February 2, 2010

The Embassy of Hungary has adopted MacFarland Middle School

In January 2010 the Embassy of Hungary in Washington, D.C. joined the Embassy Adoption Program (EAP), a joint project between D.C. public schools, the Washington Performing Art Society and several Embassies.

The mission of the EAP is to help D.C. students to better understand the world and foreign countries through involvement of many embassies to the educational process.  It starts with each embassy “adopting” a D.C. elementary class for the school year and providing the students with as many information as possible on the country’s history, culture, geography, science. The embassy staff usually gives a series of lectures to the class as part of the curriculum.

Hungary has adopted a 5th grade class at MacFarland Middle School in Washington D.C. The first one hour long class was given by Mrs. Zsuzsa Szombati, wife of the Ambassador who talked about   Hungary’s   geography, natural treasures, cultural heritage and language.

Mrs. Szombati gave a PowerPoint presentation with interesting details about the country, its capital city and its people. She answered a vast array of questions about everyday life, and gave a few hints on how to proceed to deepen students’ knowledge of Hungary: she distributed brochures, provided a list of relevant internet sites on Hungary and its heritage.
	The 5th graders wanted to learn more about the activity of the embassy, about diplomats and also about the personal achievements of the ambassador’s wife.  They were surprised to learn that many tools we use in our everyday activities, like the ball point pen, the computer or the hologram were invented by Hungarians.

A short film was also presented featuring these inventors and Hungarian landmarks. Students were thought a few Hungarian words and also made their first successful steps to overcome the difficulties of Hungarian pronunciation.

The embassy is thankful to Ms. Njambi, Coordinator of the Embassy Adoption Program for her valuable contribution and to the the class’ teacher, Ms. Ashley Connick who provided indispensable assistance to make this first encounter a success.