The document provides information on Mount Amiata and the surrounding area in Italy, including: 1) The landscape features varied vegetation such as vineyards, olive groves, and chestnut trees, and local products include wines, olive oil, mushrooms, cheeses, honey, and chestnuts. 2) The area has a wildlife park that is home to donkeys, deer, wolves, and other animals. Outdoor activities include hiking and a challenging ropes course. 3) The town of Castel del Piano hosts an annual Palio horse race between four districts and celebrations last several days with parades, games, and fireworks. 4) The local middle school is described, including the

1. MOUNT AMIATA
Mount Amiata and its surroundings are a vast environmental park where
nature, art and culture happily combine. The vegetation is varied. You can
find vineyards, olive groves, chestnut trees, beech and fir.
Thanks to the favourable soil and climate, the excellent Montecucco wine
(also recognized D.O.C.) is produced in this area. The famous Seggianese
olives give a top quality olive oil recognized D.O.P. Our wine and oil
accompany most of our typical dishes, among which recipes with local
mushrooms. The mushrooms of Mount Amiata are a natural product of
the woods and mushroom picking is an ancient activity of the inhabitants
of the Amiata villages.
The Amiata donkeys were used in the past to carry mushrooms from the
woods to the towns and to help farmers with their work. You can see
these donkeys in our “Wildlife Park”, together with deers, roe deers,
mouflons, chamois and wolves, the biggest attraction of the park.

2. The Park is a natural reserve and all the animals live in the wild, but the
territory where the wolves live is fenced.
Wild boars, badgers, foxes and hedgehogs also live in the local woods.
Going back to the local products, we can't forget “ricotta” and
“ravaggiolo”, two types of cheese that are processed in this area.
Bee farming is important too, and our local honey is famous.
But the most important product of Mount Amiata is the chestnut. Many
local recipes have chestnuts as a fundamental ingredient; we also have a
special chestnut beer. There are various types of chestnut trees and the
“Marroni” are the best.

3. As a tribute to this important fruit the Corsini factory created a special
cake called “polendina”.
The Corsini's story began in 1921 in Castel del Piano, in the old family
bakery of Corrado and Solidea Corsini. Since then the bakery and then
the factory has been handed down from father to son, and through the
years the dimensions and the importance of the factory have grown. Now
their panettone, panforte, cakes and biscuits are famous and exported in
many countries.
Climbing up the mountain top, we find beech and then fir trees.
The beechwood of Mount Amiata is the biggest in Europe, but now some
trees are diseased and they will be cut down.
In winter the atmosphere is spectacular because the beech and fir trees
are covered with snow and they seem made of ice!!

4. In winter there are more visitors to our mountain thanks to the snow and
a small ski area on the mountain top. There are 12 ski slopes in total,
some are for beginners and some are for expert skiers. Most of the
slopes are quite narrow, because they are surrounded by the trees, and
that's make them more difficult than they seem! The summit is 1738 mt.
and from there you can get a great view over Tuscany. On the very top
you can also see a monumental iron cross built in 1910.
Apart from skiing, you can also enjoy trekking in the woods or try the
Amiata Balance, a challenging course on ropes to test your balance and
endurance.

5. CASTEL DEL PIANO
In our town there are a lot of attractions, for example “Piazzone” (big
square”) where many people of every age meet and talk or read
something, and children can do sport. Now it is more beautiful than
before. In fact one year ago the town council decided to restructure it.
There are some football teams such as “Giovanissimi”, “Esordienti” and
others. In Castel del Piano there are two football pitches; in one you can
play 5-a-side football, and the other one is a real football pitch. Other
popular sports here are tennis and basketball. There are two tennis
courts and a sports hall. There is also a new gym next to one of the
tennis courts and the small football pitch. In this gym you can play other
sports, for example volleyball and handball.

6. THE “PALIO”
The biggest and most exciting event in Castel del Piano is the Palio.
The palio is a horse race with four horses representing the four parts of
the town.
The four districts, called “contrade” are Monumento, Poggio, Storte and
Borgo.
The Palio takes places on St. Patron's day (8th September) and at the end
of the race the winning contrada goes to Madonna delle Grazie church to
say thank you.
The symbols of the four contrade are: a fountain for Storte and Borgo, a
castle for Poggio and an eagle for Monumento. The colours are: red and
blue for Monumento, white, black and sky blue for Storte, red and green
for Poggio, pink and violet for Borgo.
The celebrations last 3 days: 6th, 7th and of course 8th September, the
most important day because it is when the Palio takes place.
The 6th and the 7th there are heats for the horses and then the leaders
of the contrade check the horses which will run the Palio.
The days before the 8th each contrada has a special dinner with the
supporters and they sing, they have fun and they have a rather good
dinner.
Each contrada is busy also in the morning and in the afternoon. There are
some games and you can also cook the dinner.
The 7th afternoon and the 8th morning the contrade do a test for the real

7. race; they can try the course and the start.
On 8th morning there is a historical parade with some representative
members of the contrade who walk around the square .
The four contrade wave their flags for 10-20 minutes (first the contrada
which won the latest palio) and a lot of people come to watch the flag
wavers. Then in the afternoon there is another parade.
After that the contrade go to Garibaldi Square and all the people gather
here to see the race. The square is full of excitement!
The race should start at 6 o'clock but generally it doesn't start until 7.
At night there is a bingo and finally fireworks that last about 40 minutes.
The next weeks the winning contrada has a street parade to celebrate its
victory and to remind its “enemies” who the best is, at least for the
year....

