The schoolyear is divided into two half years. So you'll get a Halbjahreszeugnis, half year school report. Thats probably why your kids dont get graded until February. The grading system is based on the test scores as well as oral participation. So the Halbjahreszeugnis was always a nice reminder to me how well I participated in the classes.
Eigentlich bewerten wir Schüler folgendermaßen: Klassen 5-6: je drei Klassenarbeiten pro Halbjahr im Mathe, Deutsch, Englisch. Und ein weiteres Fach. Das weitere Fach schreibt nur 2 Klassenarbeiten pro Fach. Ab der 9. Klasse sind es nur 2 Klassenarbeiten für alle Hauptfächer. Dafür sind sie umfangreicher. Weitere Bewertungen in den Hauptfächer: Tests (z. B: Vokabeltests) Projekte und mündliche Mitarbeit (im Unterricht). Die anderen Fächer schreiben Tests oder führen Mappen für Projekte, o.Ä. Für Kinder, die noch die dt. Sprache erlernen müssen, galt eine 2-Jahresfrist, in der sie nicht bewertet werden. Kinder werden quartalsweise bewertet. Zum Halbjahr gibt es Zeugnisse. Mitten im Halbjahr gibt es den Elternsprechtag. Da wird eine Notenübersicht für alle unterrichteten Fächer erstellt und den Eltern vom Klassenlehrer gezeigt. Die Lehrer/innen sprechen dann mit Eltern über den Lernstand/Lernfortschritt der Kinder/Jugendliche. Diese Elternsprechtage vergeben Termine Uhrzeiten, wann man da sein sollte. Manchmal muss man warten, denn es gibt immer viel zu besprechen. Sorry, my English is not the best for this subject.
@@gvicze Aua, da hat man uns damals aber mehr gefordert. Die Faustregel lautete: Wochenstundenzahl = Schulaufgabenzahl. Ein Lateinlehrer war noch etwas schlauer: er hielt noch eine sechste Schulaufgabe ab - für die, die eine versäumt hatten. Für die anderen zählte es als Extemporale.
When I was in Gymnasium - a loooong time ago in some small town in Northrhine-Westphalia - there was this boy from South Africa that came to us in 8th grade. He didn't speak a word of German when he first came but he and his younger sister learned quickly and fit in in no time. (Decades later, I ran across this guy in Berlin, where I live now. He thanked me over and over again for helping him feel at home during those first weeks and months. I never realized that I had helped him at all, let alone this much. I just sat next to him in class and we became friends, that was all.)
Awe that’s so wonderful that you were able to help him. Just being a friend to a foreigner is a really big deal. We can feel quite lonely and scared at first, so having friends makes a huge difference! ❤️
A lovely story. We arrived here from Greece, it took time to adjust, our kids never complained they understood we had to leave Greece then our kids thrived. I am so impressed by the German system. Very pleased indeed.
@@MyMerryMessyGermanLife When your child goes to a German Gymnasium you carefully should check before if this Gymnasium has a main emphasis: Is your child more a musician/artist (then you should send him/her to a so-called "Waldorfschule", teaching a lot of arts, music and craft), is the child more interested in science (then a Naturwissenschaftliches Gymnasium is suitable) or sports (a special "Sport-Gymnasium" where athletes are trained for a professional sports-career)? If your child is in the wrong emphasis it can give a rude awakening after some years... I was on a very old "Humanitisches Privatgymnasium" (with the emphasis on old languages like Latin, Old-Greek , Old-Hebrew was also possible), luckily I learn languages fairly easy.
TBH the difference is not as big as some make it out to be. Universities can only expect you to have what is requires at Abitur level, so everyone mostly starts from scratch anyway. It can be dangerous to start out thinking you know a lot of material already.
@@MyMerryMessyGermanLife Do not send your child to a "Waldorfschule" as another user recommended...! They teach accordingly to an ideology called 'Anthroposophie' which basically is a lot of woo, especially when it comes to technology and the natural sciences, and their history curriculum is basically made up bullshit by their founder that includes Atlantis being real. Many of the so called 'Querdenker' in the South-West have ties to those schools or that ideology. Be aware of that!
You should talk to your "Gemeinderat" about that bus problem. Are there more kids who are in need of this bus? The "Gemeinde" can eventually contact the bus company - at least that happened in my "Gemeinde" when I was a kid and we needed a special bus for getting to our school.
Yes, my region also contracted a bus company to cover extra busses in the morning and afternoon. Only if you missed them, you had to rely on the public ones. But other citizens weren’t banned from them ever.
Taking public transport is quite normal in Germany and often it's school transportation diguised as public transport for financial reasons. BUT hearing you talk about the busses being late...when I went to school we had the same issue and eventually parents complained because 1. your kids have a right to education and that is being hindered if they cannot get to school on time. 2. Your kids also HAVE to be in school and cannot be due to poorly organized transportation. 3. Several students being constantly late impacts the education and progress of all other students in their class. Given that there is only one bus in the morning, maybe think about taking this up with the school and the transportation provider.
As mentioned in my comment. When my siblings and I went to school, we had the same issue with coming late to school. I remember that there had been some sort of agreement, that, if we had waited at least 15 minutes for the bus, we had to call the school secretary, to inform them that the bus didn´t show up, and we could go home. This has usually been an issue in winter. There had been many cases, where the bus operator informed us. There used to be a small shop close to the bus stop in our village. So, if they knew they were late, they called them, and kindly asked the shop owner to inform us.
@@muesztaerrieh Same thing for me in the 1980s in a small village: it was minus 20 degrees Celsius and lots of fresh snow, and the elder children told us: we’d have to wait for maximum 1h, and if the bus didn’t come, we would go home. An older woman living right next to the bus stop saw the dozen children out in the cold and let us in and made tea and gave us some Christmas cookies she had made, so we wouldn’t have to wait out in the cold, and in the end we went home and enjoyed our free day, because the bus never came, and nobody was reprimanded, because we had waited the usual time, and lots of buses didn’t arrive that day (- pretty much an act of God / a case of force majeure (“höhere Gewalt”) due to weather).
