eTwinning meeting (IT/POL/FIN)

On 9th November Polish/Italian and Finish students participated in another eTwinning meeting. This year’s subjects were devoted to the theme of physical activity. Students discussed the following topics:

Give examples of physical activities.
Examples of physical exercises are swimming, jogging, football, team sports in general and walking. Choosing the steps over the elevator. Even P.E. lessons.

What are the health benefits of physical activity (for body and mind)?
There are many benefits of physical activities, mainly connected with improving our health. Physical activity helps to reduce stress, increases endorphins, helps us to be fit and in a good mood. When we exercise we look well and feel good. 

What are the disadvantages?
One of the most popular disadvantages of physical activities are the injuries. The most common of them include: muscle, tendon strains; muscle disruption, damage; joint capsule injuries or dislocation; various fractures.

Do you practice any sports? If yes, what kind, how many hours per week? 

We practise a lot of sports. Finnish people practise ice-skating, hockey and volleyball. In Poland and Italy we like it too, but we are more interested in football, basketball, tennis and many other types of physical activity.

The number of hours per week that we can devote to sports depends highly on the amount of free time that we have. ;) 

Is this a good idea that PE is obligatory when at school? Why? Why not?

We think that this is a good idea. Many students don’t like practising sports, some of them are not used to doing as their families don’t spend their free time in this way. Therefore, PE at school can sometimes be the only time when children take care of their physical well-being. 

What are the risks involved in sports?

Sports are important in life! It is very important to be fit and healthy. However, too much sports may be dangerous and bad for our health. Risks connected with sports include, for example, fractures, sprains and muscle strains. Many of them can be very burdensome, not completely curable or simply incurable at all. Therefore, you have to be careful while practising sports. 

What kind of activities would you recommend?

Generally, in Poland we play football, basketball, volleyball and sometimes ice-hockey. People also cycle a lot and ride horses. Toruń is the most famous of its basketball team when it comes to sports and in our school we have also basketball classes.

What sports are popular in your country/town?

To be honest any kind of physical activity can be good for your health, if you practise it with restraint. We definitely recommend running, swimming, cycling and also many team games like football or basketball. If you are a calm person, you can also do yoga or meditation. 

Again all students considered this experience to be very enjoyable. Italian teachers even sent to all of us some pictures depicting their students’ work in progress ;) We are looking forward to the next meeting online! 

Dance to the music (Poland)

This task aimed to stress the importance of physical activity. What we wanted to highlight was the fact that in order to get fit, to improve your body shape and general well-being you don’t have to be a sportsman or a sportswoman - you can also be a dancer! 

Not everybody likes running, swimming, jumping etc. However, if you want to improve your physical condition and you like listening to music then dancing is certainly something for you! Sometimes all what it takes is just to give it a go! 

There are various types of dancing as there are various music genres – so it’s possible to choose something for people of all ages. You can do it just for pleasure and health benefits or you can become a professional who takes part is dancing competitions. 

Health benefits of dancing – our Top Ten! ;) 
1 Boost Memory – this kind of aerobic exercise is extremely helpful in preventing diseases like for example dementia
2 Strong Bones – it prevents and it’s helpful in treatment of osteoporosis 
3 Improve flexibility – dancing helps to reduce stiffness which has a positive effect on joint pains 
4 Calorie Blaster – dancing improves the level of our stamina and helps to burn the calories (approximately 5-10 calories per minute)
5. Reduce Stress – due to the fact that this is quite an enjoyable activity it is strongly recommended as a means to achieve stress relief 
6 Better Blood – dancing improves the level of good cholesterol in our blood while reducing the level of the bad one; it also aids sugar control in our blood 
7 Diminish Depression – it has positive effects not only on our body, but also on our spirit; if you experience sadness, life dissatisfaction or less severe symptoms of depression dancing can be a remedy to all those negative feelings 
8 Culturally Diverse and Socially Satisfying – this is a great “feature” of dancing; it has no barriers and knows no language; wherever you are - dancing helps to bond with strangers and people from other countries; feeling uncomfortable at a party – just grab somebody and dance!
9 Increase Energy – research show that regular dancing can increase your energy levels; it might be worth trying if you feel sleepy and tired all the time
10 Balance Better – while dancing you learn to keep your balance in many different positions; it improves your muscle strength and makes you less prone to injures  

Luckily, in our school we have a teacher who is a professional dancer. Therefore, we have at school dance groups and our students of all ages can learn dancing in a more professional way. They also take part in and win various national dancing competitions. 

The dancing performance prepared by the students:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2q2wcmlN2-0&feature=youtu.be 

Some backstage photos: 

Howdy!

This time we'd like to introduce some typically Finnish sports to you! Hope you'll have a chance to try them out! Enjoy! :)

- The Vesanto crew

• Finnish baseball a.k.a. pesäpallo
• Disc golf a.k.a. frisbeegolf
• Finnish slipper football a.k.a. Reiska-jalkapallo