The councilor of Social Welfare, Youth and Equality of the Formentera Island Council, Dolores Fernández, presented today via press conference the opening of registration for the Formentera Summer School programme. The programme is a socioeducational resource that exists during summer months to provide children between 3 and 12 with a wide array of recreational activities.
A total of 200 spaces are available and activities will be held at the Mestre Lluís Andreu (Sant Francesc), Sant Ferran and El Pilar de la Mola public primary schools. During the months of July and August, alternatives for free-time activities will be offered to those children who participate, all with the goal of fostering creative development and imagination.
This time around the Summer School's guiding theme will be “Som artistes” (“We're artists”), the objective being to focus on arts and crafts, music, dance, etc. using the summer's activities as a starting-off point.
The different activities will include arts and crafts workshops (to stimulate imagination, creativity, psychomotricity, etc.); workshops – like gymkhanas – to promote physical fitness; game workshops (both traditional and from all over the world, outdoor, water games, etc.); music workshops (dances, songs, instrument building, etc.); theatre and physical expression workshops (in preparation for different end-of-the-month festivals); storytelling workshop; trips to the beach and other field trips.
These activities give children the possibility of an extremely diversified education through games and physical activity, not to mention imparting values like solidarity, friendship, responsibility, trust and mutual respect.
Like in years past, the school's objective is to offer an educational and recreational space for children during the summer months, to foment different educational leisure activities and assist in the solution of work-family conflicts (bearing in mind that the summer season is the period of time when employment is highest and children are not in school).
The Summer School activities programme will extend from 1 July to 30 August from 9 am to 2 pm Monday through Friday, with the option of 8 am start-time. Swimming will also be possible as a complementary activity.
The professional staff will include 22 day counsellors, 1 director and 1 certified Special Education staff member to tend to children with special learning needs.
It is important to remember that the Summer School, although a recreational activity, is still educational, and as such full importance is given to the use of games as learning tools. Games form an integral part of the culture in which children live, fundamental to the physical, intellectual and social growth of a child.
Finally, we remind readers that registration will be open starting today, 12 June, and will continue through 19 June, in the Citizen's Information Office (OAC) of the Formentera Island Council.