"School bus" is an American thing. In Europe I would not generally expect the concept, except for children with special needs. As you had to come to the rescue and helped another child out, are there enough children in the village to start child pooling? I mean, if each day another parent could do the duties for 5 or 6 of them, that might work. Note the daily trips on PT with school friends has a developmental side as well. Nice video. Nice hair, you two :) - the dark chestnut brown is really cute and how it was modeled too.
Yeah carpooling is a good idea! And yeah you’re right about how taking the bus allows the kids to make friends. Our boys were just invited to another kids’ house on Friday, and he was a kid they met on the bus!
Dependng on how far they live from school. In my secondary school back then there were kids that lived in up to 15km distance, so for those who could not walk there was buses to collect and drop them to their villages and towns
@@MyMerryMessyGermanLife Germans don't really do carpooling to get their children to school and back again. If you're a kid in Germany and need to get anywhere, you generally either walk, ride a bike or take public transportation. Dedicated school buses exist (especially in rural areas), but aren't the rule. How far do you live from the school?
There are no super special yellow buses like in the US. But regular bus companies run buses at certain times that are really only used by students. They may even have some sign designating them as a school bus
The reason why they are Gastschüler until February probably is because this is the time that marks half of the school year. At that time, they also get their "Halbjahreszeugnisse" (=half-year-reports, which are not that important, but gibe an overview of the grades achieved in the previous months) (They usually get a Halbjahreszeugnis and at the end of each school year, a Jahreszeugnis. The Jahreszeugnis, includes the marks of the whole school year and they are now crucial for being able to move to the next grade). Therefore, since they are Gastschüler, they are not under pressure because of the Halbjahreszeugnis, they get the chance to have a "fresh start" when half of the school year is over and only get their marks of the second half-year counted for their Jahreszeugnisse. ... & Schönen 1. Advent!💫🕯❄
I grew up in a rural area in Germany (Baden-Württemberg), where pupils were supposed to commute to school by public transport. It usually worked very well for those who came by train, but service was always rather dodgy for those who had to take the bus. After a year or so, most pupils started to ride their bikes to school, even the ones that lived pretty far sway. They would ride in big groups, at least from spring to autumn.
Good to know! Yeah that would work well in the spring and autumn. But we need the bus during the winter. It’s so icy around here. Hmm, okay we can talk to the other parents.
Glad to hear that you have found the right school for everyone of your kids. My kids are half-American and experienced both American elementary schools and elementary school, Gymnasium and Realschule and FOS in Bavaria. I absolutely love your videos - it reminds me of all the „cultural shocks“ I had when we lived in the U.S. You’re such a positive open-minded family interested in other cultures. That’s why I always look forward to seeing your updates of your life in Bavaria. Viele liebe Grüße aus der Nähe von Nürnberg!
Hallo Carola! Thank you so much, we’re so glad you enjoy our videos. And so cool that you’ve also experienced culture shocks - it’s something that’s hard to relate to unless you’ve lived in another country!
@@MyMerryMessyGermanLife I went to kindergarten, 1st and the first part of 2nd grade in New York State. Then my family moved to Northern Germany. Our tiny village school there had one classroom, one teacher and about thirty-five pupils grades 1 - 8. Oh boy - culture shocks galore!
Oh Wow someone else from Bavaria! I grew up and went to school in a small town called Schwabach, you probably know of it being that it’s only 20Km outside of Nürnberg 🙂
I took the train to Gymnasium every morning. I got up at 5am and my dad drove me to the train station on top of the 30min train ride. In the town of my school I then had to walk up a little hill for around 15min. But I loved to have time with all my friends on my way and I loved my Gymnasium. Hope you have a great day! Greetings from Salzburg
I truly commend you for the choice of holding back giving kids smartphones, I have a kid in my family that already is kind of addicted and not even 8 years old. But I also think that a cellphone is really needed when starting the 5th grade, it's just part of being a part of society and more importantly like you stated ensures that the kids and you can stay in contact, wherever they are. I got mine in the 5th class and that was 2007 when mobile phone still were pretty basic, but honestly I'm really glad I didn't have this brain-rewiring distraction device of a smartphone that I use today. I think it helps staying focused on other parts in life and let's the brain enough free space to "unfold" and mature. Sure, neural stimuli and consuming media are important but IMO boredom is quite underestimated for its value of generating ideas/creativity. From what I've seen and heard from you so far, I really appreciate your openminded-ness and approach to parenting!
At least in my part of Germany, people also "shop around" for a Gymnasium they like. In my city, we had four Gymnasiums, each with a slighty different focus. At one, you'd have more math classes and start younger with sciences like chemistry, while I took additional classes in arts at my Gymnasium. About a year before changing shools, there would be "Tag der offenen Tür", where students could visit the different schools (usually with their parents). Then, you'd apply centrally, giving your top two choices and cross your fingers ;)
Tag der öffnen Tür was really important. Mostly for the focus of a school/Gymnasium. We had like 4 schools (3 Gymansien and 1 Gesamtschule) I watched the lessons and for me I choose the secondary school with focus on languages. I actually am really happy about it, because the other two were rather muscial/mathematician focus and science focus. I f.ex. was in a bilingual class (that's how it was called back than - 20 years ago) where I had French as major (5 school hours per week in 5th class) and English as 2nd foreign language (3 school hours per week in 5th class). As I was in a bilingual class with the focus on French, in later school years we had like some Nebenfächer in French (history, politics and geography - continuously till grade 10, 3 hours per week). We also had many chances at our Gymnasium to speak English and French- we had a partner school in the UK and in France. The English classes even had the opportunity of an exchange to UK in 7th grade (2 weeks) and our French focus class had an exchange to Toulouse in 6th grade (3 weeks). And the exchange students than also came to Germany the next year. The exchange was only pupils and I think 3 teachers (just FYI because you had a video about self reliance and independence of children jn Germany) and we had assigned host families. Before going to Toulouse we were Pen pals with the French students of the partner school. In Mittelstufe we had a Model European Parliament project where representatives of European countries stayed here in Germany for I think 2 weeks recreating the European Parliament and the EU in general. We hosted a Beitish and Greek representative. And as Germans are often much influenced by Hollywood and the Englis-speaking media, we had so many chances to improve English during that time. Also from grade 10-11 many pupils had the chance of doing a year or half a year abroad - most pupils at that time went to English-speaking countries (USA, Canada, Australia or New Zealand were in the leading spots back than). In the Mittelstufe we also had some more English hours per week and we could pick Wahlfächer: