Interactive board – Arabic course © Girard school
Girard school, one of the bilingual francophone schools of Alexandria, is engaged in the Quality Process “Démarche Qualité” with the CIEP- International Centre for pedagogical Studies of Sevres. Girard hosts more than a thousand students from kindergarten to High School.
In this context, she chose to bet on new technologies as a motivational lever for students and as pedagogical innovation field towards new learning capabilities. It is also to anticipate and prepare young people for tomorrow’s society.
Innovative School project
From 2012 to 2014 the procedure’s stages between the CIEP and the school have followed from diagnosis to the development of concrete suggestions, involving all teachers. The result of this process is reflected in the major axes of the 2014-2018 school project:
1) Improve the educational quality and strive for excellence.
2) Develop the interdisciplinary teaching to improve language proficiency among students.
3) Develop openness to the world.
- Increase openness of the institution to society and internationally.
- Educate the school community to citizenship.
This evolution for a decidedly active pedagogy presupposes a change of position towards the student. In this perspective, the learner must remain the main actor, manipulate his environment, and reorganize it. This approach comes in a series of concepts such as “discovery learning”, “learning from experience”, “creative teaching and learning.” This approach aims primarily to develop better skills in problem solving, and intellectual autonomy. The teacher is a facilitator rather than knowledge transmitter. Pierre-Yves Roux, head of the Unit Expertise and Projects of the French Language Department at CIEP stressed “Teaching in Girard school focuses on students. It is important as well to work on teaching evolution. Learning is an act of growth, transformation; it is a process that allows us to explore an environment, to grasp the meaning and the significance.”
Involvement and teacher training
Tableau interactif – cours de sciences © Ecole Girard
In recent years, digital has been fully integrated in learning styles and has been at the heart of the school project. Teachers use the smartboard since 2010. It is an important tool to train and teach differently. This technology has become essential to adopt a creative pedagogy, dynamic and effective for the new generation in order to create interactivity sparking motivation and attention of the students. Teachers have received training on “Online Learning” or “e-Learning”, creation of interactive entertainment, integration of the TV in the classroom and how to have an audiovisual classroom, beginning from the school year 2012-2013. These training are offered by the French Institute, by the francophone departments of the Bibliotheca Alexandrina, and in particular the CAF.
A responsible of TICE ensures coordination of activities and services. It has set up tools to facilitate internal communication and collaborative dynamics, including the updating of the email addresses list. A documentary monitoring allows teachers to regularly receive a newsletter from the Documentation and Information Centre of Girard School to keep them informed of anything new that may be relevant.
Developing digital educational use
The school site has developed an educational platform: We can find many interactive activities developed by teachers. In kindergarten, the teacher shows students photographs of an accomplished activity and offers students to relate their experience. In elementary school, the teachers use video footage to develop oral expression. In middle school, students often work from films or documentaries sparking discussions and related activities. The press, literary, philosophical or dramatic lead to productions presented in class. Digital activities have become integral to the functioning of the Girard School and is featured on the school site, its Facebook and Twitter page.
All news is displayed as well as important announcements affecting current or former students, which strengthens the relation and communication in the school, between students and teachers, youth and adults.
CDI, the fulcrum and resources place
Since 2009 the French CDI is equipped with BCDI software. The librarian of the institution was then trained at the CRDP of Poitiers. Librarians at Girard School also encourage the use of digital tools in the classroom (Internet research, student achievement …) or proposed activities: digital correspondence, chats, and exchanges with students from France Morocco, Belgium and Algeria, and between classes from different schools in Alexandria. Furthermore, the CDI has subscribed to the Culturethèque of French Institute of Egypt, which offers regular competitions.
The CDI promotes the realization of multimedia objects, as thematic CD (superstitions, French expressions, the human body, journey through history : Egypt / Belgium, farm in Egypt…) and also blogs, such as the one offering a culinary glossary recipes / cooking tools/figurative expressions… In 2015-2016, the fifth grade class has a project in the class of CDI, creating a blog on the journey of flat Stanley in the Mediterranean in collaboration with two foreign schools in Algeria and Corsica.
Le CDI encourage la réalisation d’objets multimédia, comme des CD thématiques (superstitions, expressions françaises et le corps humain, voyage dans l’histoire : Égypte/Belgique, La ferme en Égypte…) et des blogs, tel celui proposant un glossaire de gastronomie : recettes, ustensiles de cuisine, expressions imagées… En 2015-2016, la classe de 5e primaire a comme projet dans les cours du CDI, la création d’un blog sur le voyage de Clément aplati dans le bassin méditerranéen en collaboration avec deux établissements étrangers en Algérie et en Corse.
