Spotlight - 10.2019

nothing to do with Scotland! I had been

misled.

It was only when I got to Germany that

I was made aware of the stereotype that

all Scots are really stingy. And that stereo-

type was used extensively in marketing

language as shorthand for advertising bar-

gains and good deals. In Germany, some

companies use “Mac” in front of their

name to announce the fact that they con-

sider themselves a value-for-money sort

of establishment. I should be offended.

Meanwhile, in Scotland, we don’t think

of ourselves as a mean nation at all. We

think we’re fantastic, in-

ventive, friendly, funny...

but not mean!

In the classroom

While parents in the UK

have the legal right to ed-

ucate their own children,

in Germany, parents are

required by law to send

their children to school

from a certain age. And

school is a serious under-

taking — one that takes

up a large part of family

life from then on.

When kids start school, adults will tell

them: “Jetzt geht der Ernst des Lebens los!”

(Now the seriousness of life begins!) Chil-

dren have no clue what the grown-ups

are talking about, but their parents know

only too well. Parents are expected to take

time off work if they need to talk to teach-

ers and rearrange their schedules to fit in

with the school timetable. In the begin-

ning, either one parent has to be home by

11.15, or they have to organize and pay for

after-school care. Spaces are limited, so it’s

recommended that you sign up as soon as

you conceive.

Once the children are home from

school, the afternoon is spent supervising

homework and sharpening coloured pen-

cils. Homework usually revolves around

colouring in. This is necessary to further

hone the child’s hand-eye coordination. It

is vital that children learn not to go over

the lines! This can take up to three years

and untold quantities of coloured pencils.

At primary school (Grundschule), chil-

dren start preparing presentations from

an early age. Well, I say children, but it’s

not unusual to bump into a parent at the

bookshop explaining their purchase of a

book about tortoises with, “Wir haben am

Donnerstag ein Referat.” Parents get really

involved in their children’s schoolwork.

Things went a bit crazy at a school at-

tended by some of our friends’ children.

In one class, parents began sending food

to complement the topic of the presenta-

tions in HSU (Heimat- und Sachunterricht).

It was a thoughtful thing to do. While it

began with one parent sending along

muffins for their child’s presentation on

the USA, it escalated quickly. The head-

mistress finally stepped in when she

found a whole class eating Schnitzel and

Pommes at nine o’clock in

the morning after a pres-

entation on Austria.

School is not for play-

ing; it’s for learning. After

all, children have only

four years of primary

school to prepare them-

selves for secondary

school. With this goal in

mind, full parental coop-

eration is expected. Dur-

ing a chat with my son’s

teacher when he was in

his third year of primary

school, the teacher told

me that my son was “immer noch sehr ver-

spielt”. On the one hand, I was delighted

that my nine-year-old was still playful,

but on the other hand, I was worried

about a school system that didn’t seem to

approve.

Secondary education is com-

plicated

There’s lots of school-related German

vocabulary that doesn’t translate into

English very well because the system is

so different. When discussing German

secondary schools, you can either say

weiter führende Schulen to talk about all of

them in general, or Gymnasium, Realschule

and Mittel schule if you mean specific types.

A Ge samtschule is a combination of those

three and is similar to the British “compre-

hensive school”. Most parents who went

to a Gymnasium themselves expect their

children to go to one, too, in order to get

the all-important Abitur, the school-leaving

qualification with which they can then go

on to study at university.

In their third year of primary school,

children are given tests regularly, and the

marks count. The fourth year of primary

approve [E(pru:v]

, für gut halten

bargain [(bA:gIn]

, Schnäppchen

bump into sb.

[)bVmp (IntE] ifml.

, jmdm. zufällig

begegnen

complement

[(kQmplIment]

, ergänzen

conceive [kEn(si:v]

, schwanger werden

delighted [di(laItId]

, erfreut

headmistress

[)hed(mIstrEs] UK

, Schulleiterin

hone [hoUn]

, verbessern, verfeinern

mark [mA:k] UK

, Note, Zensur

mean [mi:n] UK

, hier: geizig

mislead [mIs(li:d]

, irreführen

offended [E(fendId]

, beleidigt

purchase [(p§:tSEs]

, Kauf

revolve [ri(vQlv]

, sich drehen

shorthand [(SO:thÄnd]

, hier: Kurzform

stingy [(stIndZi] ifml.

, geizig

tortoise [(tO:tEs]

, Schildkröte

untold [)Vn(tEUld]

, unzählig

vital [(vaIt&l]

, lebensnotwendig

“School

is not for

playing;

it’s for

learning”

66 Spotlight 10/2019 CULTURE