Neue Stifte, neues Maeppchen: new German school thread

[finknottle]

Am starting in positive manner as we're 7 weeks into the new school year and all 3 of mine are settled and happy.
Well, d won't be if she does have head lice and has to stay off because she loves school so much.
S1 is in the second year of secondary & still thriving. Is class prefect for the first time which was a great ego boost.
S2 is in Y4 & has been doing better in class but his test results are still lousy (unfortunate choice of phrase if we are lice-ridden) and his teacher is convinced it's the language issue. He's trying harder which is a good sign. He lost the prefect election by 1 vote to his best friend and was chuffed to bits to be his "deputy" and that so many voted for him.

Had forgotten how wonderful the "erste Klasse" is.

sorry about the tipos, I am always to lazy to check what I type but I think you're used to that now!

Wise words there, ZZZen, agree about the long view and the attitude to the country/danger of always seeing the negative.

I read frogs comments on the Education thread, agree with her. It's good to have the view of Germans in the UK who see both sides. We/I see things, understandably enough, through expat specs.

Different for you and your children as your h isn't German, nor are your children half-German. There isn't the same issue of identity. Plus, I'm in my "make the best of it, do all I can" mode because we have no choice. You do.

haven't seen that thread, the one admylin linked to?

I like frogs, she always has good advice (and doesn't have all the tipos either, smart girl that she is). Will go and have a look at it but I thought I wouldn't post on it since I post so much about it here really. Good to hear other people's views.

How are you all in the finks Haushalt?

S2 had a temp of 41C at 4am. Scary. Is now asleep but am afraid it'll go sky high again. Yesterday it was 40.3, then the Neurofen brought it down, then 12 hrs later, the 41C.

Apart from that, we're all fine. D is so happy at school and her teacher is great with her. Because I'm at the school so often doing SEB stuff or Förderverein stuff, or stuff with S2's teacher, or d's, I find they talk to me in greater detail about what s2 and d are doing. Very much a "Oh, are you here again? Wanted to tell you...." It has made such a difference and that's shite really because I shouldn't have to be SO involved for that to happen IYSWIM.

There is a huge "Them and US" mentality on the part of the teachers and parents, ime. I hear a lot on both sides. What I can't judge is if it's the same everywhere or if it's got a particular German slant with the level of formality which exists here.

There are some "Lesemütter" who come and listen to Y2 reading. They are indulged, tbh, not really encouraged. Like Aushilfskräfte. At my nephews' schools in the UK, the parents are welcomed and encouraged, that's what my brothers and sil tell me anyway. Snapshot I know.

Wittering now, too much caffeine I think.

Hope the temperature has gone down abit finknottle. dd had a virus in Berlin, she was in bed with 40 degrees fever for 5 days. Regular nurofen was all I could do. It just kept coming back as the nurofen wore off.

ZZZen, very wise advice but no way would I be able to let that side of us go - and I think my dc have gone too deep to change and accept being/pretending to be German! Good point though, when they are older if we were still here , living as we do now, they'd be on the first train/bus out of here when they'd finished schooling.

I remember a British mum in south Germany and her dd was like that too, just counting the days until she was old enough to pack her bags and go to UK to her cousins house to live and study somehow.

Finknottle lol at bollocks in your email! I must use that more often (h wouldn't even understand it!!)

sounds like that horrible flu virus finks. Hope he'll be better soon, it's worrying when you can't bring down the fever, isn't it?

I know what you mean about the "them and us" mentality, I think it might be schools all over these days, not just in Germany.

It doesn't have to be though admylin. That's what I was trying to say but maybe I didn't bring it across the way I meant. I know a German-English family. The dad is from the UK, the mum is German. The dc moved to Germany having been in UK schools and the dd is miserable, as you say counting the days till she can go back, the ds is fine. Both now at German gymnasium, both doing well. Maybe the fact the mum is the German partner has something to do with all that?

