Over Easter I had the amazing opportunity to go to Chongqing and celebrate our link school's 250th Anniversary with them! Just think of what 250 years in China's history looks like and you will have some notion of the bizarre and surreal nature of such an event: 10,000 people, including 4000+ immaculately turned out students ; red banners and inflatable dragons everywhere; confetti fireworks; dancing and singing from students, staff, retired staff and ex pupils! It has certainly set a challenge to Framingham Earl high school for our 50^th Anniversary in 2009!!!

I was one of the lucky members of FEHS staff to go because of our successful peer education links with Botswana, which I set up in 2003. We now hope to develop our Dreams and Teams sports link with Chongqing No.7 school, to have more impact on the whole school curriculum. We also intend to establish a more active, student led China club – Zhong Gua – Middle Kingdom club – through which we can explore the Mandarin language, calligraphy, kite-making, art, martial arts, paper making and book binding, Chinese culture, history and religion, China’s place in the global business arena and of course the 2008 Beijing Olympics!

We also hope to include some video footage of the Chinese students recounting their traditional stories in our Talking Traditions project. We have been working on the DVD and Resource book to explore traditions of storytelling in Norfolk and Botswana for 18 months and it will hopefully be completed for use in Norfolk schools next term once we have completed the editing process at Anglia TV. This project follows on from our Weaving Words project completed this year. (See Blog entry below)

I would love to hear from other schools that have successful links with China and to obtain information on local experts in the above fields whom we can tap into for workshops and guidance.