German Visitors
Fourteen students and two members of staff from the Otto-Pankok Schule in Mülheim an der Ruhr, Darlington’s twin town in Germany, recently spent two days in the German Department at QE. They worked with AS and A Level students on various projects covering topics such as the environment, immigration, German films and media. The visit culminated in group presentations in German followed by a German-English feast which included specialities from Germany. Live music was provided by student Aidan Harbottle who wrote a German song especially for the event, entitled Freunde und Familie, which he performed on his guitar.
Erich Bittmann, Head of English & Sport at Otto-Pankok Schule, has been bringing German students to Darlington for 21 years. Penny Porter, Head of German at QE has been working with Erich for 5 years and this is the sixth time that the Otto-Pankok Schule has visited QE under Penny’s direction.
Penny comments:
“It is always a delight to work with Erich and his students and we had an absolutely wonderful two days with them. All students - from QE and from Germany - were extremely enthusiastic and highly motivated. The students first made contact before the summer holidays by email and Facebook and were really excited about meeting each other. All benefitted tremendously and proved themselves to be excellent ambassadors for their school/college and for their country. It was wonderful seeing our students working together and we are already looking forward to students and staff from Otto-Pankok Schule visiting again next year.”
October 7, 2011