After all of this life changing learning I experienced in Germany, here are the following changes I plan to make moving forward as both a teacher and a mother:
1. My students will be writing responses far more -- open ended, original thoughts. 2. At the end of each year, my students will be working on their public speaking skills by presenting to parents, family, and friends on their learning. We'll be starting some type of showcase. 3. I will be teaching my students and my children about more worldly career options instead of only what they see in Livingston County. I will start with diplomat jobs and other worldly endeavors. 4. My students and children are all going to start learning foreign languages. While I do not see them often enough for mastery of the languages, we can still gain basic understandings of each as well as struggle through new, hard items, which is great for a gifted population. 5. Because I am the PDC co-chair and an instructional coach, I will bring this higher expectation instructional method back to my local colleagues. I will communicate with them regarding the more open-ended response type, less worksheets, more discussion with teachers and performances, etc.
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As part of my Fulbright Teachers for Global Classrooms Fellowship, I had to develop a guiding question for my trip to Germany and follow up on that action research upon my return. I posed the follow questions, and I answer them as best I can in pink font:
-- How do other educators best reach their brightest, highest learners? Germany does not have any gifted programming in their country. This was a foreign concept to all Germans I discussed my job with. They were interested in adding a program like mine. However, the German schools expect so much more of all their students that I believe their gifted learners are better served in the regular education classrooms than American students tend to be. Students read, write, speak, and perform so much more there. Students rarely do worksheets or anything multiple choice based. They found it laughable how much we do. Deeper, more authentic, more rigorous daily assessment pushes their students greatly. It is not perfect by any means, but it would be great combined with gifted services in my opinion. -- Is there a gifted education system or other forms of differentiation to help students reach their greatest potential? See the previous answer above. No gifted system and not much differentiation. Instead, they push for greater performance overall in all students. -- Do teachers generally teach to the middle level, on-grade students in the whole group instruction? Or cater more to the higher or lower achievers? I did not see teachers catering to low level learners at all in Germany. Instead, they completed on grade level tasks across the board and expected every student to perform at that level without extra support. They also gave daily homework. In general, I did not see differentiation of any kind. If I stayed there longer, I would examine how the high and low achieving students feel about classroom work. Instead of differentiating at individual grade levels, they focus on sending students to the right type of secondary school and thereby career. Lower students head to vocational school and higher to gymnasium. It does not seem as though students have many opportunities to change the direction of their life/upbringing and generational patterns definitely exist. -- Can students advance through grades/content faster than peers? Or do students stay with age-equivalent peers every year? Like American education, students are placed in grade levels based on age. They typically do not progress any faster or slower than each other. In fact, they spend first through fourth grades together in the exact same group with the exact same teacher. This is done because that teacher helps direct every child to gymnasium (academic) or vocational school after fourth grade. This is such a heavy responsibility that it is critical for each teacher to know her students and their families deeply and truly. Once in a blue moon, they will advance a child to a new grade (skip a grade), but most Germans I spoke to said this is not ideal. First because the teacher will not know the new student as well for future recommendations and second because the fellow classmates, who spend years together, sometimes don't include that new child as well. -- What do advanced course options look like for secondary students? Like American secondary school, students can sign up for courses that interest them much. However, the German students are usually already in their career specific fields by this time, too, not waiting until college. So while the courses are chosen by the students, their paths are very set by this point as well. -- Do other countries write IEPs for their gifted &/or special education students? Or are those needs handled differently? No. The only special education services Germany offers is completely separate special needs schools. No inclusion. When they do try to work those students into regular schools, they are not given services or aids. Finally, there are no gifted services at all. Top 5 Items I Missed While Traveling Through Germany:
