The School Thread for students, teachers and parents

A whole different take on the subject of teaching: I still sometimes have nightmares about my job!! Kids getting out of control, things like that.


It's weird, because my beginner's years are behind me and I haven't had a out-of-control situation for over a year. So why the sweaty dreams sometimes? I notice it mostly happens during vacation, when I haven't been working for a couple of weeks.

Oh, dear first cause! This is going to be complicated.

First: In Germany everything school rests with the authority of the States (Länder), not the Federation (Bund). That means that there are 16 slightly different school systems in Germany. The subject “Philosophy” is heavily affected by this situation.

“Lebenskunde” is a speciality of the States of Berlin and Brandenburg. Most state constitutions guarantee Religious Education in public schools, supervised by the Christian Churches and the State. Every student that is registered with a Christian Church has to attend RE. However, parents may choose to de-register their kids from that subject. What happens then is quite different from State to State. In some States students may simply have free time and that’s a prime reason to get rid of RE, isn’t it? In other States they will attend “Ethics”, but there are no qualified teachers and everything is improvised and differs from school to school. In jet other States, there is a regular subject that those students have to attend and so do Muslims and students without denomination.

The only States that do not offer RE are Berlin and Brandenburg, where “Lebenskunde “ is obligatory for every student. It’s a mixture of Comparative Study of Religion and Philosophy and frankly I don’t like that concept at all. It’s neither fish nor meat.

However, I live in the State of North-Rhine-Westphalia – not that far away from you – and here matters are like this: There are two subjects: “Praktische Philosophie” that is taught in the secondary level (5-9) and “Philosophie” in the college level (10-12). There is no such subject on the primary level. The State strives to establish RE for Muslim students. “Praktische Philosophie” is taught mainly at grammar schools (Gymnasium). Other types of schools continue to improvise. The reason for that is that only college students who want to teach at grammar schools are allowed to study philosophy. Other students might do an advanced training later on, when they are teachers, but nobody does.

“Praktische Philosophie” and especially “Philosophie” very closely reflect philosophy as it is taught at universities. I like that. It’s providing the subject with a clear academic structure and it’s not a jumble of everything.

Matters are roughly the same in the States of Schleswig-Holstein, Mecklenburg, Lower Saxony, Hessia and Rhine-Land-Palatinate.

Not anymore. For a year now I've been confident that it won't happen. And the funny thing is, it works both ways: the confidence is one of the reasons it doesn't happen. Children feel that you're confident.


I had a talk with my groups and an inquery. They had to write down what went well and what not, about me teaching. I know what my flaws are, but funny, they do to of course. Some of them said I shout and most of the time a bit too suddenly. So yes, my anger outbursts are not helpful really.

Last year when I still had a coach in school he said 'Act angry when necessary, but don't be angry, it will damage your health. You have to appear that way but not really feel it.' That is a good one. Teaching is a lot of acting. I often act happy or enthusiastic when I'm not, simply because I can't feel enthusiastic for hours in a row. Or I put up a bit of a show, kids love that. Things like that.

It's a bit of a "Smile, you're on stage" thing. While being authentic at the same time obviously!


Thanks for your reply to the RE subject!! I'll reply to that later on.

That's horrible

Hi Bregje,

where have you been hiding? I hope all is well?

Looking forward to our discussions of course. And since there are other fellows with teaching experiance or / and interest in philosophy around on this board, it might not only be the two of us.

Anyway, this week my students had their final oral a-level examinations (Abitur). They passed with fairly well to very well grades. I feel more relieved than I thought.

Yearning for the 6-week-summer-break now!

Cheers!
Volker

So, question for all teachers, students and parents and everyone who lives their years from september to july:

Each year at the end when its almost summer vacation, I get very sentimental and emotional. Its because its a time of saying goodbye but its probably also simply exhaustion. Each year music is strongly connected to this time of year and I remember very well that last year it was The Amazing Spiderman and I listened to Promises a million time in the last week of school. Also there was some belly dance track I can't remember, but I will find it again if I search through my mail.

This year I've been listening a lot to Iron Man 3 and the end titles of Star Trek. So that music is linked to this time a bit but I truly had an emotional breakdown/breakthrough when I listened to Mark Fowler on YouTube and quite coincidentally it was his Game of Thrones performance that did it. I also love the rest of the film music he plays and I just listened to his Devinire by Einaudi which was lovely too, but yeah. My 2013 summer break feeling award goes to Mark Fowler.

Anyone else who has emotional connection to music at the end of the year and what is it?

It will be interesting to see if I experience this once I get a teaching job. I've heard stories like yours many times.