We Had the First Meeting on the International Project "Financial Literacy"

As it has already been informed we had our first meeting at our Art School on the International Project "Financial Literacy" organized by AIESEC. At the beginning of the meeting it was noted that this project has two main values. The first one is that our high school learners acquire their first important knowledge in finance which they will often encounter in real life after finishing school. Such knowledge has never been taught at our public schools, but is very important in real life. Most of the population in our country are under the burden of paying their credits back, but they don't have elementary knowledge on the credit kinds and the risks they bear in them. They don't know how to manage some savings out of very little income. On the other hand knowing trigonometrical formulas or the rare terms of biology is mandatory.       

 The second important value of this one-month project is the chance to communicate with the teachers who do not know Armenian at all. I am sure that our students will definitely make progress in their English speaking and listening skills.    

During the first part of the meeting our High School learners Anna Mkrtchyan and Susanna Avetisyan presented our website mskh.am in English. In their presentation they spoke nearly about everything: the Media Library, subsites, school electronic magazines and pages in foreign languages. It was also mentioned that now all the public schools in Yerevan are closed due to the H1N1 flu, but our school continues its educational work online thanks to maily our school website mskh.am.

During the second part of the meeting the foreign specialists began introducing themselves and presenting some information about the countries they are from. Emili Thompson presented her native country Canada. She mentioned that Canada is about 325 times as big as Armenia but the population is not very large because of severe weather conditions in the northern part of the country.

 Kelvin Kan Kin Chun's presentation about Hong Kong was also very interesting. Kelvin presented their national holidays and dishes with great enthusiasm.  

Dimitrije Nikic presented Serbia. His task was a little complicated because he had to speak also about other countries which were parts of former Yugoslavia. Then he showed a beautiful film about the Serbian part of the River Danube. Dimitrije said that Serbia exports honey in large quantities and gave us a jar of honey and wooden spoons from Serbia.   

Izabella showed us a small flag of Brazil most part of which is green symbolizing the biggest rainforest in the world. She also spoke about Brazilian festivals and national dishes. 

Chondra Herman presented the most famous American brands: Coca Cola, Apple, Michael Jackson, The Statue of Liberty and Fast Food. At that moment Vahram Tokmajyan asked Chondra whether she knew where the copper of the Statue of Liberty had been brought from. The young American didn't know the exact answer, great was her surprise when Vahram said that it was brought from Armenia.

The learners who were present at the meeting, were especially inspired: Anna Mkrtchyan, Mary Telunts, Susanna Avetisyan, Arpi Sahakyan, Mary Markosyan and others. They are already waiting for these unusual lessons, but Arina and Elina sisters said that they were going to join in the lessons of modern dances given by Odre Wirtanen from the USA. .