1. My family and friends, of course. Thank goodness for Facetime. 2. Ice cubes in drinks. I think I only had this one or two times, and it was very missed on the hot summer days. 3. Air conditioning. My hotel rooms both had air, but nowhere else did, not even the hotel lobbies. We happened to visit during the worst heat wave Germany has experienced in years. One day, Berlin was the hottest city in all of Europe. The citizens there were certain it was a true sign of global warming. You see, Germany sits at the same latitude as the middle of Canada. It tends to be far more tolerable in the summer than we are used to in the Midwest. 4. As stated in my foodie blog post, I missed chicken and beef. Pork is by far the most common protein in Deutschland. I had chicken a few times, but I do not think I ate beef one time. I think Europe does not have enough land space to raise much cattle. 5. My blow dryer. Even though I brought it with me as well as an electrical outlet adapter, the appliance drew too much power. I blew fuses every time I tried to use it. So natural, air-dried hair was a must the entire trip. Top 5 Items I Miss Since I Left Germany: 1. Mass public transit. It was so convenient and clean and easy. I especially loved the bike culture most. 2. The very fresh, clean food. I felt so much better while there. Everything I've tried eating since returning to America has made me feel crummy. 3. The variety of cuisines. I know part of this issue stems from the fact that I live in such a rural region, but it is not just that. Germany is such a short drive to all other European countries that it not only has lots of restaurants, but it has very authentic, immigrant-owned food specialities. It is better than just a large US city. I tried so many new foods while in Germany, and it will be hard for me to get these cuisines now that I am back home. 4. Such responsible children. German parents and culture expect so much more of their kids than we American adults do. They do not expect them to mature to early. Instead, the trust them more, which in turn makes them more responsible. Traveling around town, being in a room without the teacher present, completing better academic assignments with more writing and speaking, and learning in a shorter period of time -- these are just a few specific examples of child responsibilities in Germany. In general, though, it was refreshing to see such independent children, much like we remember from back in the 1980s and 1990s in America. 5. My travel companions, our tour guide, and my partner teacher. They were all such progressively-minded, innovative souls. They were true inspirations. It was so refreshing to spend such a long amount of time with these thoughtful educators. I am so glad to have made these friendships, and I am thankful we are all remaining in contact moving forward. Take the German food journey with me! 67 photos of it, to be precise.
Above, you'll find every food I ate during my 15 days of travel. The first few feature me with the food, but all other pictures are placed in chronological order. Enjoy this mouth watering excursion. My main takeaways in terms of food: -- First, and deepest, I cannot express just how truly fresher and realer all the food I ate in Germany was. It is not just less fried food or fast food. I ate plenty of both. The food has way less additives and preservatives and manufactured ingredients. It was simple, clean eating even when indulging. I simply felt so much better with everything I ate there. Their salami/beef jerky was real meat and so much better than American versions. Even the cafeteria food I had three times was so fresh! -- Second, Indian food is my absolute new favorite cuisine! -- Vietnamese cuisine is my new second favorite. -- I missed beef and chicken while in Germany. It was a whole lot of pork in everything. -- Seasonal veggies were a huge part of every meal (ya know, part of that fresh philosophy). -- Airline food is exceptionally better in Premium and First Class seating than in Economy. -- Pretzels are everywhere in Germany, but fresh, warm restaurant pretzels are far superior to quick-order cold ones. -- Gelato, daily. Just do it. -- I enjoyed the best spaghetti carbonara of my life here. So close to Italy! -- I tried a few German beers, especially Radlers, but I'm not a beer connoisseur, so don't ask me for advice/input on that topic. I know, disappointing. -- Frittenwerk is a must of German fast food experiences. -- Finally, weiner schnitzel far out-beats currywurst. Many of my colleagues and friends have inquired on how I had this incredible opportunity -- a free trip to Germany. It started in summer of 2020. I was accepted into the Fulbright Teachers for Global Classrooms program where only 70 educators are selected across the nation each year. I then completed a six month global education course based around the United Nations' Sustainable Development Goals. After successfully passing that course, I was invited to a global ed symposium in Washington DC along with my building principal for three days. Next, I had to build a teaching website full of global ed resources and other elements. Then, sadly, the Covid pandemic hit, and our program was paused. Originally, my final step was planned to be a three-week trip to Thailand to learn about their education system. After a two-year hiatus, trips were rescheduled to better vaccinated countries, so I was relocated to Germany. As part of that final step, I also had to build this blog on my global ed website.
