Gymnasium

I finally finally finally visited my school!  So awesome, and so interesting.  Here’s what happened/my disorganized thoughts:

1.     I forgot to wear earrings on my first day of school, whoops!

2.     All of the teachers were incredibly welcoming.  Some live in Detmold also, and it sounds like there are lots of options for carpooling out to Blomberg together, which would be way better than sitting on a bus for 35 minutes in silence every morning. 

3.     The kids speak really impressive English, at least in the classes I observed.  We told them I don’t speak any German so that they will speak English with/around me!

4.     Dress code is pretty casual, even the headmaster wears jeans. 

5.     Teachers only have to be at the Gymnasium when they have class – there is no like “be in the building from 7:30 to 3” rule or anything.  They also don’t have individual offices or even department offices.  Instead, there is a massive room with tons of tables/bulletin boards/coffee machine/copiers where all the teachers can gather, leave their bags, hang out between classes, etc.  Sandra, the woman who took me around with her all day, said she would much prefer if they had like a 7-to-3 schedules, but the lack of offices makes it pretty impossible to do any work at the school, so the teachers end up doing all their preparation and grading at home.

6.     Almost every English teacher I met already has an idea of what classes they want me in.  I think I’ll be pretty busy!  Which is a good thing…since Blomberg is a bit far away, once I’m out there, I want to be in a lot of classes.

7.     The German school system is still very confusing to me.  Sandra tried to explain on Thursday night how the older students end up choosing different subjects to focus on, and take different exams based on which classes they’re in more, and on top of regular school exams have to choose subjects for their Abitur (it’s the test you take at the end of Gymnasium that gets you into Uni…maybe…?), and the Abitur has both written and oral components.  So, Sandra has a 13^th grade English class that meets only Thursdays and Fridays, because that group didn’t choose English as one of their final-year focus classes.  Confusing, no?

8.     Students miss class sometimes to take exams for other classes.  For example, a student walked into the 13^th grade class in the middle of the hour, he had just come from a physics exam.  I feel like that never happens in the States, although maybe that was just Mayfield?  Either way, the system in Blomberg is structured such that it’s expected that students sometimes miss a class for another class’s exam. 

After school, Sandra let me spend the whole day hanging out with her and her kids (she has two adorable, super-ginger boys, 2 and 4 years old) and even took me grocery shopping!  Such a necessity… We were able to also talk a bit more about teaching in Germany, she feels that the profession has really lost respect recently, which made me sad to hear.  I’d always thought Germany had a much better handle on their education system than the States, but I feel like I might be discovering this year that things are just as difficult here as they are at home. For example, she told me that the state governments are continuously “updating” curriculums with no further support for implementation, forcing teachers to completely revamp their systems every few years, and on top of that, making each school purchase the books/pamphlets describing the new curriculums.  More on this topic to follow as I learn more…

Saturday was spent sleeping, jogging, continuing to attempt to unpack my life, and playing poker with some of Seba’s friends (I lost everything in the end, luckily they don’t play for money.)  It was simultaneously great to hang out with people speaking German and soooo annoying at how stuttering/unclear mine still is.  Ohhhhh well it will get there. 

Tomorrow, Monday, I get to go on a school trip with the 9^th graders to the Ruhrgebiet!  (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ruhr)  Check it out.  According to that wiki page, it’s the 5^th largest urban area in Europe!