German primary schools - what should I look for when choosing?

[Yodeleeiay]

And what are the pros/ cons compared to UK primaries?

DD will start Grundschule next year and I have to apply in a few weeks. We have two nearby, one Catholic, one Evangelical, but both accept children of any/ no religion. There is also another new, smaller one in the next village, 20-25 mins cycle ride away.

DD initially wanted to go to the Catholic one because that's where one of her best friends went last year but now says she just wants to go where her friends go - her best friend is going to the new one (but lives closer to it).

The new one has a great reputation and a v good head. The Catholic one has had no head teacher for the last five years. It seemed a little shabby but is popular, perhaps because this is a Catholic area.

The Evanglical one is also 'Integrative', which I thought was a plus point, but a couple of parents have warned me about children with behavioural issues disrupting classes. A different parent said it had good teachers and was child-oriented.

What should I be looking for? I feel I'm slightly being lobbied my other parents keen for me to choose the same school as they are choosing for their child, and getting conflicting advice. Do you have experience of integrative Grundschule? Also, we may go back to the UK in a few years, would German Grundschule be a reason to stay longer or leave sooner IYO?

Hi yodeleeiay . Our eldest has only just started his first year, so don't have all that much experience.

Would you be allowed to send your dd to any of those schools? Are you in the catchment area of all three?

Wrt to integrative Grundschule: ds1 is at an inklusive Grundschule. He is one of those with behavioral issues disrupting classes though, as he has Aspergers. However, staff - both teaching and support- really are incredible. Everyone is very positive and supportive, and they see each child as an individual with individual needs. For ds1 it has been a very good experience so far.

Hope that helps a little.

Are these private schools?

You don't usually get any choice what so ever - you go to your local school, you will be told where to send your child, not asked where you want to send her (unless you are going private).

I actually prefer this to the insane UK system of submitting choices based league tables and waiting to see what's pulled out of the hat for you... A massive plus for me is that kids usually attend the same school as the other local children (unless you live somewhere very densely populated).

Thank you for replying. I just know we are allowed to apply to all three schools. I haven't heard anything about catchment areas, I'll try and find out.

I'm glad to hear your DS is having a good start at his school, it sounds lovely. I don't know if the disrupted classes thing is true or just a scare story to make me favour non-Integrative school. Do you really think some children can disrupt classes significantly? Isn't the point of a Integrative/ Inklusive school that it is equipped to help every child, through extra staff, training etc.?

Mr Tumbles, they're not private. I also had heard you just went to your local school, but not so simple here. Maybe it differs by state. We get to put two choices on the application form. I didn't even know there was more than one local school until a month ago.
All the parents from kindergarten are coming and asking where I'm choosing, and giving (differing) recommendations... Only 2 or 3 children from DD's class will be going to the 2 nearest schools, so parents want to make sure their child will have a friend in their new school.

Hey Yodel just a little hint. I'm pretty sure it's evangelisch in German and is in no way what is meant by evangelical in an English-speaking world sense.

Most likely Lutheran would be appropriate and in the UK I'd say closer to the ideas of John Know (originally) and in Germany known to be more liberal than the Catholic Church etc.

Might be something you'd like to consider when choosing.

If you are not Catholic have you looked into what that school does with the non Catholic children during religion? Our school is a state school, not officially Catholic (haven't really come across church schools here, the whole thing must be totally different wherever you are) and splits the children into Catholic, Evangelisch and Ethik groups for religion class, but the Catholic children have one extra class to prepare for First Communion - the non Catholic minority go home earlier than the Catholics on that day (and the school bus doesn't run, so I have to pick DD up).

If you send your DD to a Catholic school where almost all the children are Catholic (despite others being accepted if they choose to apply), and don't want her converting , she is likely to feel left out sometimes, especially when the others do their First Communion, which is a huge deal with much dressing up and receiving presents - if she is the only one not doing it in her class it will sting!

Are the 2 religious schools in your village and the non religious one in the next village? I would definitely go for one she can walk to, all else being equal, so she can be part of the informal ebb and flow of playing with classmates - again where you are may be completely different to where we are, but here the norm is to get homework done then go and play/ have a friend over to play, pretty much every day, so it would be much nicer for both you and your DD if she can walk to several friends houses, and school friendships will eventually become important.

The integrative one sounds good to me as one would assume it is more attuned to seeing children as individuals, unless they lump all the "non integration" children together and are just as rigid with them as a regular Grundschule, and only adapt for the children who are on the "Integration" list - wouldn't surprise me somehow, but I have no experience of that kind of school, as there isn't one anywhere local to us and I am 99.9% sure we wouldn't be eligible to apply for non-integration places at the ones in the next big town, being out of catchment.

Religious schools are liable to present religion as Truth even outside religion lessons, which as an atheist would put me off if I had a choice - but that part is very personal and only you can decide!

MrTumbles it's a wonderful explanation

Worldcitizen, you are right of course, Evangelical isn't the right translation... and it's true, protestant-type religion classes would be more familiar to me than Catholic.

Mr Tumbles, thank you so much for your insight, you raised lots of good points. I found an old thread that also recommended shorter distance because school starts so early.

Re the religion, the evangelisch school spoke at length about religion, how many teachers and pupils aren't evangelisch and (I think) even their religion lessons weren't 'church' lessons but more generally about religion. I didn't understand so much of the Catholic school's presentation on this but did notice the crucifixes hanging in every classroom.. Apart from anything else, I think it's culturally useful for my DC to be taught about Christianity. But I hadn't thought about all the other children in the class being confirmed and DD not.

We didn't get to look round the evangelisch/integrative school, but I think I'll go to the school office to ask for a registration appointment and see if I can look into any classrooms on my way.