Italian Day 2009
By Rita PrigioniOn Tuesday, April 21, 2009, 110 high school students participated in the third Italian Day event, "Forza con l'italiano" held at the UW-Madison campus. This fun event takes place every two years among the high schools that offer Italian as part of their curriculum. This year, students from Bradford High School, St. Joseph's High School, Tremper High School, (all from Kenosha) and Trinity Academy from Pewaukee came to test their proficiency and show off their ability in four language and culture categories: 1) poster contest; 2) spelling contest; 3) poetry reading contest; and 4) skit contest. The UW-Madison Department of French and Italian faculty, graduate students and other guests provided the judging.
The schedule for the day (pdf) began with students arriving in the morning at the Red Gym, a unique castle-like building on the UW-Madison campus. Giovanna Miceli Jeffries, the main coordinator for the program and an instructor with the UW French and Italian Program, provided welcoming and introductory comments. This was followed by remarks from special guest, Dr. Eleonora Cammareri, Director/Dirigente of the Ufficio Scolastico, Education Office of the Consulate General of Italy located in Chicago.Then, the competitions began. Students split up into different rooms devoted to Spelling Level I, Spelling Level II, Poetry Reading Level I, Poetry Reading Level II, Skits Level I and Skits Level II. Meanwhile, the posters, which had been made previously at their respective schools, were being judged and prominently displayed on the back wall of the "On Wisconsin Room."
For the poetry reading contests, students had to memorize (as much as possible) their poems composed by Italian poets. Each recitation was judged on the basis of pronunciation, clarity of recitation, and the ability to show that the student understood the poem. Coincidentally, April is National Poetry Month.
Read the poems of the students who took first, second and third places:
Pro Memoria (pdf) composed by Gianni Rodari
Tic Tac (pdf) composed by Attilio Lolini
Sole (pdf) composed by Aldo Palazzeschi
Nevicata (pdf) composed by Ada Negri
Carnevale a Venezia (pdf) composed by Cesare Rimini
Tristezza (pdf) composed by Adelaide Migliaccio
L'Alfabeto Divertente (pdf)
The majority of the students took part in the Spelling Level I competition. Words, such as azzurro, difficile, leggere, colazione, piazza, and cucchiaio were a few of the words testing their skills. Spelling Level II included words such as francobollo, pettegolezzo, sciroppo and vaccinazione. It should be pointed out that the standard Italian alphabet was enforced with proper pronunciation. Students competed in teams of three students per team, with three rounds of competition.The last area of competition was the skits. The language, of course, had to be in Italian, and the skits each lasted approximately 5 minutes. All skits were fun to watch and the students did a fine job in acting. The students composed their scripts from original material. The medalists ranged from school bullying to Carnevale to Giulietta e Romeo.
By late morning, the majority of the competitions were over. It was now time for a PowerPoint presentation by UW emeritus professor Christopher Kleinhenz called, "Ieri, oggi, domani. L'Italia attraverso i secoli." This was an illustrated presentation about the history of Italy, comparing and contrasting it from yesterday to today. In fact, the students learned that April 21, the day of their Italian Day event, was also the birthday of Rome, which is 2,762 years old!Following the Italy presentation, Doug Schuette (a former student from Piazza Italia) gave an overview of Piazza Italia - A Unique Dorm Experience (exit WisItalia). He explained it is an Italian language floor located at Tripp/Adam's Hall on the University of Wisconsin-Madison campus and is located in a beautiful building on the lakeshore of Lake Mendota. Piazza Italia is an Italian-immersion living community available for undergraduate students, supervised by a resident native-speaker of Italian. Doug emphasized that students are part of the International Learning Community where they get together with students and faculty for delicious dinners and events. He encouraged anyone going to the UW-Madison to consider this dorm experience, even if they are not Italian majors. For more information, students/parents can contact the Language Coordinator Mattia Begali (mbegali@wisc.edu) or Prof. Grazia Menechella (gmeneche@wisc.edu).
By this time, it was time for il pranzo (lunch), so Rita Prigioni (WisItalia webmaster) lead the group of students, teachers and volunteers, and walked over to the Italian Workmen's Club on Regent Street. Although the weather was drizzly, the smell of pasta and tomato sauce warmed everyone up. Thanks to the generosity of the Italian Workmen's Club and the Italian-American Women's Club, the students enjoyed a lunch of spaghetti, salad and Italian bread.
After lunch, the third round of the Level I Spelling took place. Then, it was time for the awards. Everyone did a magnificent job! The students worked hard all year long at learning Italian and it showed. In fact, the judges had a difficult time in narrowing down who would be the first, second and third place winners for each of the categories. As a result, there were quite a few ties (two-way, three-way and four-way ties!). Rina Pignone, co-coordinator of the event and Italian teacher at Tremper High School in Kenosha, announced the student names and their awards. Each school received a plaque for their overall participation and performance, and individual medals were given to the students.
List of Winners
View the list of winners (pdf) for all four competition categories. Thanks to everyone for making this event a great success. Bravi, gli studenti!
Online Web Album
View more photos of this event. Photos taken by Rita Prigioni, WisItalia volunteer webmaster.Sponsors and Volunteers
This event was sponsored by the UW-Madison Center for European Studies, with generous support from the UW Department of French and Italian, WisItalia, the Italian Workmen's Club and the Italian-American Women's Club.View the list of Sponsors, Volunteers and Participants (pdf) from the Italian Day 2009 event.
Updated March 6, 2010