8. OUR SCHOOL DAY
Our school is a “Scuola Media” (Middle School) for students aged 11 to
14. In our school we have 36 lessons a week, from Monday to Saturday
but one of the second classes has chosen to do only 30 lessons.
We start at 8 o'clock and finish at 1 p.m. on Monday, Wednesday, Friday
and Saturday, but on Tuesday and Thursday we finish at 4 pm .We have
5 periods on Monday, Wednesday, Friday and Saturday and on Tuesday
and Thursday we have 7 periods.
We have a ten-minute break in the morning and one-hour break at lunch-
time. On Tuesday and Thursday we have lunch at school but some
students eat at home.
We study History, English, Maths, Science, Art, Music, P.E., Italian,
Geography, I.C.T., Technology, French and R.E. There are 6 classes; 2
first classes, 2 second classes and 2 third classes for a total number of
about 130 students.
In our school every Tuesday and Thursday we have 2 afternoon lessons.
On Tuesday afternoon we have easy lessons like reading (if we do
Italian), or experiments (if we do Science) or P. E.
On Thursday we can choose what to do. Our teachers give us a piece of
paper with different subjects that we can choose (we call them “labs”).
Our choices can change every term. We have lots of activities and some
are very nice. For example we can do basketball, football, tennis,

9. athletics, English for Trinity exams, I.C.T for E.C.D.L, Science club, eco-
lab, kitchen garden, Art, cineforum, etc. Some teachers also do extra
lessons of Maths, Italian and English for children who need to revise or
catch up with the class. Some of them need extra Italian lessons because
they are foreigners. In fact we have a lot of immigrants here.
The students of the third classes can also choose to do an extra lesson
from 4 p.m. to 5 p.m. on Tuesdays to attend the course to get the
motorcycle licence.
We like these activities a lot because we can stay with all the students
of our school, not only our classmates, and because they are fun. What do
you think of our activities? Do you like them?
Every year we can also have special projects, like for example lessons
with a psychologist, or theatre, etc....
In our school R.E. is optional. Students who don't do R.E. study other
subjects with one of their teachers. They usually do Maths, Italian
homework or revise for a test.
In our school there are also three children with special needs who have
supporting teachers only for them. These teachers help them with their
special curriculum and also plan activities to help them socialize with the
other guys.
At the end of the third year we have exams...four written exams (Italian,
Maths, English and French) and an oral exam on all the subjects!
SPORT COMPETITIONS
In our school we do a lot of sport competitions. There is a volleyball
tournament with other schools and our P. E. teacher trains us to become
“number 1”.
Another sport competition is in May: that’s the “Giochi della della
Gioventù”. On this day there are a lot of competitors from many schools.
We do many sports (volleyball, basketball, football, etc.) and finally we
see which school has the best results in all the games.
The most important local sport competition is “Trofeo Amiata”. The best
boys and girls of our school do long jump, high jump, 1000 metres, 60

10. metres, 100 metres and shot put.
It is fun and if you win you get a medal.
There is also a skiing competition in winter, but just a few students do it.
CONTESTS
In our school we also do contests; some of them are local, some others
regional, national or international. For example our school took part in the
European Robo-cup competition. It came first in Austria three years ago
in the “Rescue category”. These students built a robot that could enter a
building, locate the “victims” and separate them from various types of
debris and rescue them.
We also won a regional contest in English. These students drew and wrote
a comic about the mystery of Stonehenge.
We also take part in literary contests, the Maths Olympics and local
contests with works and ornaments that we make with our Art teacher.
Some of our works are sold at the Christmas market to raise money for
charity.
SPECIAL DAYS IN OUR SCHOOL
In January we have a ski holiday because we are a mountain school and
skiing is part of our curriculum. All the classes can take part, provided
there is the required number of students.
Then the last day of Carnival our sport teacher organizes some games for
all the students who are first divided into teams.
In the second term we go on school trips, usually one or two. They can be
one-day trips or three-day trips.
The last week of school the classes which don't have exams don’t always
have regular lessons. In fact they often go out or play board games. If
they go out, they play volleyball or football and chat with friends and
teachers. On the last day we all go to Garibaldi Square to eat an ice-

11. cream and then we come back to school...and when we the bell rings we
shout and play with water and get wet!!