Year 1 teachers, Miss Whaley and Mrs Gill, have safely arrived in India and are visiting our partner school, Kamla Nehru Public School, Phagwara.

Pupils from both schools joined together this morning using Skype to share facts, ask and answer questions about each other's schools and the local area.  Children finished the session by singing familiar songs.  In India, the session was filmed by a local TV station and is appearing on local news twice today!

"We were welcomed by the school band performing a set piece and roller skaters showing off their skills!  Next, there was a whole school welcome assembly outside in the lovely sunshine and we were presented with garlands and had a good luck bindi placed on our forehead.  We also watched the children in upper school perform Scottish dancing and were given a very thorough tour around the school. We were taken into all the classrooms where children greeted us so respectfully and asked us a range of probing questions!

"We then talked with the teachers and shared strategies that we use in school such as talk-partners and use of lolly sticks. We talked about our school being a Values-based school and it turns out that Kamla Nehru school has values embedded throughout their whole curriculum. They were very interested to hear about Mind-up, some of the lessons we have taught and how we use glitter bottles to calm down the emotions. The Headteacher expressed an interest to explore this further during their visit to our school.

"In addition to this, the school teaches Jolly Phonics and we talked about our use of ReadWriteInc. in comparison.  We think they are keen to see us teach a phonics lesson tomorrow.  Luckily we have brought some resources with us to enable us to do this!" explained Miss Whaley.