REACHING OUR GOALS

REPORT ON THE ACTIVITIES DONE BY GHANDI TEAM DURING THE PERIOD 24th March/14th April 2015.

By Carmen Nieves Hernández Brito.

The Gandhi Team has taken part in two different campaigns or solidarity projects.

The first one is part of the High School Project on Solidarity. The IES Canarias Cabrera Pinto is currently participating  in three Educational Nets (Solidarity Schools Net, EcoNet and Equality Net), our group chose  CHILD SOLDIERS. It was carried out with the collaboration of the Atención Educativa teacher, Dácil Melián Huguet and students in 1º Bachillerato B, who are part of the Ghandi Team. 

The objective of the activity was to raise awareness on an important problem which is affecting many children worldwide, that is,  using children in armed conflicts. First, in class, they looked for information about this terrible issue, and then wrote summaries of the articles they had found on the internet, and  posted them in  their blog. They also made  a poster with pictures and some facts. All the information has been taken from different sites on the Internet. There are posts about stories of children like Natalia,  showing how they are recruited, others from organizations which are working to help these children like SOS Children, and others about the countries which are using children as soldiers, and the number of children killed in these conflicts.

On the 25th of March, they went to the town centre and put their poster on the middle of a very touristy area, next to the Concepción Church, and they asked locals and tourists to share their views on this issue. Some of them wrote messages and opinions on their cardboards! Many people congratulated them on their action!

By the end of the day, they found out, a lot of people are worried about this problem and shared their views. 


However, they felt, that somehow, mature people had shown more interest than younger ones, so they thought it was necessary to do something else to raise awareness. 

For that reason, they have put this poster in the School Entrance Hall. It is there so that anybody can write a message, their opinion, etc. 

From the 13th to the 17th of April, "The Cultural Week" is taking place in our school.

There will be different lectures and workshops on Children's Right, Gender Equality, and about Gender Discrimination... 

It will be a good moment to take different groups on a Tour to see all the different projects done on the school, and that all the groups have the opportunity to write their opinion, "every grain counts".

The aim of the activity was  to raise awareness, not only in the group of students working on it, but also in our community and back to school again, making it visible for the whole school!  

The second project "A BOOK IS A DREAM. BE PART OF THAT DREAM" has been carried out during the first weeks of April. In this one the English teacher and tutor of the group of 1º Bachillerato B, Carmen Nieves Hernández Brito, has collaborated. The team wanted to do an event and raise money for children in need. 

They had read a newspaper article that pointed out that our region, was at the top in education inequality and child poverty. 

They had many ideas to do it, donating different items and then selling them, and giving the money to charities, and many more, but there was a problem, we didn't have much time to put their ideas in practice, at least not in time to meet the Euroscola deadline, so, they decided that it would be a good idea to collect books that they had at home, and that they had read and enjoyed, and offer them to other kids. 

First, they created a poster to promote the campaign, and they went to all the classes in our High School and put a "solidarity box" there. 
Then on Friday the 10th and Monday the 13th, they went to the classes and picked the boxes. 


Finally they counted the books and they will be given to the charities before the "Book Day" on the 23rd of April. During the cultural week, the books will be handed to the charities. UP TO THE MOMENT OF SENDING THIS BLOG THEY HAVE REACHED 600 BOOKS!

This project has been important in different ways, first showing that teenagers care about their mates, and are worried about their community, and are ready to work to reach their goals, also,  for the children receiving the books. We know they will feel they belong to a community who cares about them. The idea of writing a message in the cover of the book for the receivers to read, was also very sweet!

We also hope they start enjoying reading, and economic difficulties don't hinder their future. Reading is the way to having an enjoyable experience and to knowledge!

It also has to do with sustainability. Many of us have books at home that are in perfect condition, and we are not going to read again! So, it is a good idea they can be reused, and enjoyed by others. 

The Ghandi team wanted to get as many books as possible, so they decided to include a prize _something sweet and a diploma_ for the class which had donated more books! The prize to the most solidarity class!

I would also like to mention that in addition to the Euroscola project, some of the Ghandi Team members, are working on  "Mediation" and other Solidarity Projects in our High School. They meet every Thursday in the school.  "Mediation"  is aimed at creating "positive leaders" among students. I must say, this campaign has been a great example these students can become those leaders!

Finally, as an English teacher, this experience has been incredible for my students, and Dácil thinks the same about her subject, "Atención Educativa"


Searching for information  about the Millennium Goals on the net, in English, and writing their posts! Superb work! It has been worthwhile the effort.

Throughout these weeks, we have encountered many difficulties, not enough time, none of us knew much about blogs, reading and writing in English is not always easy, but we have discovered that a lot of things can be done if you have a goal in mind, so by asking other mates and teachers, by using tutorials in youtube, we have managed to do something we are very proud of. 

As Diana Scharf Hunt once said, "Goals Are Dreams with Deadlines"

Our BLOG has reached 2,350 visits. 

Really amazing! 

I would like to say, thanks to all the people involved, of course, Euroscola Team for organizing this contest, and specially the members of the Ghandi Team for their hard work, and showing how important "values" are for them! 

WELL DONE!

COUNTING DONATED BOOKS

OUR SOLIDARITY CAMPAIGN CAME TO ITS FINAL COUNTDOWN
By Gandhi Team

After an intense week on Friday the 10th and on Monday the 13th of April, we went to all the classrooms in our High School to take the "solidarity boxes" and see how many books  we had managed to get!

We were excited because we got a lot of books, nice looking books, and we knew our campaign had been a success story, but we wanted to know how many we had managed to collect!

Our class brought many books! We took a picture to remember this campaign.

Afterwards, it was time  to start going to all the classes and picking up the "solidarity boxes".