f.ex. music/arts, Religion/ethics and Spanish/Latin. So since grade 8 I even had Latin and could take my Latinum at grade 12th. It's not the biggest use nowadays but for me- as I like Roman languages - it was good. At the end of my school "carrier" aka Oberstufe I had my majors in French and English and could almost drop all of the Naturwissenschaften (except biology and maths - maths unfortunately wasn't optional). For me this was a blessing because the sciences (physics and chemistry) I actually hated during school - I know Kevin is an engineer, so for you that might not be understandable - so I was glad just to take biology (which was more like learning by heart) and maths. For the language I could take in Einführungsphase (grade 11) even Spanish. But unfortunately because I already had 2 foreign languages as major in grade 12th and 13th and Latin on top I actually had to drop Spanish after grade 11. But with the background of Latin and French I started improving my Spanish during my vocational education phase (berufliche Ausbildungsphase) and as I started working in 2017, since than I learned and am still learning Italian - the Latin I had in school is a real advantage here😊 So to conclude, I think it's really important to know the abilities and maybe the "strengths" of your kids and choose the school according to that. Well sure it was also a big advantage for me to have a few classmates of my Grundschule in class. But my than BFF went to a Gesamtschule because of her grades - she didn't fit (according to grades) the Gymnasialniveau. I'm a German with Korean roots (one of my parent came to Germany jn the 80s and stayed here; I do speak fluently Korean) and our class was really diverse for that time because we had many children from French-speaking countries. Actually our school had a good diverse mixture.... So yeah, just wanted to share this. I love your videos. For me it's always helpful to learn and improve my English and your clips are so interesting and as you don't have a strong accent it's so cool to watch them. Keep up👍🏻👍🏻 P.S.: So yeah, it's actually 4 languages I can fluently converse (German - 1st native language, Korean - 2nd native language; English and French - foreign language I'm able to fluently converse) and 2 I have the basics which are good for holiday use (Spanish, Italian)
Me again: I remember that we had a French girl who came to Germany in grade 6. As her parents were both French, she had to adjust in a functioning class community and had also the language barrier. But I remember that when she was in grade 8 she really was fluent in German with a little French accent. So I think your kids will adapt pretty fast.❤
When my younger son started taking the bus by himself, he got lost several times, too. And he was extremly scared, too. I talked to him and we made a plan, what he could do in such a situation (in that time kids didn't have phones, yet): He should watch out for a trustworthy adult and explain the situation. So, the adult could tell him in which direction to go. Of course the first thing your kids should do when getting lost is calling you. But I think a plan b could give them some more confidence. Maybe when you make sightseeing trips, occasually you could ask people for the right way. Because of the great navigation tools we have today probably children haven't experienced such situations with their parents very often.
I guess a solution without smartphone could be a local map. Seems a little outdated, maybe, but nevertheless effective. A small one just showing the area right around the school should be sufficient. Back in the days "before smartphone navigation", situations having to ask for the right way were pretty scarce as well, at least in my experience. Maybe the expectations of finding your destination were lower, always getting right were you want to go on your first try without ever having looked at any map at all was sheer dumb luck. And even with a map, you might not have found what you wanted right away, depending on the quality of the map... fun times ;) it was basically more laid back, because navigation did not have to be perfect. I mean, I don't expect everybody to find their way just by looking at a map at home and following it in their mind - you can always print it out, maybe buy one or even get one for free at a tourist information or town hall. (opportunities vary greatly from my experience)
That reminds me of my cousin (in the 1970s), who went to the police station that was luckily nearby to explain that she missed her bus station *. The policemen were: a) so nice to call us and b) explain to her how to get back to our part of town and told us which bus she is now taking. * The old express bus system required you to press the stop button in any case, otherwise the bus would simply drive through if no one wanted to get off or get on at the station. Our younger child went to school in the next big city and luckily the older schoolmates were always helpful when for example the route was blocked and everyone had to find another way. When our child was one of the elders, they looked after the younger ones as well. (Abitur 2010)
@@MyMerryMessyGermanLife Children here are usually trained not to ask "anybody" on the street for help when they are in trouble, but rather to go to a shop and ask the salespeople there. It's kind of a security issue. I don't want to scare you, but children approaching strangers on the street are more likely to be exploited than children asking a clerk in a store for help. I am very sorry that your kids had this bad experience with the busses. The American school bus system also has advantages. Other than that, they look super cool!
I had to use the public Bus. it is quite normal in Germany. I had no problems during my school time because the bus schedule was very good. In the morning there was a bus every 7 minutes. I live in a 15.000 citizens "big" Gemeinde in Hessen. I think it depends where you life and how the local politics do their homework with building up a good infrastructure. Bavaria is special even for Germans. It is like a totally different country inside Germany. Beautiful but not representing Germany as a whole
I would question if there is one "Bundesland" representing the whole of germany, not even Hessen...i mean, isnt that a beautiful part of the federal system? different places coming together?
@@MyMerryMessyGermanLife i think if your school sees your children coming in late from that only bus in the morning they will ask the operator themselves, because its not your kids fault. you know we had that topic in Gymnasium every single day, when school started.. oh they are late because of the train/bus. school and village/town/local authorities will help out.
They’re probably starting to grade your kids in February because the second semester starts then. At least this is the case for me as I’m currently doing an exchange in England.
Yes, in Germany, the school year is divided into two semesters (Halbjahre) and now your sons have one semester to get a grip on the system and at the start of the new semester they will start to get grades.
I had to take the train to go to the Gymnasium. We were 6 kids from my village who went to the same class (3 boys and 3 girls). One day we got on the wrong train, it was an express train and did not stop in our village. We stood by the door ready to disembark and when the train did not stop one of the boys started to panic and started crying. The conductor came and gave him some sweets and calmed him down and told him we could just take the next train back and he was going to show us where to go. He also taught us how to recognize the Express train on the time table. I still remember when I saw our regular stop flying by I immediately started working out how to get back. I was about 12 at the time.
I just love the community mindset here in Germany and how adults will help kids when they see them struggling. It’s something we don’t have much of in the US anymore, mainly due to the whole infrastructure being based on cars!
