N6 - September/October 2014

From our Pedagogical Director and Coordinator

At long last after many months of waiting
we have managed to start the new school
year in our rightful home in Pozzolatico.
The achievement in getting the building
ready for the children and negotiating the
official maze in just over one year was
indeed extraordinary. We now inhabit large, fresh, light-filled rooms in a building
that still has a lot of potential and the effect on everybody is clearly discernable.
We have views that are dreamlike and

grounds that are bountiful in their nature.

Whether standing under the venerable
plantain tree, meeting in the corridors or
the parents room we all feel we belong to
a community that puts learning at its heart. And for learning we need each other.
The building provides us with a unique
opportunity to realize a vision for both our
children and the adults around them and
soon we will be seeing many more activities in the spaces we have available.

Over the next months we will be finding

new spaces ready for our creativity and
enterprise.
One immediate accomplishment was
that the whole faculty from Kindergarten
to High School are working together in a
way that was previously not possible. We
are now one school and grateful for all
the effort and time that people have put
in to make this joyous occasion possible.
Christopher Clouder

Students of the Liceo dei Colli

Some of the teachers of the Liceo dei Colli, from left to right: Almut Stolte, Francesca Zannoni, Alessandra Mazzoni, Indro Cattel Casattelo, Angelo, Francesca Bing,
Valentina Maffei, Christopher Clouder e in basso, Giulia Miscioscia and Elisa Martinuzzi

The voice of the students

The X and XI grade trip to Sicily for the study of Volcanology
Our students accounts and comments
Didactics (from the Ancient Greek didaktikos, from didaskein ,
teaching ), usually refers to all that is learnt at a notional and
informational level; but in the tour we did this week, teaching
began as soon as we set foot on the train . The educational goal
of this trip had a double edge: on the one hand we were to learn
the correct terminology and mechanisms of the volcano in detail
and on the other hand we had the opportunity to learn to be with
others, to share experiences and to challenge each other.
Our school follows a teaching method that is very much based
on observation and experience. During the first year our teacher
Valentina Maffei introduced us to Husserls phenomenological
method of observation; so what better way than to go directly
into the field?
We had the opportunity to check the veracity of the information

we had directly with our eyes, so that the concepts could be

indelibly imprinted in our memories.
To expand our knowledge we visited the volcanic centre where
we listened to well-informed volcanologists explaining the peculiarities of the Strombolian eruption and, while hiking on Mount
Etna, we were accompanied by qualified hiking guides that brought us to know a lot of interesting things, including the formation
of secondary craters, the frequency of eruptions, the different
forms of volcanic bombs .
In conclusion , each one of us was, for some personal reason,
impressed by something that we were later able to share with
the rest of the class ; and thats why, everyone for himself and
also all together , we decided to create a geology book for future
reference !
Rosa Calosi - Grade XI

The organization of the trip to Sicily has brought greater harmony

into the classroom and within each individual student. The initial
gathering, while waiting for the arrival of all the participants to the
trip gave us the opportunity to meet our new classmates at the
beginning of the school year and was an important moment for the

commencement of this experience. The most effective organizational model, by which we were inspired, was to deal with situations
on the spot, so as to embrace the needs of all, while still following
the main program, structured by a few basic rules that left each one
their own independence .
Valentina Sprecacenere - Grade XI

During the trip to Sicily, in my opinion, a wonderful relationship developed between students and teachers.
The class came together during this trip and lived these days in
an atmosphere of joy and interest for the topics brought by the
teachers. To live through intense moments like these, all together
as a school, was a wonderful experience: the relationship between

students and teachers was pleasant, fun and easy going. Without
any tension, some of the factions within our group came much
closer together, thanks to the forced proximity that is experienced
on such a trip. It seems to me, that this kind of forced community
that one experiences during a trip allows us to get to know each
other more easily.
Dario - Grade XI

Hiking on Mount Etna

Exploring the craters

The ninth grade one-week practicum

at the Farm of Loppiano ( FI )
The ninth grade trip to Loppiano was held
from the 14th of September to the 19th.
The Farm has existed now for more than a
century, in the olden times it belonged to a
noble family from the Valdarno valley and
was subsequently handed over in concession to the Christian religious Focolare
movement. The main crops are those of
the vine and the olive tree together with
some cereals and vegetables. The techniques used to cultivate and to work the soil
are varied and all belong to sustainable

A moment of relaxation in Loppiano

agriculture thanks to which we try to preserve the fertility of the ecosystems. The
farm has recently been equipped in order
to accommodate groups and provide teaching in the field, offering the opportunity
to those who come here to work together
with the staff and to observe directly how Working in the vineyards of Loppiano
they are organized and how they manage their working day. I spent only the first
three days with the students, that is to say
Sunday the14th , Monday the15th and
Tuesday the 16th until evening . These
were three very beautiful and very intense
days, for myself and for them. In addition
to the interesting activities on the farm
that took up most of the time (just to name
a few: grape harvesting, sampling of the
grapes and the calculation of sugar content in the laboratory, reconstruction of an Practical lesson in Loppiano
ancient arch etc.) ; We also had the opportunity to get to know each other better
by cooking and sleeping together in the curious and willing to learn more about
same apartment . The kids proved to be certain topics. It has been a very positive
excellent cooks and also keen workers, experience.
Teacher Francesca Zannoni

Open Day of Liceo dei Colli

7th September 2014: Open Worshops

The High Schools Open Day, Lorenzo Galligani, who teaches sculpture at the Liceo dei Colli, while running the workhop.