I think you're right ZZZen. Most of our or rather my problems probably come from that. My h has also never lived with a German family, he's been through the Deutschkurs and that's it. I lived in a German family and got to know their traditions the first year in Germany and later I had more German friends than he ever had (before I met him).

I think I'd be making more of an effort if I was married to a German and integrated and accepted into his family.

Well I've said before and I think it is true that if you have a German partner and live in Germany, you WANT to see the good in everything and like the place naturally enough because it is part of who your partner is and the place that formed him to a large extent. And if he is good, therefore it must also have a heap of good in it.

There are a lot of expats from English speaking countries in Berlin. I met a lot of people who liked it there and were in no great hurry to get back to Canada, the US, Australia or wherever they came from. Hard to say why it works for some and not for others. Probably the whole package plays a roel, how happy the marriage is, where you live, what your social life is like etc etc

I think if you do stay on though you will have to force yourself to start to like the place more. I suppose it's like breaking any habit, you have to plug away at it bit by bit, day by day till it stops being an effort IYSWIM.

The school situation does make it tough though as I very well know and I had to admit defeat in the end. I was wondering though if you wouldn't get that anywhere you lived if the schooling were in a different language and your kids were at the local schools. I mean it would probably be just as hard say in Spain although the system would be different to Germany, it might be just as hard for an expat to deal with.

Very wise words, ZZZen.

I'm struggling a bit atm to accept that my dc are rapidly losing their English. When we came here 2 years ago German was their second language - now it's better than their English which is still native speaker like but not quite so fluent. On the one hand I'm pleased that for them but on the other I want them to speak English as well as they speak German and as you said that may not be possible or desirable.

I think the 'them and us' mentality does exist in the UK too. At my dd's school there was very little enthusiasm whenever parents expressed a willingness to help out at all. Even getting together a functioning PTA was a real struggle. However, I think most schools there do now encourage parental involvement and there are some very inspirational headteachers.

I think the school system here does make it especially hard. After all we are the only ones with our very own thread of doom on Mnet

I hope your ds is better soon finknottle.

at only Thread of Doom on MN, taipo.

True, but there are threads/topics on Education/Primary/G&T etc.

I read them now & again for a bit of perspective. Thank heavens our lot just go to the nearest primary, we have no claiming a faith, proving addresses, hoping for a place in the right school, appeals process etc.

Am going to rave again about the system d's using in Y1. We had a parents' mtg last week and the teachers again told us: don't check/correct homework, don't even check it's done! They'd much rather badly done or not done at all homework than work Mama has done/helped with. Don't worry if child next door can write sentences and yours can't. Or read a book already. They'll all get there in the end.
And when they're sick, no homework. If they want and can, let them draw a picture.

S2's next Mathearbeit next week, typical that he's sick so will not be fit. Am popping in to see his teacher this morning as he's better, temp normal.

I was filing away school stuff and found the regulations about Versetzung, he should be OK even if he gets a 5 again in Maths as long as he does OK in Deutsch or Sachunterricht. Relief. Sort of.

Morning. Also laughed at thread of doom! Must admit, alot of exapt on her eseem to have their dc at international school or still have very small dc. I have never lurked on the Italian thread though, who knows...!

Ds had an English Klasenarbeit last week, still no results in but yesterday he had a double English lesson and teacher let them all go home half an hour early he reckoned sie hatte kein Bock and when I asked him what they did in the lesson, he said they had to copy a text into their books from a book.

I go to meet the German teacher tomorrow. They've been doing Berichte and ds did one before yesterday and teh teacher said that would have bene a very good grade 2 - so when he write sthe Klassenarbeit tomorrow he should be atleast feeling motivated after that. we'll see. It'll be a page with Zeugenaussagen and he 'll have to write a newspaper Bericht using the Aussagen for information.

Finknottle, tell me what your ds did to win his reading thing? Which books did he read? Ds is on teh Bartimäus triology books now and then he has to find some new ones.

Arse buggery.
Saw s2's teacher & s2 has a Sachunterricht test next week as well as maths. His 2 lousiest subjects. She gave me loads of info though, said she was sure s2 would not have done all the work (at him, not her) so she gave me a master file so I could crosscheck what's missing.