My kids take public transportation to gymnasium. There is no “school bus”. The bus runs every 10 minutes at peak times, every 20 at off peak times, so the kids can take the bus at which ever time they want. Every line also has an E(xtra) bus around the time when most kids get out of school. We have about 8 Gymnasium and 5 Realschule, x Gesamtschulen….in the city so kids going to a further school or have to switch to the tram, take an earlier bus. Also the older the kids, the later the bus they take so they can sleep to the last minute and run into class before the bell. lol In my opinion 5th is super easy as is 6th. A lot more subjects are introduced in 7th. 8th is ok 9th is pretty tough, 10th is ok again. And from what I hear and have seen so far, 11this difficult again and 12th not quite so bad again however the stress of Abi Prüfungen is real. So I think for your kids coming in at grades 5 and 6 it is optimal to get them right up to speed. They are smart kids and will do amazingly well, I’m sure.
The stories you told about your kids taking public transportation totally took me back to when I was in Realschule! I grew up in a tiny village, so the public transportation sucked. The busses were late pretty much every time, sometimes, on the way back home, the bus got too full and the bus couldn't stop at our bus stop anymore because there were too many kids (and the next bus wouldnt come for the next two hours). Once, eleven years old, I got dropped off at a completely different station because of road construction that I have never seen before and he just dropped me off. Cried for an hour until I rang at some strangers house to ring my parents (my parents gave me a phone for the exact same reason you did, but right in that second, it was dead!). so the experiences of your kids kinda made me chuckle a little bit because apparently it is very common but oh dear, let me tell you, i absolutely hate busses and i am 23 now, but you wont find me in a bus very often now :D
About "sitting around just to wait for the bus"... I never had to use the bus, but most kids in my class had to. They usually used the time to start homework together (or, of course, sometimes just hang around, eat,...). Sometimes I was even jealous, because most days I "had" to go home immediately after school. So maybe this is another aspect of self-responsibility: use the time in some way.
I love how you put so much effort in understanding how everything works here and it's beautiful to see how you embrace the culture and how respectful you are. It's hard work and I can imagine how difficult it is with four kids, but it will pay out in the end. Haircut looks fantastic, btw!
I'm Bavarian too and yes, it's public transport everywhere. I was often 5-10 min late. Oh but wait for winter when it snows. But weirdly enough it was never an issue. You kinda get there when you get there. I'm so happy that your boys are feeling welcomed and happy now. I used to work as a school social worker at a Mittelschule and it's definitely more of a "social issue" environment. And about February - we call it Halbjahr. You even get a Zeugnis called Halbjahreszeugnis, so you know where you are at.
Thank you so much for this! My family is moving to Germany in June. I lived in Germany in the 80s, but I was a kid then. I'm just starting to learn all of the things I need to know as a parent. When I lived there I was a military kid, so I went to school on base. I visited the local Gymnasium to see where some of my friends went to school, but never had the pleasure of going myself. You videos are going to really put my kids fears at ease.
Hi! I am looking through all these videos and if you ended up moving. We have four children as well and are always considering a move. My oldest is 12 so it feels like it's now or never. Specifically scared about the school aspect. I see a lot of these videos are older, would love to get in touch with people that are like minded and on the same journey.
I think there are usually dedicated school buses in areas where you don’t have a lot of public transportation. At my Gymnasium there were a number of school busses that brought the children from the surrounding villages to the Gymnasium and back.
Yeah that makes sense. I think we have 5-7 kids from our town that go to the same gymnasium as our boys, so there’s just not a huge demand for the buses to make it worth their time.
@@MyMerryMessyGermanLife It can be really difficult if you live in a rural area and the school is in a different town. You might consider contacting other kids' parents and trying to organize a car pool. Might be difficult, however, if school days end at different times for each kid. On the other hand, I found that getting familiar with German public transport and dealing with interrupted and unreliable services helped me to learn self-reliance. And in those days (70s), nobody had phones. ;-)
The Italian system is so similar, and I started taking the public bus in middle school at 11yo. Where I am from there was a bus every 30 minutes, a couple more during rush hour for students and workers. And I'm 35 now, and I got my first old Nokia phone at 12 for the same reasons you gave it to your children
Thanks so much for putting out part II. As expected, this was way too short for me again. But I don't complain. I find it amazing how much effort you put in the quality of your videos - be it subtitles, or dividing into chapters. You rarely ever get to see that elsewhere. And not to mention the excellent camera work. That's the icing on the cake. What amazes me the most is that you managed to find such a perfect fit for ALL of you, be it your place of residence, work, schools, nature, just everything. And him happy you find such a good school for your oldest, and likely also for the younger ones later on.
@@MyMerryMessyGermanLife I can only agree: Great, interesting, well-produced videos that I am always looking forward to watching. 🥰 11:28 A little tip for your learning German: "Deutsch" = the German language itself (e.g. "ich lerne Deutsch", "Deutsch als Zweitsprache", "Deutsch als zweite Sprache") "Deutsche" = a female German person (e.g. "sie ist (eine) Deutsche") "Deutscher" = a male German person (e.g. "er ist (ein) Deutscher") "deutsch(e(n/r/s))" = general adjective for something that is German (only capitalized in proper nouns or start of sentence/phrase) (e.g. "ich trinke deutschen Wein", "er besucht eine deutsche Schule", "es gab deutsches Essen", "die deutsche Kultur erleben") Also: "Gast" = guest "Gastschule" = host school "Gastschüler" = guest student (for college: "Gaststudent") 😊
So glad to hear the boys are enjoying their new experience at Gymnasium so far! ☺️ Re: busses. I think that might vary. I went to school in a rural, very thinly populated part in Lower Saxony. Since I lived in the town that had the local Gymnasium and Realschule I didn’t take the bus, but many of my friends who lived in smaller towns and villages did. If I recall correctly there were dedicated school buses that ran to the school for first and second period and back after 5th, 6th and 8th. I believe this was because the regular busses ran only a few times during the day and wouldn’t be able to service that huge number of students during certain times. Also because there was such a huge number of students from surrounding towns that had to go to Realschule or Gymnasium in my town it probably was the most sensible and economic solution for the Bezirk. If there had been several other school options within 25km range this might not have been the case.