Metalwork, open workshop with

Rolando Pierini.

The High Schools Open Day in September with Il Circo

Tascabile, a circus arts school that will begin a collaboration with The Liceo dei Colli this year.

Thanks to all parents

and teachers
During the first two weeks of September, the School and its workshops have seen an incessant
swarm of busy parents and teachers. In the new carpentry workshop a large group of parents from
the School has worked tirelessly to
design and make 120 desks for the
students of the School, 10 double
tables for the kindergartens, coat
hangers for all classrooms, long

benches to accommodate shoes

and drying racks for the paintings.
Furniture has been fitted, the new
blackboards hung up, classrooms
and common areas cleaned and
decorated. With these few lines we
want to thank everyone for their valuable work, which has allowed us
to make the school serviceable and
welcoming for our children..
The school community

From Parents

Macbeth performed by the

students of the Liceo dei Colli
July 2014
On the occasion of the last day of lessons before the summer
holiday, the students of the Liceo dei Colli treated the school community to a stage performance of The Tragedy of Macbeth, by
William Shakespeare. To the happy surprise of all, the crowd
reached numbers beyond expectations, including not only family
members and teachers, but also many students and parents from
various grades of the Waldorf school. Young and old alike applauded the superbly executed and creatively staged performance.
The play, considered Shakespeares darkest tragedy, tells the
story of Macbeth, a Scottish general who is informed by three
witches of their prophecy that he will one day ascend to the throne
to become king of Scotland. Encouraged by his wife, Lady Macbeth, to accelerate his rise to power, Macbeth proceeds to kill off
his king and then commit a series of further murders in an effort to
protect the secret of his deceit and his own life. By the end of the
play, Lady Macbeth has committed suicide and a rival army has
killed Macbeth. Shakespeares message about the tragic turns
that life takes when man is overcome by ambition for power and
uses evil as a means to fulfil that ambition is still relevant today,
even if the acts of evil take on a different form in the context of
our society.
Indro Casatello, English teacher, directed the play and adapted
Shakespeares script for this performance. The students performed Macbeth in English. By all accounts, this was no small feat.
The students are not native speakers, and the old English language of Shakespeare is considerably more difficult to comprehend
and memorize, due its uncommon structure and word usage relative to modern English. However, with a lot of hard work on
the part of the students and their teacher, our scholars pulled off
a nearly flawless performance! I couldnt be more proud of the
students. Their effort and enthusiasm were 100% and they put
on a fantastic play! We had a great time working together on
Macbeth, commented Indro.
The staging of the play was unusually creative and resourcefully planned. The performance was held at what was to be the
future site of the school, with the theatre not yet completed and
significant parts of the building still in renovation phase. So, the
teachers and students set about choosing locations around the
campus. Some acts they performed in the interior of the school:

Parents at work

Out, out, brief candle!

Lifes but a walking shadow, it is a tale told by an idiot,
full of sound and fury,
signifying nothing.

the villas ballroom with its frescoed ceiling was an ideal setting for
the banquet scene. Others were staged outside: the act in which
the witches communicate their three prophecies to Macbeth was
set in space surrounded by stone walls where the witches appeared to be dancing around their cauldron in a grotto. The audience
lined up on the exterior stairs leading down toward them to watch.
The unanimous favourite of the students was the final scene of
the play, in which the army of Malcolm, son of the king, and Macduff, another general, march upon the castle to seek revenge for
the murder of their family members, and a battle ensues. The stu-

dents wore camouflage reaped from the park surrounding the villa
and fought using self-constructed wooden weapons. Their Kung
Fu instructors, Valentina and Angelo, had rehearsed the fighting
scene to perfection with them.
At the completion of the play, with evil avenged and the general
Macduff having been hailed as the new king of Scotland, order
has been restored, so to say. The audience fell into roaring applause. Even though many would have found it difficult to understand the words of the play, staged in a foreign language, the
performance was lost on no one!
Nina Marton (mother of two students at the Liceo)

Giornale del Liceo dei Colli

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Il Liceo dei Colli - Via Imprunetana 124, - Loc. Pozzolatico, Impruneta (FI) - Tel: +39 055 0330237 - www.liceodeicolli.it