Beyond this amazing program, there are so many travel-oriented teacher programs. I'd like to share a quality list here, so more of you can have this incredible opportunity: Germany specifically addresses its heinous past transgressions in a strategic model called a "landscape of remembrance" or "memorial landscapes." This method brings history straight into view for modern day citizens. There is no option for today's Germans to avoid the lessons learned from the Holocaust or divided Germany. In America, for example, the opposite tends to be true. When we want to learn more about slavery or the Civil Rights Movement, we have to seek it out -- travel to those locations, research historical texts, journey to find the knowledge. But after restructuring their country post-WWII, Germans knew they had to keep those atrocities at the forefront of their memories to ensure they never repeat those unbearable mistakes.
As seen in the photographs above, Germany has built both small and large memorials directly in citizens' everyday pathways. Picture one is one of the most powerful moments I encountered in Deutschland (that's what Germans call Germany). Scattered throughout Europe, planted in city streets and sidewalks, commemorative brass plaques eternalize the lives that were lost in the Holocaust. Called the Stolpersteine (in English: “stumbling stones”), the plaques commemorate the victims of the Nazi regime. They include the names, dates, and last known locations of missing/murdered Jews. Photo two is located in the center of Bonn along a populer walking path beside the Rhine River, the old capital of Germany. After WWII, remaining citizens used the remaining brick rubel from the local bombed Jewish syngoguge to build this Star of David memorial. With how bicycle and pedestrian based Bonn is, people travel past this monument daily at least. Photo three is a departure of the others on this post and is one of the few photos I took memorializing the Berlin Wall period. Of course, there are Wall sections still on display throughout Berlin also, as well as the Checkpoint Charlie location, but this subtle brick pathway runs throughout the entire huge city (large than Chicago) denoting the past Wall location. In photo four, you see a Jewish memorial mural located in a city plaza also beside a busy thoroughfare. Photo five was one of my strangest moments in Berlin -- no the strangest. This is Hitler's death location. In order to ensure that this site never becomes a pilgrimage site or shrine to nationalism/racism/xenophobia, Germans simply built a parking lot above the old bunker and beside it a plain, regular apartment building. How strange would it be to just live every day life right where Adolf Hitler died and just park my car on top of that site? We all found it pretty perfect as a way to recognize how unremarkable we all find him. Photos six, seven, and eight all come from my visit to the Murdered Jews Memorial near the Brandenburg Gate. As described many times above, this remembrance site sits in the middle of very busy Germany, and at first, it seems so simple. You first walk up to what looks like a few dozen concrete boxes. But as you move into the structure, you slowly realize it is made up of hundreds of blocks, and they gradually grow in size. Not only that, but as you walk, further into them, the slowly grow taller and taller until they are towering over you. Suddenly, you find yourself in a deep pit with barely any light with this pressing weight pushing down on you from all sides. To make matters even more extreme, I first visited this site at night. I would highly recommend that for your first viewing. To have no crowds and pure darkness made it so much more powerful than it already is. The memorial is open 24 hours a day, 365 days a year because it requires no staff and is simply a part of the sidewalk square on that block. Did you notice all the clear symbolism in my description -- the ever-enveloping feeling of pressure and darkness, looming, growing, a pit, you underestimate it at first . . . I could talk about this memorial for an hour if you ever want to ask me about it in person. Please do. Photos nine through sixteen are all related as well as they were taken on my concentration camp visit to Sachsenhausen. This visit was optional on our trip as many individuals did not feel comfortable with such a visit. Thankfully, one of my travel colleagues, who speaks fluent German, helped navigate us through an hour of public transportation to get to one of the Berlin suburbs where Sachsenhausen still remains. It served as one of the Nazi parties first ever work camps for a decade before it also turned into a death camp. The craziest part to witness was how the suburban town sits right next to it and surrounds it. You cannot help but sit there and wonder how they allowed this to go on in their town. How did it slowly start and convince citizens it was an acceptable enterprise? Once it grew and grew, didn't they all know what was truly happening behind the walls. Of course, it was such a solemn visit, and even though the sun was beat down 100 degrees hot that day, we both agreed it was the last place on Earth where we would ever complain. To