On Thursday I got up at 6.30 am and Iva and I met the others at 8 am in front of the church. Our first lesson of the day was with Torbjorn. We talked about the Monday observation at the boarding school. We all agreed that the children have a lot of freedom there, that they see this school as there second home. Thay walk around on their slippers, they put their feet on the table, they eat gum during the lessons, they eat together with the teachers, they even hug the teachers.. The teachers are their family during the week. A lot of the pupils don't go home during the weekend so for them this is really their home.
Afterwards Torbjorn explained that there are three main ways of planning a curriculum. First we have the subjects (the content) which is what you will teach to the children. The teacher knows the content and he will open it to the students through his way of teaching. This is a more traditional way of teaching. Then we have the objectives which are the things that are usefull for the pupils to know. This is an utilytarian way of thinking. The pupils have something to say about the content and the teacher will be more like a guide to them. The way the pupils feel matters a lot. Finally we have the process which is a more progressif way of thinking. Here the process of the pupils counts, not the process of the teachers. The pupil is in the centre, he can learn on his own rhythm.
We then had to make a mind map (a brainstorming) about the curriculums is our home country. For the subjects in Belgium we wrote: memorisation at home, drill exercises and certificatif tests. For the objectifs we wrote: PMS, practise trainings, technical and vocational schools. Finally for the process we wrote: pair works, feed-backs, communication, activities concerning the pupils' interests, the 4 important skills (reading, listening, oral, writing) and formatif tests. We compared our mind maps with the curriculum system in Denmark and there aren't many differences.
In the afternoon we had an English lesson with Jette. I prefered going to the English lesson instead of the music class. It was too difficult for me... We talked about the Unites States, it's symbols (freedom, racism, religion, terrorism, power, ....), it's values (pride, individualism, civil rights,...), it's heroes (Michael Jackson, Arnold Schwarzenegger, Martin Luther King, Bill Klinton,...) and it's rituals (death penalty, religion, halloween, thanksgiving,...). We worked in pairs and we had to write the 50 states down on a map. This wasn't easy.. Afterwards we sang a song together: "This land is your land" of Woody Guthrie and at the end of the course we made a timeline of the American history and we played a small role play. Our subject was about the immigrants from Mexico or Latin America who arrived illegally in the Unites States. Up to 1986 the law in America forbade illegal immigrants to work but there were still people who hired them. We had to argue about this matter and find a solution. I liked this course a lot, espacially because we were mixed with other Danish students.
I arrived back home at 3 pm and I worked together with Manu on our thesis. In the evening I worked some more on my weblog and I went to bed at 10.30 pm.
On Friday we had another citizenship course. Here every country had to present it's educational system to the other students and say if we have a course called citizenship or if this is integrated in another course. This was very interesting. In Belgium in the secondary schools there isn't a citizenship course. This is included in several other courses such as in history, geography and religion. Through these topics we become aware of us being citizens. Citizenship is also shown and taught to us through our social lives. We learn to be a good citizen by practise. At the university citizenship is an option you can choose.
Afterwards we talked about the challanges we consider to be some of the biggest today. We mentioned globelisation, global heating, discrimination, racism, intolerance, hunger, war, ...
In the afternoon we also had another Danish lesson but this time only with Leifs. We had to cut out words and make sentences! This was fun..
After school Manu and I worked on our thesis and in the evening we all had a drink at the Friday café at school. We had a nice evening. I went to bed at 11.30 pm.
On Saturday Iva, Kate and me went to Germany, Flensburg, together with Tora (Iva and Kate's buddy) to go buy cheap food and drinks. We left at 9 am and we arrived there at 10 am. We went to two big stores (like colruyt in Belgium). I bought a lot of water, juice, muesli, chocolat, cheese, ... We returned back to Haderslev at 12 am.
In the afternoon I worked on my weblog and I listened to music. At 5 pm I watched "Die hard 4" with Bruce Willis. I loved this movie!
In the evening the other students came over at 8 pm and we had another "movie eneving". We watched "The pursuit of happyness" with Will Smith and his son. After the film Tim made typical belgian waffels for us. This was delicious!
I went to bed at 2 am.
On Sunday I only got up at 10.30 am. I stayed at home all day and worked for school. I also watched a great movie "Alpha dog" with Bruce Willis and Justin Timberlake. I liked it a lot. In the evening I read in my book and I went to bed at 10 pm. This was a relaxing day and I enjoyed it...
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