Educational methodology

Tutoring is one of the pillars of our educational project. By working with self-knowledge, acceptance, and self-improvement, tutorship is essential to empower and support all students in their personal growth, which also helps to assess their progress according to the abilities and efforts of each of them.

In a joined and coordinated way, the Student, the family, and the school establish a personal plan that includes personal objectives for improvement, and which is continuously reviewed in the tutoring interviews with each student and the family. Therefore, it is important to keep frequent interviews with the tutor to ensure the educational coherence between family and school. The school assesses these interviews positively and establishes a minimum of three per year with the family, and at least a mínimum of nine per year with the pupil.

Information and knowledge reach our children and teenagers through different sources. Nowadays, it is necessary to work with them on research, management, and especially, the formation of criteria to select information, process it, and transform it into a language on their own(Language creation) that integrates previous knowledge, lived experiences, and their own thinking so it will be LEARNING of the construction of their own knowledge.

LEARNING TO LEARN. Our model Works to guarantee every Student’s transversal competencies they will need to continue growing autonomously: learn to manage and build knowledge, learn among equals, learn to communicate, and cooperate. The Student must be the true protagonist in their learning, always guided and motivated by the teacher. In Virolai we are learning to learn in a dynamic and experiential. We provide the tools for our Student to be open-minded to life and to observe their surrounding, ask questions, formulate hypotheses, do research, reach conclusions, and express their thoughts.

LEARNING IN A GLOBAL ENVIRONMENT. We believe that the relationship between learning and life is fundamental. From this reasoning, with the teacher’s help, we must find meaning in what they do, through interdisciplinarity, connecting different areas of learning based on specific competencies and working in real, everyday situations.
We want our students to leave school with more questions than answers, and keep their curiosity, their motivation to learn, their creativity, and their will to improve and grow through their lives. We do this through:

Our aim is for each student to know and accept their uniqueness positively. Based on this self-knowledge, they can propose their own growth.

This process starts when children are young because we adapt the teaching to the differences in age, maturity, and learning rhythm of each student, with specific and individualized proposals. We dedicate our attention to students with educational needs, whether due to special difficulties or ease of learning, to whom we offer the appropriate means for their project, with the support of the school’s psycho-pedagogical office. We also provide students with a wide range of personalized resources for reinforcement, extensions, teacher tutorials, and diversified optional subjects to ensure personalized attention keeping an eye on students with different rhythms of learning.

Technology is present in our school in a transversal, even invisible way, as a tool that eases learning. Students should not only know how to use it, but they should also use it to create new technology, jumping from users to digital creators. The programming incorporation in the classrooms is part of this strategy. During the learning process, students must learn how to manage their digital identity, using git ethically and respectfully with others, bearing in mind the security aspects. These competencies will be essential for their future professional and personal lives.

The control of languages is crucial for our students to be open-minded people in the world. For this reason, we start learning English from nursery school and introduce a second Language at the beginning of secondary school, always adapting the learning process to the different learning rhythms. The progressive immersion of our students in English spreads to different areas of learning. From the 4th of primary, they are prepared to acquire the official qualification from Cambridge University to finish Baccalaureate with the First or Advanced qualification. In order to encourage the student’s immersion in the Anglo-Saxon culture and Language, the school organizes exchanges with schools from all over the world, using French or English as a vehicular Language.

We participate in International projects in which the English Language is used to communicate, such as the Erasmus Project, the Young Scientists’ meetings, and The European Youth Parliaments, where the second Language we teach, French, is also present.