Plus told me about the maths test and then ran after me to say if he's really not fit he doesn't have to do the tests next week. She is great but my heart sinks when I see what he has to catch up on. He has missed ONE DAY of school and has about 8 (EIGHT) things to do. He has to catch up on Schulübungen, Hausaufgaben and learn for the tests. She put some in brackets that he can leave as it was so much but as she says, what's left has to be done or he won't be able to do the tests.

He's in no state to do anything today, we can hopefully start tomorrow but h is away all weekend so can't help.

Sorry, forgot about reading contest. It's called the Vorlesewettbewerb
S1 won the school one but cannot remember the book, he practised mostly with his teacher and h.

For the Kreisentscheid he read from Magyk by Angie Sage, which he'd got as the prize from the school. I though it interesting that most of the books the children read were translated from English, apart from Cornelia Funke.
They had to read from their chosen books then some unseen text, excerpts from a v boring science fiction book.
S1 loves the series now & I bite my tongue about reading English books in English as any reading any of them do in German is good. S2 rarely reads in German. Sure that's another reason his German is so bad.

S1's current teacher is the best any of them have ever had, he's been lucky. S2's is lovely but not as experienced or confident and a bit too scatty...

S1's is excellent at getting the best out of the children I reckon. I tend to credit the system a lot for his success but tbh a lot is to her credit too. She also made him do most of the class reading the last 3 months to improve his reading of unseen texts for the contest and practised loads with him in her free time. So glad she came to the contest and that one of her pupils won for the first time for the school in what is her last year of teaching.
Wish I could hypnotise her into switching to s2's school next year. She's far too young to retire...

Your ds's teacher sounds great finknottle. It really sounds as though she wants to help him. I think it goes to show that many teachers are probably just as frustrated by the system. I also like the approach your school has to hw in the 1. Klasse. I think ds's teacher is pretty good in that respect - she's quite laid back really but has the parents on her back if they think hw is not being set properly or they're not sure exactly how it should be done. The last parents' evening was quite an eye opener - a small but vocal group of them really started laying into the teacher!

Your ds's English teacher otoh sounds like she's given up, admylin. I would be never have the nerve to get my students to copy out a text and then finish the lesson half an hour early. Pretty sure she wouldn't get away with that in the UK. Not for long anyway.

We've got Magyk too finknottle, in German but as I was reading it I just kept thinking this book would be so much nicer in English!

Definately has to do with luck regarding the teacher. My 2 were at the same primary school in Berlin. If I had to go by ds's teacher I would have told anyone to keep clear of that school but dd had teh best ever teacher and I would have said - because of him that it's a great school.

Coming back in a minute with homework for ds, we can't figure it out. Teacher said the first 3 dc to email him the correct answer get a prize tomorrow new forms of motivation..

OK, can anyone make 4 words out of these letters:

D EB EN EN SI TA US

MI ER ET LL M

EB SI EN

T R E IM E

No idea if the close together letters have to stay together or not and we have found 3 words SO LANG WIE which go in where the star is!

1st = Siebentausend

So Lange wie

sieben

something

Have checked all the sums (where he got the letters from the key thingy) and can't find any wrong so up to now we got
Siebentausend MI ER ET LL M sind so lang wie sieben T R E IM E M I think we've got a new M on the last word. Millmeter isn't a word though is it? As if something is missing.

siebentausend
millimeter
so lange wie
sieben

?decimetre?

Are you missing the letters "dec" from the last one?

Can you tell I'm sitting virtuously in my study not filing?

7000mm = 7 dm
?

Millimeter is a word

No there are no options for dec - blardy homework. And no i for after the ll in millimeter!

10 mm = 1 cm
100mm = 10 cm = 1 dm
1000mm = 100cm = 10 dm

7000mm = 700cm = 70 dm
?
Is any of this right?

...sinnvolle Reihenfolge bla bla bla erhältst du einen wichtigen Merksatz! There are definately letters missing.