News | 19 March 2025
Trip to Italy with IES Landskrona fritids
During the half-term break, the leisure time centre at IES Landskrona travelled to Italy – without even leaving the school. Showing how imagination and dedication can create fun and rewarding activities for students.
The ‘theme journey’ is a project the leisure time centre (fritidshemmet) team at IES Landskrona has been very involved in. Emil Persson who helps to run IES Landskrona’s leisure time centre as what is known in Swedish as a fritidspedagog, said:
“The theme journey is truly a team effort. It all started with the idea of a test project before Christmas with the theme of Mexico. It was a success among the students, so we decided to continue this holiday activity with different themes. We base our work on LGR 22, where the purpose of the after-school program is to stimulate the students’ development and learning, as well as to offer them a meaningful leisure time. This is to be achieved by structuring the teaching around the students' needs, interests, and experiences, but also by continuously challenging them and inspiring them to make new discoveries.”
The students started their trip to Italy by creating their own passports and boarding passes before passing through security and boarding the “plane”. They received a boarding pass where they filled in the destination, airport, gate, time/date, and seat number. The staff dressed accordingly as flight attendants, pilots, and security personnel.
When the students took a break, the educators quickly set up and created the "airport." After the break was over, the students came back and had to go through security. Those who triggered the alarm were searched! After presenting their passports, they received their boarding pass with a seat number and could proceed to board the "plane". The plane was actually the assembly hall, with numbered seats, and the students sat down in their assigned seats. Staff used the intercom system to make security announcements, gate changes, and boarding announcements.
Before taking off, they showed a video on a projector of flight attendants going through safety procedures on the plane. After that, they showed a video from the cockpit showing what it looks like when a plane takes off, followed by another video showing what it looks like when the plane lands. During the flight, they enjoyed refreshments while learning about Italian culture, history, and traditions.
“We informed the students that we had landed in Italy and conducted a guided tour of famous sights using Google Earth,” Emil Persson explained. “Our dream is to have VR glasses and other digital aids to show the surroundings in an exciting and engaging way. When presenting the sights, the students got to see and discuss places like the Trevi Fountain, learning about why it’s so famous, a bit of history, and they also saw the Colosseum, among other things.”
The guided tour ended at a restaurant, where the kitchen served pizza for all students and staff. For an afternoon treat, they had prepared gelato (ice cream) the day before, together with the children.
“We also offered creative activities for the students who didn’t want to participate in the trip. We created a room called the ‘Da Vinci Corner’, where students could engage in activities like cutting out masks, creating artwork of Italian landmarks, and beading materials like pizza slices, the Italian flag, etc,” said Louise Mattsson, also a fritidspedagog and head of the leisure time centre at IES Landskrona. “To carry out a project like this, it requires planning time with colleagues, structure, and a lot of engagement and creativity from the educators. Our next step is to try and synchronize planning time with the teachers so we can do similar projects during a regular school day, so that all students, even those not attending the holiday after-school program, feel included.”
After these amazing trips, IES Landskrona plans to go to Chile (Easter Island) during the Easter break. Before each break, they create a schedule that both guardians and students can follow.
“The students' reactions have been positive; they are engaged and excited,” Louise Mattsson said. “The feedback from guardians has also been positive and encouraging, which has led us to want to continue and expand the project, further developing the after-school program.”