the intercultural Christmas market. Meanwhile, coordinators had a meeting to talk about the organization of the activities for the next visit, among other questions; a minute of this meeting was written. Finally, students went home and teachers had dinner together and then went back to the hotel, finishing the exhausting day!

On Friday German teachers arranged a visit to the shoes factory ‘ARA’. We took a train and then a bus to arrive to the factory, which was in the outskirts of Cologne. It took the whole morning. We were shown how they organized the whole process of shoes production; we had also the opportunity to ask some questions. Back in Cologne, we had lunch in the brewery ZIMS in the city center. The cold bad weather didn’t prevent us from enjoying an interesting guided tour around the city center organized by the host country. After that, people was free to visit the different Christmas markets around the city and do some shopping. Teachers had dinner and then they went back to the hotel.

Saturday was a special day. At 11:30 the group met in the Rautenstrauch Museum, which displays a lot of diverse clothing and materials from cultures all over the world. It was an amazing experience. Finishing the visit, the group took a bus to the amusement parc Phantasialand, where the group spent the whole afternoon. It was a great experience, especially for students, but also for teachers. Back in Cologne students went back home and teachers had the last dinner in a typical German restaurant and went back to the hotel.

On Sunday, each country left for to their homes.

Juan Pablo García

Spanish coordinator