On April 22, the European School students, with an initiative of the Greens Movement of Georgia, planted willow, laurel, spruce trees in the schoolyard and greened the environment. The representatives of the Greens Movement met PYP 5th graders, working on environmental projects and gave useful advice. The first grade students had a lesson about reusing of waste products. PYP students from grade 5 staged a shadow play that considered environmental threats.

On April 17, the Vice President and other representatives of AdvancED, a North American schools accreditation association, arrived in Georgia from the US. At the Ministry of Education and Sciences the guests attended a meeting on the topic of recognition of the American High School diploma. From the European School Irma Barbakadze, American High School Director and Natia Tevzadze, Academic Director of American High School, also attended the meeting, where the parties came to an agreement to start the recognition process. In the end, the guests visited the European School. Our FabLab impressed the visitors, who recommended to become STEM certified.

On April 23, known as World Book and Copyright Day Nino Kusrashvili, PR Manager read children’s book -Guess how I love You to primary students and explained the importance of copyright. Many ES students got involved in the campaign #giveabook, they gave books, made handwritten notes on the first blank pages and wished a pleasant reading to recipients.

On Earth Day, April 22, an exhibition of kids’ handcrafts was held at the European Kindergarten. Kids made handcrafts with the help of their teachers, who explained to them the importance of cleaning the environment, recycling, and reusable material. The activity aimed at raising responsible and caring citizens.

World Book and Copyright Day was proclaimed by UNESCO in 1995 and is celebrated on April 23. Together with 195 different countries, Georgia also celebrates this day and organizes book sales annually. Giorgi Kekelidze, a famous Georgian writer and a public figure proposed to make April 23 a National Book Giving Day in Georgia. The European School joined the campaign #giveabook with great enthusiasm. Giorgi Kekelidze met the ES students, explained why to love books and what a copyright is. Giving books increased children’s enthusiasm for books.

Georgian Program students from grade 6a read Davit Zurabishvili’s fairy tale -Journey to Dreamland, at literature lesson first and later staged a performance with the help of Georgian language teacher Tamar Tsagareli. They also translated a few chapters from this tale in Russian with the assistance of Russian language teacher Nato Mikeladze. These engaging lessons sparked students’ interest in literature and became a fun experience for them.

Certificates of participation were awarded to the European School students who recently returned from Brussels after an official visit to the European Parliament, European Commission and other EU institutions. After signing the memorandum, the European School received a letter of recognition from the European Parliament, showing readiness to support ES students’ participation in cultural and educational exchange programs. After the awarding ceremony, presentations on various interesting topics, made by the awarded students in Brussels, were shown to the ES students’ body.

Merab Dzuliashvili, PYP 4a student became the PYP library assistant for one day. At that particular day, students worked on presentations about their transdisciplinary themes (grade 4 - How the World Works and grade 5 - Sharing the Planet). They were asked to cite the resources used while researching the topic. Together with Nino Ramishvili, the PYP librarian, Merab explained what is academic honesty, what is plagiarizing and reminded students how to cite resources. Students made another step to digital citizenship through this activity. “It was a really interesting experience, but it was hard helping 5th graders, and I really liked it”, - Merab Dzuliashvili.

PYP students spent two weeks on Mother Language project. Within the project, they worked in pairs and groups, searched the biographic information about Georgian writers, prepared presentations, learned poems and mastered in the art of reading aloud poetry.  On April 16, the students visited the Mtatsminda Pantheon of Writers and Public Figures, where the children paid respect to their ancestors, put flowers on their graves, recited poems and finally visited Mama Daviti Church.