Schools

All schools contacted to this point have confirmed by headed letter/email that their school will use the museum to enrich curriculum and non curriculum based subjects. It is estimated 80% of these individual school visits based on the response to area's of study to be of interest will be (focused based education programs FEP's). FEP's will consist of History, English, Science, Technology, Geography, Art and Culture K.S 1-4. BVM CIC will establish school visit's from the border regions and the R.o.I and have in place FEP's relevant to the established curriculum but which has a common theme to that in Northern Ireland. A basic break down of the border regions and R.o.I curriculum will be obtained, from the Department of Education and Science Marlborough Street Dublin 1, which the FEP's will be structured around. Schools in both regions will be contacted and a directory made of schools in these regions wanting to visit BVM and/or use the FEP's. The Directory will only consist of schools that have sent a letter or email of conformation stating that the school would like to visit and/or use the FEP's.

BVM will also establish integrated visits with single denomination schools. Single denomination schools will be contacted and a directory made of these schools that wish to participate in integrated visits. BVM will then determine which schools are best suited based on distance, size and area of study being covered. Once grouped BVM and the schools will establish a meeting to discuss what the schools and BVM aim to achieve from the visit and how this will be done through the FEP's in a neutral area. All integrated education programme's will be focused based and cover History, English, Science, Technology, Geography, Art and Culture. The FEP's of single denomination schools participating in integrated visits with the opposite denomination wether from Northern Ireland, the Boarder regions or the RoI will touch on a common theme.

Teachers taking part in museum visits and/or FEP's will be supported by one of four volunteer's, a cultural assistant or the education support officer. Four Volunteers from the community have already offered to give two hours each a week Monday-Friday for FEP's. The four volunteer's, Cultural assistant and one part time museum support officer will provide 20 hours a week of on site teaching support to all visiting schools. All visits which use the FEP's will be conducted in the community classroom which will be housed in the proposed new construction.

For schools that are under staffed, rural or too distant form the museum there will be an educational outreach program available for schools within Northern Ireland, the Boarder Regions and the R.o.I. BVM has informed schools of this service and several have requested details about the service. BVM will also be making contact with schools in the Boarder Regions and the R.o.I to raise awareness of the proposed service. A directory of schools which wish to use this service once in operation will kept. At present there is one cross community Pre-School willing to work on projects with other Pre-schools from differing denomination's and ethnicity.

If you feel that your school would like to take part in any form of visit or be considered for the directory, you can fill in the form below otherwise please contact us by phone or e-mail.

© Bann Valley CIC