Same regulation as when I went to school. The public transport bus ran seldom and didn’t stop anywhere near the gymnasium. So there were coaches doing the school tour. They were overcrowded and the pupils at my bus station- we were the last to be picked up - had to stand. Which wasn’t fun if the driver decided to break hard, since a coach has nothing which you can grab…
@@MyMerryMessyGermanLife It gave you survival instincts. Especially taking into account that our school bus driver most of the time was the senior boss of the coach corporation the school rented the coaches from. And his eyesight wasn’t the best anymore… 😉
Sorry, I am a little bit late to the party - but something caught my eye: When you compared US and German subjects, you compared „local language“ and „foreign language“ - however in Germany we have two foreign languages at the gymnasium (English and French at your sons‘ school). In the US those 6th graders only have English classes, their local language. 1 language (in tthe US) vs. 3 languages (local language + 2 foreign languages) in Germany. I might be biased but I find it pretty cool that in Germany we get to learn so many languages.
Re.: Pottery in art class - these type of classes will have some kind of "themes" per semsters e.g. 6th grade pottery class, next year sketching, water color in 8th grade and so on. Same Sport/P.E.- baketball in 6th grade, gymnastics in 7th, athletics in 8th, etc.
Im very happy your child got to know someone before attending gymnasium. I attended foreign schools (UK, Philippines) before coming to germany and I didnt know anyone. And I can tell you - it was HARD. Teachers can sometimes be ''sub-optimal" for this kind of situation, especially when your guys/gals are more introvert. Make sure they get a friend or two, and be supportive when things do not go well. They may not occasionly, but its rarely your kids fault
I actually teach German as a second language at my school here in Lower Saxony. We don't have to give grades to our DaZ students for 2 years. The rule is that they don't need to get grades in subjects that require good German language skills to succeed. So we usually grade them in subjects like music and arts but not in German, science or social studies.
@@MyMerryMessyGermanLife I teach at a Gesamtschule. But I used to teach at a Realschule before and we did the same. I'm not sure about the rules in Bavaria but maybe you can look into it.
@@MyMerryMessyGermanLife I teach German as a second language at a Gymnasium in North Rhine-Westfalia and we've got the same 2 years without grades - rule plus support in learning German. Additionally, if parents elaborate on their children's good skills and grades in previous schools, it's no problem to be accepted at the Gymnasium (for a two year test phase). I always feel sorry for you being in the state with the strictest rules in Germany in your situation.
God, Bavaria is so gorgeous. So happy for y'all! Fellow US southerner here moving to Frankfurt in May. I have been binging all your vids to prep for my move. Thank you so much always for making them!
Usually there are normal City busses with routes optimised to cover schools and in the morning when school starts they are filled with pupils. Depending on the place, if you're in school or even uni, you get a public transit pass that either covers the whole local network or is tailored to cover only your typical ride from home to school.
I grew up in Austria though, and my gymnasium was a fancy one on a hill far outside the city. It was serviced by an intercity bus that had a route optimised for student pickup from the main city, via small villages to the gymnasium up the hill, with a timetable around the schools schedule. It was a normal intercity bus though, and occasionally one or two adults on their way to God-knows-where would get on in a village. The volume of all conversations suddenly dropped with an adult present, and we all showed our best behaviour (it was a Catholic school) Looking back it feels quite amusing.
We are a Chilean-German family of 5 that has just arrived to Bayern, near Erlangen, three weeks ago. You have no idea how great has been to watch your videos, specially the ones about schooling! Our oldest daughter, who speaks only a few words in German, is in 7th grade and we visited the local Gymnasium to talk to the principal about her situation. It was exactly as you mentioned, "no, she cannot come to the Gymnasium, she has to go to Mittelschule and then apply in one or two years". No alternatives, no help. It was literally a slap in the face and we felt terrible feeling that her education was being compromised. While looking for a solution, we found about the InGym project, which is a path for foreign kids with educational background similar to the Gymnasium to get into one in Germany. Tomorrow we have the final meeting, hopefully everything ends well. Thank you so much for your videos, inspiration and courage!
@@MyMerryMessyGermanLife well, it worked!! She passed the exams and will star the 6 months integration program at a Gymnasium in Nuremberg and after that she will be transferred to our local Gymnasium. It is a great alternative for foreign kids!!
I was really looking forward to this episode and hearing about how your sons are doing at Gymnasium. I did think they would be fine. Yes, some students find Gymnasium too much of a challenge, but many do not. So glad you are all settling down as far as Gymnasium is concerned!
You two are so wholesome and even though my husband and I don’t even have kids, we do live in Germany (I’m Canadian, he’s German), and I enjoy hearing from other people who have moved here about how they overcome their challenges. Good for your kids for being able to learn so much in such little time! Kids are so adaptable that way. PS love the hair - you’re one of those lucky people that a lot of different hair styles look good on because your hair has so much body 👩🏻🦱💁🏻♀️💇🏻♀️
I don't think school busses are a thing in Germany. As for Berlin we just have city busses as well and I never heard of dedicated school busses from friends that grew up in different places of Germany either. Funny thing: we did have specific busses who took us once a week to the nearby swimming hall for our swimming class (which is mandatory in Germany in different grades). If some of the classmates live in the same town maybe you could organize a "parant taxi"? It's possible there are parents who drive their own kids on a daily basis and would be able to pick up your kids as well (at least in the morning, because (like you already know😉) classes can finish at different times for each class). Thanks for sharing your experiences and struggles with us! It's so interesting and informative to get another perspective on everything. I hope you know you are doing a great job with everything so far👍
I was in “middle school”, then known as “Junior High School” in the 1960’s. Our ages were 13 to 15. Even in those “early” years of my life, I knew that I wanted to experience cultures further away than Mexico, which was only 10 miles away from where I lived in Southern California. My parents had only recently crawled into the bottom of the US middle class and I was the first female in both my mother’s and my father’s families to graduate from high school. My truly genius 16 year old idea to achieve my wish was that I would become an international airline stewardess. So I studied French. Understand that in those years “authority”, represented by teachers, doctors, politicians, etc, stood so far above any “ordinary” human being, that their decisions were nearly ever questioned. So when my high school counselor told me that I was “too intelligent” to become an airline stewardess I believed him. French for nothing except the possibility to enter college. So when I actually did live in Paris France, my French was so uncertain that I believed that I was incompetent. And arrogant Parisians were only too eager to confirm that I was right. Trust me, just like everywhere in any country, there are people who desperately need to be right. Due to my circumstances of being in Paris (as a partner to a Vice President of Apple Computer), my “status” was constantly challenged. Exactly because I had never before been evaluated on the grounds of a relationship, I became uncertain of my own worth when evaluated from an international unknown standard. What I eventually understood is that there are Parisians who perceive themselves as “upper class” who have this need to be special. I loathed Paris for many years because of the prejudice I encountered in those first months. Eventually I learned to separate those first experiences of specific people from the awesome experience of the city. From urbane Paris I then moved to the countryside of Northern Germany. My partner then is German and she wanted to live closer to her family. She worked in Paris during the week and then flew home to Northern Germany on the weekends. I lived in the house she had bought there which was being renovated. The experience of living in a house built in the 1800’s which was receiving a new thatched roof was extraordinary and delightful. The mice in the kitchen, not so much. Whew! Didn’t intend to write so much. Yeah, culture shock. Paris, Northern German countryside and for the last 25 years, Sweden. And despite all of the trauma of my first years in Europe, I am daily grateful to be here 35 years later. Bless you for granting your children the wonderful possibilities of experiencing other cultures within the safety of a loving and supportive family! ❤️🙏
I grew up in Berlin. Big city. In the 70s I walked to my Grundschule alone when I was 6 yo. In the 80s I took my bike to go to my Gymnasium when I was 12. No school bus. No Ted Bundy.
