The Austrian school system is quite different from Canada's--to be expected, I suppose, but nonetheless I have moments of sheer delight in the differences. For example: Hausschuhe. House shoes, or slippers, are compulsory for the students. So it is not uncommon to see a hulking quarterback sized 18-year-old in fluffy pink slippers. Just because he can. Crocs and Birkenstocks are also acceptable. So on Thursday, when the students were required to wear their "Festkleidung" (Feast Clothes, literally), or, the formal uniforms, it was distracting to see navy skirts, white blouses and scarves, navy tights--and white Birks. The boys in their pressed trousers--and Bart Simpson slippers.
As the teachers here don't have their own classroom (the kids stay in their own classrooms except for art, music, science labs, and P.E.), there is a "teachers' room" where you have a desk as wide as your chair, and quite shallow. So these desks are stacked with towers of papers, texts, lessons, assignments to correct--and they have 5 minutes to get from whatever floor/wing they were teaching in to their desk, drop the previous lesson material, grab the next lesson's material/stacks of paper, take a sip of water and a bite of a sandwich, and fly off to the next class. It is a room of perpetual chaos, crowding, and movement. At some point I will take a photo of it. I've never counted, but I think it has to be about 40-50 teachers in there. It is a scene reminiscent of Harry Potter. Strange but wonderful.
Another moment: teaching the 10-year-olds body parts. They all know eyes/ears/nose/arm/leg in English, but the extra bits are missing. So with my conversation group I played a game to review what had been covered in another lesson. They all stood, and for each pair of students I pointed to a body part and the first child to shout out the correct name could stay standing, the other had to sit. Eventually of course the winner is the one left as you continue around the classroom. So eyebrow, earlobe, jaw, forehead, no problem. Then I pointed at my chin. In great eagerness to be the first with the correct answer, little Helmut shouted out "DOUBLE CHIN!" It's such a pity he'll fail the class. Seemed like such a bright boy, too... I could barely continue. The students weren't quite sure what was so funny. Reminded me of that teeth-whitening ad when the kindergarten teacher was teaching colours and pointed to her teeth and the children called out "beige! cream! eggshell! ecru!"--everything but white:)
Another school moment: At the end of the little ones' conversation class lessons I read aloud for 10 minutes to them. As I was reading Robin of Sherwood to a rapt circle, I saw out of the corner of my eye one little boy had flopped over and laid his head on another boy's knee. The second boy was absent-mindedly stroking the other's hair. This will never again occur in their high-school career, I have no doubt! They're not at the punching/chasing/wrestling/showing off stage yet. It was adorable.
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2 comments:
love the doublechin comment. i don't think i would have been able to resume class. also love the picture of german highschool students in fuzzy pink slippers. wish i could see that around here.
It's quite amusing. They spend 8 years of "gymnasium", or, academic high school, with the same group of 24-30 students, they don't break up into different courses, so at 18 they've been close to the same people as at age 10 and that seems to really remove a lot of inhibitions. It's quite nice actually. I think the idea has merit.
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