Educational exchange — Teachers observe their peers with interest during trip

By: Laurent Bonczijk, The Newberg Graphic
Published: 9/28/2010 1:59:48 PM

Travel abroad is hailed as formative for students. But it can also be for the chaperoning teachers.

Helmut Simon, 56, is in town with a group of German students from the school Gymnasium Lüchow and he’s been paying keen attention to what his American colleagues are doing in the classroom.

“In many respects it’s the same,” he said of the classroom dynamics. German instruction is more conversational and “somewhat more relaxed at first sight.” In his school they also have the benefit of smaller class sizes at only 20 to 25 students per teacher.

He said he was rather impressed by the plethora of technology available at Newberg High School and found the building to be new and modern compared to his school.

Gymnasium Lüchow’s principal Rainer Bartholomai said that a major difference from an administrative standpoint is scheduling. Class periods are 45 minutes in his school, with some classes scheduled back-to-back and students have a weekly schedule instead of the A- and B-day rotation at NHS.

An additional difference is in course loads. Students at Gymnasium Lüchow take 11 to 13 different courses at any given time.

Classrooms are dedicated to certain subjects and teachers don’t have their own classrooms, Bartholomai said.

Simon said he has asked a couple of teachers for their notes already and while in the classroom of German teacher Susan Schiller picked up on her use of silly stories. “It’s a method, which is new to me, but I feel is very effective,” Simon said. He added that he thought that by using those stories students pay attention and remember better.

Schiller, who went to Germany for Newberg’s exchange last summer, said she was impressed by the German teachers asking students to answer in full sentences in a foreign language. She commented that it was a good way to give the students more practice.

Bartholomai noticed that Newberg’s teachers also had “a lot more of handing out papers, controlling, and giving grades,” than in a German classroom. He also noticed more continuity between lessons. “It seems to me that they take a lot more care to see that all the students come along,” he said.

Simon, who has been teaching for 30 years and will remain in the classroom until at least 65, said it’s important for educators to constantly train and improve their skills in order to remain fresh and relevant to the students.

“Contact with people is what I like,” Simon said, “otherwise it doesn’t work.”