Benhall Infant School in Cheltenham, UK have a newly developed partnership with Old Yundum School in the Gambia. To help inspire other staff in the school and increase the outreach of the partnership to as many areas of the curriculum as possible, Benhall’s partnership co-ordinator produced the following ‘idea sheet’, which was circulated to all staff in the school.

PARTNERSHIP WITH THE GAMBIA - SUBJECTS FOR STUDY

• Geography: Where is the Gambia? What is the weather like? What is the land like? How far is it from England?  What qualities do the Gambia and England share – i.e. similarities and differences and why? What countries are near to the Gambia?
• History: What people live there? Have they always lived there? What was the Gambia like 100 years ago? What is their flag like? What do the colours represent? What is their National Anthem about? Is it similar to ours? What language to Gambians speak? What tribes are there in The Gambia?
• Art & D&T: Design a flag for our school (look at the one for our partner school, Old Yundum).  We will produce a full size flag from the children’s designs to fly alongside the Old Yundum school flag in our school grounds, and give one to the headteacher of Old Yundum to take home and fly at his school. Batik – the headteacher hopes to show Benhall children how batik is created in the Gambia.  What type of clothes do we need to wear in the Gambia – design.  Gambian stamps – design a stamp for school, our country.
• English: Factual writing about the Gambia, letter writing, stories for The Gambia, reading about The Gambia, learn some tribal language – Fula, Mandinka, Wollof.  Poems about the Gambia.  Make a class book about weather in England, a day in your life at school/home, food you eat, special celebrations, favourite poems/stories, our school, our homes, birds, animals.  The idea would be to make class/individual books for the headteacher to take back to the Gambia to help the children there with their understanding of us.
• Science: Study foods grown in the Gambia and foods eaten in the Gambia.
• Maths: Money – look at Gambian money (dalasi), what is it worth? What could you buy with 100 dalasi / £100?
• RE: Most Gambians are Moslems but all religions live happily together. Could look at Islam.
• General: It would be appreciated if staff could set up some wall displays about the Gambia.  Central areas would be particularly good but maybe one in each class too.  I can provide a variety of resources and information.

PLEASE CONTACT US IF YOU WOULD LIKE TO LEARN MORE ABOUT THIS PARTNERSHIP.