We had some good anecdotes while collecting the books. 

The 3º ESO A classroom had 133 books! We needed a lot of volunteers to take the books down. We heard two of the students talking, one of them said: 

"Goodbye to my childhood books!" 

We felt sorry because they would miss their books, but were very thankful for their generosity, thanks Andrea and Elena! We know you love reading and books, but they will be enjoyed by other mates!

While we were putting them in boxes and preparing them to be picked up by the charities, each of us discovered great books we had enjoyed in our childhood. We couldn't resist opening its pages and feeling some nostalgia for our childhood times. 

Other books reminded us when we started at the High School and we read that really exciting book. We are sure, some kids will have the same experience!

Some students forgot to bring their books, and said they would bring them the next day. So, the number of books collected will increase after this blog is sent.

Other people outside the school have also known about our campaign and have donated hundreds of books. We would like to mention Ana María Hernández and her daughters Estela and Carlota. We have received  such lovely books from them! "Pepe the Chicken", a cute one.

We feel proud of what has been done. As Swami Sivananda used to say:

"Put your heart, mind, intellect and soul even to your smallest acts. This is the secret of success"

This is what we have done!

Monday 13th April has also been a special day in our High School. We have been  celebrating a "Solidarity Day" 

There have been  different lectures and workshops about solidarity, human rights and gender equality. We feel this week more than ever we are "learning important things", not only contents which will be asked in our next test.

Well, at the end of the day,  we counted all the books, our High School has donated 600 books for children in need. 

And there are more books that students haven't been able to bring today. We will go on till we reach 1,000 books!

Thanks to all The IES Canarias Cabrera Pinto High School Community of students parents and teachers, and the rest of people who have helped us with this solidarity campaign.

Here you can see some of the pictures we took while counting the books and preparing them to be delivered to different charities!

DONATE ONE BOOK

DONATING A  BOOK FOR CHILDREN IN NEED.

"A book is a dream you hold on your hands. Be part of that dream"           
After all the research we have done, our team has decided  to take action! The force moving us is

"Think globally, act locally", so we have launched a campaign to get  books for children without resources!

If each one of the students in The Cabrera Pinto High School donates one book, we will get more than 500 books! 

We are asking for books that have been  read, enjoyed, and that are in a nice condition.  

Once we get the books, we are going to offer them to  different charities: Spanish Red Cross, Aldeas Infantiles  and Caritas. 

We hope all the books will have reached children and young people by 23rd of April, and they can all celebrate this day, reading a book!

This is the poster we have created to promote our campaign. First, we contacted different charities to see if they would like to help us deliver the books, next our group informed all the students in our High 

School, and  solidarity boxes  have been placed in all the classrooms. Just just now all of us are busy looking for books we have read when we were younger, and that we would like other children to have.  

We are all encouraged to write something on the first page of the book, to pass a message on to the child receiving it!

We decided to start up this campaign after we read about  child poverty in the Canary Islands! We are at the top of the regions where children are suffering the most.

We were really impressed by the report that has recently been published by Cáritas. It pointed out that there are many homes in the Canary Islands where there are fewer than 50 books! We are fighting for equality in education,  trying to help children who are suffering hard economical crisis, and finally, we are trying  to promote solidarity among all our mates!

Our final goal is getting as many  children reading as we can. It is  a really enjoyable way of  dreaming and learning!

"Think Big, Read"

CHILD SOLDIERS: REACHING OUR COMMUNITY

RAISING AWARENESS IN OUR SCHOOL AND SPREADING THE MESSAGE TO OUR COMMUNITY 

By Irene Cáceres, Raquel García, Romina La Paz and Thalía Peña.

WHAT HAVE WE DONE?

This was an activity that was done during the last week of March by our team members. We searched for information about children who are involved in conflicts in different countries. 

We found out that children can be recruited when they are about 10 years old, and form part of an armed group, or they can also work as cooks, spies, messengers, bodyguards, etc. 

Nowadays there are between 250.000 and 300.000 children fighting in the world.

After our research was done,  we designed  a big poster where we put some information about  child  soldiers and after that, we decided to make it more visible and took it to the town centre. 
We showed it to people who were walking in the street, we asked them their opinion about this issue and we shared our views with people from China, Germany, Great Britain, Italy,...

WHERE DID WE GO?

We went to The Concepción Church, near a popular pedestrian street located in La Laguna and we put the poster on the floor to show people the suffering of these children. There are some cafeterias  around  and it is a busy area with a lot of tourists, and local people.

WHY HAVE WE DONE IT?

We did this project because we are worried about this problem and we want people to  reflect about what is happening in other countries: many children are being used as suicide bombers, as sex slaves, or trained as killers from very young. 

They are not enjoying their infancy, and this is not fair. We wanted to make this visible to the people in our surroundings.

HOW DID WE PREPARE IT?

We used our “ATU” classes to work in it. Our teacher, Dácil Melián Huguet  helped us, and also we used some of our free time.

WHAT HAVE WE LEARNED FROM THIS EXPERIENCE?

We learned a lot from this project. We  were impressed to find out that many countries are using children as soldiers. Afghanistan, Central African Republic, Colombia, Côte d’Ivoire, Democratic Republic of the Congo, India, Iraq, Israel, Libya, Mali, Myanmar, Pakistan, Philippines, Thailand, Mali, Somalia, Sudan, South Sudan, Syria, Yemen. 

They are used in many different ways, not always holding guns, but their human rights are constantly being violated. 
Furthermore, we got people to know about child soldiers and some of them gave us their impressions. They wrote their opinions in our poster.

We met people from  our islands and also from different countries that were visiting our city. 

Now, we have put our poster in our High School entrance hall, so that all the students and visitors can see it!

Here is the video we recorded of our experience!