So nice to hear your perspective. We went to the USA for a short while and also had different perspectives. The bus story with the construction side was hilarious. In the USA it is stranger danger concept everywhere. Here in Western Europe strangers are just people around you who might help you to solve a problem. So we learn our children whom to address and what to ask. It is such a different approach isn’t it.
My 2 cents from Austria: Here in Vienna there actually are school buses! They are from the American school and the Vienna International School. :-) Besides from that, it’s normal to take public transportation to school. My older son is in 5th grade now too and his commute is 30 minutes by tram and train (yes, including change at a big and busy station). We practiced with him several times before the school started and yes, we also bought him a phone. But it’s amazing how quickly children adapt to new situations and how they grow with the challenges.
WhatsApp has a "Send live location for x minutes" feature, so next time they get lost, you can track them in real time and nudge them into the right location. The bus situation is annoying. I guess it is less problematic when you grow up in a city, but good that they manage to become self reliant! Great parenting :)
Oh a good feature! Thanks for letting us know about that. That’s right - the bus situation was difficult but it was a great lesson in self-reliance and independence for the boys.
A big Hello to my favourite American family! I'm from Graz, Austria, which is the 2nd biggest city with a population of 280.000. Graz has a lot of schools and even 4 universities. There are no dedicated school buses at all - not even for elementary schools. Everybody walks or takes the public transport except the really posh kids which are chauffeured with private cars. In the country there are general school-buses which have fixed routes - but only if there is no public bus or train service. About Gymnasium: I also attended a Gymnasium (scientific branch) here in Graz and I loved it. At the beginning I wanted to become an airplane engineer (this was the time Concorde was developed) but then I ended up in University studying the Law... And now I´m an attorney to criminal law which I love doing. The education in Gymnasium kept all future paths open until it was the right time for me to decide where to go next. You made the right decision for your kids to offer them an education which allows them to choose whatever further career path they will take in the future.
Hi from Austria 👋 I don't know, if the school system is exactly the same in Bavaria, but for the "no Grades until February" question it might work like here: our school-year has two terms: Winter (mid September- mid February) and summer (mid February - end June/ begin of july) wirh one week break between these two. At the end of the first term, you'll get a "school-message" with all grades your kid(s) "earned" (normally a mixture of their test/ schularbeit grades and the amount of their engagement during classes/Mitarbeit). This is only an information to check, how your child(ren) is (are) doing at school. (And to maybe "motivate" them to work a little bit more on a specific class 😉) At the end of the second term, you'll get the final school report, which is important to level up to the next grade.
The bus story is a great example of showing how kids learn from new situations. They got lost and managed to navigate their way with your help. Also next time they might be brave enough to ask a stranger for help, thanks to that construction worker. This builds confidence for all new situations. The kids learn to think about several approaches they could try before using the phone as backup plan.
As I could remember, when I was in my Realschule, we had every year at the start of the new schoolyear a church sevice in a church near the school. After that the schoolyear started well. It was in Baden-Württemberg in a porotestant church in a katholic town
Late January/early February is when the Halbjahr (half year , semester) ends and children get their interim report cards. They will probably only count your sons' grades from the second Halbjahr this year.
Can confirm that the bus situation was the most stressful part about going to Gymnasium. I grew up in a very small village and we only had two busses going through our village in the morning (one that arrived at school for 1. Stunde and one for 2. Stunde) and I often got to class late. The few busses going after school didn't even stop in our village, so I had a 20-minute walk on top of 30-minute bus ride where I often didn't even have a place to sit because it was so crammed. I remember it being very stressful and exhausting. I was so happy when I got a discman and was at least able to retreat into my inner world a little. But I still loved Gymnasium for all the input and intellectual challenges it offered me, so it was worth it :)
Nice shoots at the beginning, amazing. And you have arrived in Germany, you struggle with the same situations as we struggle with. Gymnasium is a hard school, our child is there too. She say it's hard, but she want stay there and so she has to study a lot for her own. And she realize for herself, it' s for her future life. But we are in the good situation, the school is only 800m away, not 25km. Stay awesome again.
One thing you might not know about is Volkshochschule or Zweiter Bildungsweg. It is basically an evening school where you can get every school degree even later in life. In my Bundesland it is even free of charge but that maybe is different for other states. I myself went to it to get a degree in my early twentys because of personal problems back at normal school age.
