Through a communal artistic event in English, Coinco seeks to promote the learning of this foreign language in the students of its municipal schools, encouraging the involvement of teachers of various subjects and parents.
More than 170 students from four municipal schools in the Coinco commune gathered to perform their first "Talent Show", an artistic and cultural event where students from pre-kindergarten to 8th grade showed their English skills through dance and singing.
In the activity, 12 artistic performances were presented (3 per school), including the presentation of the group Kiss from 5th and 6th grade of the El Rulo School, the dance and singing of Taylor Swift from 4th B of the Huallilén School, the animal song "Wag your tail" with the children of the Chillehue School and the mix of songs by the pupils of Copequén.
For Pamela Vidal, mother of Cristina Millanes from El Rulo, "it is an excellent initiative, as the children have more activities in English and thus learn to communicate better in this foreign language, and these activities also allow them to interact more with other schools". Lesly Monardes, a parent, valued the activity, as "they are very entertaining and innovative activities that are done here in the village".
Performing at this community event is part of a long process that requires the development of an idea, learning the song in English, making the costume production, long hours of rehearsal and to top it all off, being selected among the top performers of their school for the community event, after an internal event where all the school's classes perform their song.
"In this Talent Show we saw the work of the teachers all year long and the coordination between them. To hear the children speak and sing in English in such a fluent way is wonderful," said Coinco's Technical Director, Marlene González.
English teacher Martina Garay has been teaching in the commune for three years and is happy with the progress made by her students. "All the children are very happy and the parents are happy with their children. In these years, the change is very noticeable and this type of activity motivates them to be in the English class", says the teacher.
The event is part of the activities that seek to promote English in the schools of the commune through We Learn Net, a network that was born after several years of collaboration between the Municipality of Coinco and Fundación Educacional Oportunidad, with the aim of promoting the teaching of English from an early age and sharing strategies that arise from the We Learn programme in the fourth region. Coinco is the founding commune of the network, and next year San Vicente de Tagua Tagua will join.
"Our early English teaching programme We Learn was born 12 years ago in the Elqui Valley and 3 years ago it added the commune of Coinco as part of We Learn Net. Our idea is to add new communes that are interested in promoting the learning of this language from the early years. In 2019, together with the Subsecretaría de Educación Parvularia, we will implement it in Puerto Natales. In this way, we are creating a large network to improve the teaching of English", emphasised Marcela Marzolo, executive director of Fundación Educacional Oportunidad.
