While we are here, we will be observing in 4 different types of schools. Yep that’s right, I flew half way across the world to go to school on my summer vacation. Future teacher for you right there. But all joking aside so far this has been such an awesome experience and all the teachers and principals have been unbelievably accommodating to us; letting us watch and often times participate in class and answering all of our (at times) never ending questions. I think this experience is going to be so enriching because there is so much one can learn from things that are different than the familiar. And German schools are definitely quite different than American schools. Here’s a (really) brief set up about the German schools system for those of you that aren’t familiar:
Kindergarten: ages 3- 6yrs
Grundschule: grades 1st – 4th
*At the end of 4th grade students take a test that will determine which school they will continue on to. Those with higher scores and teacher recommendations will be sent to different schools than those with lower scores. There are three different schools
· Hauptschule: grades 5-9. This is the school where the lower scoring student tend to help. Students graduating from this school would not be going on to University they would prepare for vocational training.
· Realschule: grades 5-10. The middle scoring students go here
· Gymnasium : grades 5-12 or 13. The students with the highest scores would go here. Preparing the students to go on to University or College.
The first school that we visited was the Theodor- Heuss Gymnasium(THG). Here’s a picture of the school:
Also they have a rock climbing wall which seemed cool to me!
We went to THG two days. The first day was an introduction of the school. We got a tour of the school and had time to ask the principal questions about the school, how it works, how the students are tested, etc. Just by walking around the school you could tell that it was structured very different than an American school. First of all there were children everywhere. Yes, yes, I know school and kids kind of go hand in hand but what I mean is when the students weren’t in class it seemed as if they were free to roam/go where ever. This seemed like something that would never happen in American schools, especially with students as young as fifth grade. 5th through 13th all had classes that were either 45mins or 90mins. Some students would be done with classes at noon on some days others would have later evening classes around 5 o’clock. They wouldn’t necessarily have classes every period and during their period they would be free to do as they please. I guess what I mean here is it’s not like in American schools where usually if you have a free period you are required be in a study hall or else you have to jump through all the hoops and loops to be allowed to leave school early. To me this freedom shows a higher demand for individual responsibility of the students and trust…. :o what?!? Trust students to be were they’re supposed to be when they’re supposed to be there? Crazy! But according to the Principal it works. Maybe America should consider making the students more individually responsible and giving more freedoms with the expectation that the student will do what they are supposed to do. Many people would say that this could never work. But it has and it does. Looks like we could learn a thing or two here:
1. When we can set high expectations while at the same time not strangling students with silly rules like hall passes and not being able to leave campus for lunch, students will respond positively.
2. When you put high performing students all together in one school it becomes easier to set the same high expectations for everyone which can open up for this increased freedoms. (* Not saying we should ditch all of our school system and go into complete “German Tracking” crazyiness. Its clearly has its + and - )
I could go on and on here but I will stop otherwise this will be the post that never ever ends… it goes on and my friend…. I won’t do that I promise. It’ll end, eventually. :P
Lambchop Break
This first day we visited the schools we also got a chance to meet with their student government. This was a group of about10 students and we had a little discussion of some perceptions of each others country. I found it interesting the two topics of current events that the students were most interested in was Barrack Obama’s presidency and the idea of potential legalization of marijuana. What does that say about our country? I’ll let you decide.
Another topic we discussed is what Americans learn and think about German History. Now this was an interesting topic… I know I and I’m sure the rest of the group was thinking, WWII and Hitler but we were all afraid to say it seemed. Then the Germans shared with us what they learn about in history. I have always wondered how they would learn about World War II so I was beyond excited to actually get the answer. Many people assume that while learning about history Germans act as if WWII never happened. According to the group this is simply not true! They learn about what happens just as we would. One girl I talked with said that it can be difficult since a lot of guilt is held because of what happened. But that they learn about events and focus on how someone can gain that much power and get so much people to believe in ideas of one man. I think this is such a productive way to study this!
“Learn from the Past, Watch the Present, Prepare for the Future.”
The next day we spent the morning rotating among three different classrooms. I was able to observe in a 5th, 6th and a 9th grade classroom. The thing that I still can’t get over is how well these students spoke English! All of the classes we observed were English classes.
The 5th grades preferred to speak in German but when encouraged to they could speak in English.
The 6th grade class was taught entirely in English. They had questions prepared for us to answer. They seem to have the impression that all Americans have been to New York or L.A and that we know movies stars lol. The lesson for the day was reading Robison Crusoe and we helped them with words that they didn’t know. Two words that were in the story that they didn’t know was: cannibal and baby goat. Interesting words to try and explain, don’t you think?
The 9th graders I had a blast with. There English was pretty much perfect. They had been learning about bigger cities recently so the teacher had us describe to the Chicago. Granted they don’t understand that I live pretty faraway from the city but Emily and I did the best we could to describe positives of Chi-Town. We told them about The Bean, Michigan Ave and the beach, cultural diversity, all the building and museums. But guess what they were interested in, nope not the shopping or the sites but drugs and crimes. Clearly Chicago has a great rep. The students then had to write a paragraph in English about the city. Here is one sentence from a student’s paper:
“Chicago is a loud and busy city and you are lucky to survive with only two bullets in your leg.”
Hmmmm…. Sorry Chicago I think we failed you… we tried to talk about baseball and shopping but these curious 9th graders weren’t having it.
After our observations we had lunch with some of the English Teachers. We discussed some the difference of learning a foreign language in American and in Germany. Judging by the amazing English in these classrooms compared to my pretty much useless knowledge of Spanish there’s quite a difference
Okay that was crazy long; I’m sorry and I hope it was not too boring. But this is why I’m here! The food and the crazy adventures are merely a very big PLUS!
Oh one last thought. Here’s a cool clock in the school: It should the time all around the world. It Amused me.
Night!
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