Nowadays, it is necessary to ensure a comprehensive education to shape competent people, with ethical and strong vàlues, prepared to integrate as active people, capable of giving a responsible and free answer to the challenges the society might present. For us is important to highlight these aspects:

• Creativity: it is necessary to educate our pupils in the ability to see reality with an open and receptive view, in order to give a different and diverse answer, from a divergent way of thinking.
• Resilience: in front of a variable and uncertain future, we need more than ever, to educate our young people with inner strength and strategies that will help them to emerge stronger from the difficulties and challenges they will face.
• Empathy: I know, I understand, and I share. It is necessary to work on all the social skills that enable us to understand everyone else’s opinions, emotions, values, and ways of doing, and to encourage dialogue and relationships based on affection and respect.
• Hope and commitment to the future: Hope is a virtue that can never be lacking in teachers. We must teach our pupils so they become involved, and co-responsible for building a better future for all.
• Perseverance: our culture runs and hides from failure. It is necessary to educate our students so that if they do not reach their objective despite their best efforts, they know how to value and learn from their mistakes in order to start again.

And above all self-improvement, education through effort, the ability to assume challenges, adjust and motivate and, based on their strength, work to overcome them, and develop an entrepreneurial attitude that will allow them to lead their lives.

Students’ participation in school life mitigates their involvement in the learning process, teaching them to be active and participative citizens. For these reasons, pupils from school assume different responsibilities throughout schooling, such as assignments in the infant stage, representative roles in the school or stage councils,  or positions on the coexistence, mediation, and sustainability committees, among others. They also participate in activities aimed at peer learning because, in addition to developing social skills, we believe this is the best way to learn, by teaching and applying what is learned. As a consequence, the second cycle infants explain stories to the initial cycle classmates, there is reading, writing, and math support between older and younger pupils, there are peer-to-peer collaborations in math or collaborative workshops for secondary school students, etc. These activities help to improve coexistence, which makes the school a true learning community.

Education in the expressive areas of our students is a key element to guarantee true integral development. At Virolai, we understand expression from different aspects:

• Body expression, which is worked from infancy to secondary school, aims to develop psychomotor skills, increasing the capacity for expression within creative exercises.
• Musical expression, which involves psychomotor education in the rhythm and coordination field, to the education of the ear, sensitivity, taste for interpretation, and listening.
• Oral expression, the aim of which is not only for students to be able to express themselves in three languages at least, but interpersonal communication in all areas: family, social, and professional.

Theater, acting, and artístic expression enable these skills and teach them to enjoy art.

Assessment is a point of reference and insight for our students’ progress. It’s an effective tool as long as it focuses on the pupil’s progress towards the achievement of the aims according to their abilities and personal situation, values and encourages their effort, and guides them in their learning process.  Self-evaluation facilitates self-knowledge and adjusts self-image. It is, at the same time, a productive tool to achieve a bigger involvement of the students in their own education.

Our students and their families, through tutorship and the school management platform, receive ongoing information about the academic and personal progress of each student.

Education for sustainability is valued as one of the cross-cutting themes that should involve the entire educational community. Starting from the early childhood stage, our students are engaged in sustainable care of the school’s gardens, cultivate orchards, and learn to understand and appreciate biodiversity. The school is part of the Sustainable Schools Network, which recognizes schools in our country that prioritize environmental education.

Health education and Health itself are fundamental aspects of our student’s formation.
Our educational work in this area aims to ultimately inculcate in our students values and attitudes that lead them to adopt a healthy lifestyle throughout their lives, empowering them to become active Health advocates in the environment in which they live. The participation and active involvement of families ensure family-school educational coherence.
Our school is part of the “Fem Salut” program. We have recently signed a collaboration agreement with Bellvitge Hospital for the school’s support in health education.

We offer students a motivated environment that allows them to explore other cultural proposals to enrich their lives. We organize outings, talks, and cultural visits that connect learning to cultural and society reality.

In Virolai we are convinced that knowledge and respect for one’s own traditions promote the interest to know and learn other cultures. That’s why our students actively participate in popular celebrations such as La Merce, la Castañada, the Living Nativity, the Christmas concert, the Carnival cycle, and in cultural events like the Juegos Florales and Sant Jordi. The school has its own Gegantera Colla, with two giants, Riamundi and Xofi, made up of students, families, and faculty who take part in the festivities and gatherings that occur in our city and throughout Catalonia.