@@MyMerryMessyGermanLife Volkshochschulen also offer a great variety of art courses for enthusiasts and hobbyists, like for example photography, graphic design, video editing , painting etc. ... they also offer really good good german courses specially designed for adult expats and immigrants
Germany is very good at providing additional ways to get a school degree outside of traditional school. And opening up Uni and FHs to people without an Abitur.
educated people at any age have a higher rate of success looking for jobs. should be obvious. Unfortunately, here in the US they make the people pay for their own education. no job training from the Arbeitsamt... lot's of private universities and to pay for tradeschools here in the US. At the same time it is often easier here to get a job without the prerequisite education. If you can get the job, and you can do the work. Not so easy in Germany.
The German school year is divided into two halves; since in Bavaria the school year began in mid-September, the first half end in February. That is why your two sons are at school as guest students until the half-year. After that - and this is my assumption now - you will be allowed to decide together with the school whether your sons are at the right school. The both of you are such great team. You did so much to improve your sons German skills! I am totally convinced that they will make it. Please stay commited and awesome! I keep my fingers crossed for all of your kids!
I love your new haircut. My hair is below my waist. I just keep mine in a dirty bun to manage it. I am an online private English grammar and writing tutor for two girls who lived for a few years in the US. The oldest is in the 6th grade in Gymnasium. The school system here is very different from the US. It is interesting to talk with her before our tutor sessions about what she is learning in her English classes here in Germany. Great video. Thank you for sharing.
Hallo, liebe Marry, Ihr seid wirklich ganz wunderbare, vorbildliche Eltern mit so viel aufrichtiger beglückender Liebe und guter Ideen zur allerbesten Entwicklung Euerer zauberhaften Kinder! Viele unserer deutschen Landsleute unterstützen Euch mit ihren besten Gedanken und aufrichtigen Gebeten, daß Ihr Euch weiterhin in unserem schönen Deutschland so gut entwickeln und glücklich leben könnte! In Zukunft wißt Ihr, daß Ihre immer aller Anschläge am Schwarzen-Brett der Schule sorgfältig lesen müßt, um auf dem aktuellen Stand der Organisation zu sein! Auch wir als Deutsche Familie hatten es nach unserem Umzug in den Bayerischen-Wald sehr schwer, da es hier leider nicht üblich ist mit den Neubürgern mitzudenken und ihnen das Leben zu erleichtern, ehern im Gegenteil, nach dem bösen Motto: "Wir haben Euch nicht gerufen, geht dahin zurück, wo ihr hergekommen seid!" - Wurde mir hier von einem Lehrer wörtlich so ins Gesicht geschrieen!
I grew up in Berlin and it's like you said, more public transportation, so no reason for school buses. But what you say about the buses throws me back to my childhood xD I needed to take two buses to school and especially in winter, bus missed / canceled / too late in the morning: Sprinting back home to wake Dad that he's taking you to school, or in the afternoon in the winter, walking somewhere in the dark in a strange area, because there is "replacement rail traffic". But you learn and yes, cell phones help immensely! The change from elementary school to Gymnasium was a similar experience for me as it was for your boys: finally I can fit in! so many great friends with similar interests and great teachers who assume you want to learn.
I'm from Rheinland Pfalz and finished Gymnasium in 2020. The Bus problem was normal. In the begiining it got so bad, that parents complained and then it got better for a while, but then they just changed the schedule, so the Bus wasn't "late" as much.... And then most of the time I had like 5-8 min to go like 600/700 m with a lot of traffic lights. It wasn't as bad after school, but the Bus was delayed like 10 min most of the time...
I come from a rural area in Germany and my school actually had a school bus. Every morning the bus picked up children from the nearby villages and brought them to a bus stop right before the school. If you missed that one bus you had a problem though, because that bus only came once a day. We also had a bus for gymnasium that brought the kids to the next town. I think in a very rural area you are most likely to have a school bus.
Unless it has change since my siblings and I went to school, it doesn´t have anything to do with a rural area, having most likely school busses. I think it depends on the state you´re living in, and if the district you live in is wealthy or not.
@@muesztaerrieh I never heard of a german or austria school that has an own school bus, nit even the richest communities or schools, it is just not our culture
In Austria kids use the Public transportation to get to school too. The student ID states which trains, busses or trans they can use to get to school. And yes, erratic bus drivers often drop kids off late!
I live in a bigger city in northern Germany. We don’t have School buses as you know them from America, but in the morning and around noon, when school starts or ends, there are extra buses going on the lines that are going by schools to accommodate the students that are using them.
Concerning passing grades etc.: You got the basics perfectly (which is more than many Bavarians do...)! 5 and 6 are the first non passing grades, therefore one 5 in the report cart will be excused. If you have a 5 in two Vorrückungsfächer (non-extracurriculars and also not art, music, PE) you will be asked if you want your child to do the Nachprüfung (45-60 mins written exam about everything that was covered in the subject in the whole school ear) (§33 GSO), or just fail and repeat. As a rough guideline: depending on subject and grade you will get a 4 in written tests between 50% and 60%. If your child almost passes the grade, but not quite, there is also the option of "Vorrücken auf Probe (§31 GSO) where the class conference could argue that the development was great, but that the bad grades from the beginning of the school year held your kids back too much, but they will manage the next year. They would then pass on a probationary basis and the issue would be revisited on december 15th the following school year. If your child is in the non-passing area of grades you should also get a Maiwarnung (warning in may) which also contains possible reasons and options on how to move forward. And parent-teacher-conferences are a thing, too, ofc. HOWEVER! Your children are Gastschüler, therefore their grades don't count! Like, at all. The "German doesn't count for two years" only applies if their grades count (i.e. you and the school decide that their German is good enough that they can participate and collect grades like a native, but will obviously struggle with German essay writing). Not too sure on the transition from Gastschüler to regular students, tbh, but it seems like you found a school that is prepared to suppport you and your children, which is awesome!
I always had a 5 in math (dyscalculia, but undiagnosed until i was 16 and I had the 5 starting at 5th grade) and I never failed or had to do the Nachprüfung. That was in Baden Württemberg and I always had a 1 in English which is apparently why I did not fail. I'm so glad it worked like that or I'd have no diploma by now. Just getting a 5 was hard, I got a straight up 6 on many tests.
