BILINGUAL EDUCATION
Piccola England offers a curriculum focused on the learning of the English language context by native English teachers.
The process of learning a language or several languages at the same time starts very early, with the child’s direct experience and exposure to what he/she loves and cherishes through an active learning context rich in words, games, songs, images, actions, repetition, sounds and play.
Younger children, unlike teenagers or adults, are more receptive at acquiring and mastering the phonetics of a second language. Initially the teacher’s vocabulary will be deliberately limited and repetitive with the purpose of providing understandable instructions for the pupil to grasp. Language mistakes are an important part of the learning process; it’s considered a normal passage and NOT a failure.
Our priority as a bilingual school is focused on the correct comprehension of the English language and subsequently on language correctness and the ability of the pupils to express themselves through the use of this language.
To achieve bilingualism we:
- Teach an English curricular program
- Various subjects are taught directly in English language
- Predominant use of English language during different educational, recreational and extra-disciplinary activities
- Use of the latest English teaching material.
- Inclusion of the language model proposed by the native speaking teacher to the English language program.
- English context in the schools environments.
The English objectives adopted in our school follow the Levels foreseen by the European Council Syllabus:
| SCHOOL LEVEL | SCHOOL CYCLE | SCHOOL YEAR | ENGLISH LANGUAGE LEVEL |
| NURSERY | NURSERY, PRESCHOOLERS | FROM AGE 1 TO 4 YEARS OF AGE | BASIC OR PROPEDEUTIC |
| PRIMARY SCHOOL | TRIENNIAL | I | A1 |
| II | |||
| III | |||
| BIENNIAL | IV | A2 | |
| V |
Piccola England being a bilingual Primary School fundamentally aims at teaching its pupils to communicate and express effectively and independently in all contexts of every day life both in English and in Italian.
The teaching and learning path of Italian Language and all it comprehends effectively begins for all pupils in 1St grade of Primary School as stipulated in the Ministry curriculum for Primary School. The prevalent Italian teacher works and collaborates together with English Teachers to coordinate and share educational methods and strategies to convey disciplinary literacy and numeracy (content knowledge, experiences, skills, ability to listen, read, write, speak, and critical thinking in a way that is meaningful within the content area).
The School offers a normal weekly schedule of lesson hours and program stipulated for Italian schools, providing during different disciplinary areas preparation and mastery of the Italian Language and context. We commit to support, assist and provide pupils, in case of need, with personalized and individual interventions in one or more disciplines. In specific cases we propose additional individual hours of recovery and integration in one or more disciplines.