witness actual crematorium chambers, medical experiment rooms, and Jewish bunks are feelings I will never forget. It seems appropriate that the city it sits amongst be forced to remember it forever as well. Finally, photos fifteen and sixteen are both located in the Humboldt University square as a memorial to all the book burnings that were held throughout Berlin. It is hard to see in the photographs, but this is a plaque placed in the ground beside a giant see-through glass in the ground. Below the glass is a full sized room with floor to ceiling bookshelves -- completely empty, signifying the great loss of research and literature especially at the universities because of the fires. I also witnessed bronze sculptures of Holocaust families, children, and individuals on all different street corners in Berlin. But you can bet your bottom dollar there wasn't one single statue or shrine for a Nazi. I wish America and other countries would take thoughtful note of this landscape of remembrance. It is not only powerful, but more importantly, helpful. Everywhere humans travel in the world is surrounded by art if you just look for it because humans crave art. We need it in our soul. Music, paintings, murals, child artwork, architectural, spiritual pieces. These are the things that fill us, guide us, and make us want to live. So this post is dedicated solely to many of the moments where I saw pure artistic beauty in Germany. I don't want to fill this post with a bunch of words because I think the art speaks for itself. Instead, enjoy this large slideshow of all the soul-filled moments I could catch with my camera. Feel free to comment below if you have questions about any of the locations photographed.
One of the facets I loved most about Bonn, Germany, was its deeply-rooted bicycle culture. This culture was developed in many ways. First, obtaining a driver's license in Germany costs about 3,000 Euros. Secondly, the weather is decent most of the year there. Third, they teach bicycle skills and safety from toddlerhood onward. Fourth, the layout of the city is designed with bicycles in mind through crosswalks, bike lanes, bike racks, and more. I'd love to take a short post here to share with you my favorite bicycle moments I witnessed in my 10 days in Bonn. I truly wish my small town could adopt this way of life, but I'm sure that's just wishful thinking. -- Almost every teacher I shadowed at the primary school cycled to work each morning. -- Business professionals could be seen every morning, in their dress clothes, riding to work. Therefore, most adults wore tennis shoes all day, even with their dress clothes, and it was totally acceptable. One of my travel mates even mentioned, during our first few days, how impressive it was that German women were so skilled at riding a bicycle in a dress. -- One morning, while I waited for the bus by myself, I was watching the traffic flow. A giant wave of working professionals came around the bend as the stoplight changed. Imagine Tour de France but with every day people. That one second perfectly summarized how deep the bike culture truly is in Bonn. -- The next morning, I watched a working mother pedaling down the street bike lane while her small six-year-old pedaled parallel to her on the sidewalk. It was impressive to see how they mirrored each other, and she was so clearly but silently modeling and teaching through their morning commute in such a safe manner. -- I never knew so many child carrier designs existed until my week in Bonn. I saw children on the back of the bike in a high-backed seat much like what I saw in the US in the 80's and 90s. I saw only a few tagalong carriers behind bikes. But I was far more surprised by the front seats sitting directly in front of the parent's chest as well as the giant wooden boxes on the front wheel that held children and groceries. -- Another adorable bicycle learning moment I walked by was one evening after dinner. The sidewalks are fairly empty that time of day. I passed two dads walking about 10 paces behind their three-year-old who was learning to ride on a pedal-less strider bike. He was clearly gaining independence and skill through their nightly neighborhood stroll. -- One of my German acquaintances informed me she owns three bicycles -- her nice, expensive daily one, one with better cargo storage, and a third run-down option to leave at train stations for her extended trips. -- Bicycle skill competitions and obstacle courses are a regular part of primary school in Germany. They encourage very skilled riding abilities as a necessary life skill. -- The trains have entire compartments dedicated to bike riders with wider doors and foldable seats, so commuters can easily stow their bikes as they take the train on a farther journey. -- Crosswalk ground markings and signal lights have both pedestrian paths and cyclist space separate from each other because both traffic flows are busy enough that they each need dedicated space separate from each other and vehicles.
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AuthorSophie -- a teacher, mother, wife, traveler, reader, camper, and Mizzou Tiger Archives
July 2022
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