Where I went to school in Germany, we always had a school bus. But that was probably because my school was in a cluster of 4 different schools (2 Gymnasiums, 1 Hauptschule, 1 Realschule) so every morning, a bus would come to my village and pick everyone (like, almost every kid of the whole village) up for these schools. Of course, you could also get on a regular bus a bit later and still get there on time but this bus was almost always full with people who went to work or other students who wanted to sleep 5 minutes longer. For my way home, we also got busses which drove to all the villages around. It wasn't timed the best, because the way to the bus stop would take about 4 minutes and we only had maybe 5 before the bus would just drive away, but still. So it probably depends on where you go to school and if a school bus really is needed or not.
Yeah it was the same when I lived in a tiny village (actually it was only a collection of a farm and five houses) near "Radevormwald". There was no regular bus at the times I would have needed one. So there where schoolbusses going to all the villages collecting kids for all schools from elementary school to Gymnasium and bring them back at three different times around noon and every afternnoon. Since I was older I used my bike in summer because I was at the second hold of of the schoolbus and it was quite a journey after entering. With my bike it was much shorter and quicker. I also lived in larger cities while going to school (Dortmund and Kassel) and while I was lucky to be able to walk in Dortmund I had to take the tram in Kassel for a 20min ride when I was in 5-8 grade.
Hello and have a nice First Advent! As many others already pointed out, usually kids just take a public bus to school which can be quite the adventure in rural areas. It took some of my classmates an hour or more and 2 different buses or bus and train to get to school, where they had to wait another half an hour until class started. So you could see a group of kids sitting in the cafeteria doing their homework last minute or just studying every morning. I'm glad that things start to work out for your children. As hard as it is/ was for them, it will be a lot easier for your younger ones, with all the experience to pass down. As you already figured out, kids usually start in class 5 and stay together with the same teacher and classmates at least until class 10, so students who join later on, will not get the same introduction and have to figure out a lot of things on the go. I changed Gymnasiums after grade 7, I can't remember how I managed to survive the first week there, with no teacher helping me to find my class and so on and solely depending on my classmates, a horror scenario for introverts :D. Buuut... it always did work out for me as it will for your kids, I'm sure. Also, considering you live near the Alps with a lot of snow during winters: you should expect something like "schneefrei", meaning either the school closes completely or students from different villages can't attend school because the buses don't run. Fun times :D. It was such a pity that my bus was always running, because I was living near a main road. A few other kids from villages on a hill missed several days each year, because there was no such thing as homeschooling a few years ago. Wishing you all the best and see you next week.
The class system is usually used up to the Oberstufe, that is the last 3 years of gymnasium. Up until then the students stay together in a class and taught together (except Religion). The Oberstufe is taught in courses, where each course is made up of different students but only from the same year. Your handling of the drop-off incident was very German. :)
German Gymnasiums simply are... the best type of school in Germany. I myself am a teacher and I teach at what is now called "Gemeinschaftsschule" - a school that offers everything for everyone in different academic learning levels... but the Gymnasium still reigns supreme in Germany.
Haha I remember the Diercke Weltatlas I borrowed from the school. At the end of sixth grade (like 15 years ago) I forgot to return it ... I still have it =D
Thanks a lot for this video. So many memories came up by watching it. The reason: many years ago we moved with our family from Germany to Thailand. We had a very similar experience when we tried to put our children in school. But after a while we got used to the different system and our children were much better by integrating than me. They entered the 1st and 2nd grade and it was so easy for them to learn Thai language. They are trained by german culture to stand on their own feet. I realised that the children here are much more guided by parents and teachers. I think the disadvantage of such a system is the lower degree of freedom. Please go on to make such amazing videos. I really enjoy.
Orientation or open door is usually in the spring :) Also, its February because February is the end of the first half year, they will get a report card in February and at the end of year
I grew up in Germany and I’ll have to agree with the others on the transport situation. It’s usually public transport to secondary school, even in the big city I grew up in. And public buses are terribly unreliable, my journey was often an hour or more. Took such a big chunk out of my day but also fun times with friends on the bus 😉
I grew up in a village in Northern Bavaria and went to Gymnasium in Aschaffenburg. It was considered normal that by fifth grade kids were old enough, in a group of their peers, to take the bus in the morning and go to school by public transport. And it worked fine: in their own way, the older kids would have an eye on the younger ones, and the particular bus (Linie 42, went 7.03 am, I still know that 30 years later) was filled to the brim with kids from 5th to 13th grade who all went to several schools in Aschaffenburg. The parents had trained us a little before, and they had us instructed to stick to our group - so that's what we did. There could be minor problems when the weather turned bad and the bus just didn't show up - but as it affected ALL the kids who lived along that bus line, the school and the parents knew quickly, and a solution was found soon. In most cases, the stay-at-home moms would collect as many kids as they could in their cars and bring them to a point from whence each kid knew their way to the relevant schools. On the other hand: even as a 10-year-old, Aschaffenburg was the city I knew well enough that I wouldn't have been lost one or two stops from the one I was used to.
We are taught as children, when you get lost and get scared, ask the next adult for help, but to be careful at the same time. They are allowed to explain the way, but we are not allowed to hop in a car of a stranger...
I believe February 2022 was chosen as the cut-off date for Gastschüler status because that is when mid-term grades are determined ("Halbjahreszeugnis"). For the school grades, you might consider discussing the details with your kids' teachers. School buses are usually only provided where public transportation is not available. In countries such as France, school buses in rural areas are commonplace.
Thank for for sharing your experiences with the Gymnasium and of course the ATLAS. When I was Garyson's age I was in a German boarding school and the Atlas became my favorite book. I traced the geographical whereabouts of magic movie heroes (Lawrence of Arabia/Mutiny on the Bounty etc.) and learned a lot of Geography then. At that time my father started to work for the newly formed NASA and travelled to the US a lot, so I even took the Atlas to bed to feel closer to him. Oh, and by the way: Sarah, your new haircut is awesome .. almost as awesome as Kevin's :-).
Learning a third language in your second actually can really help with the German grammar and understand the differences between languages. I found it actually really beneficial!
Dear friends now first of all Kevin is a man of taste, you dear lady look amazing with your new hair 👍👍👍😍 Now for me as a german it is very interesting to see your point of view. I graduated Gymnasium May 1980, so beeing an old fart i can not compare to todays german school system .beeing in Gymnasium, still at these ancient times my first foreign language was......ENGLISH. Now my teachers were excellent. Since they realized that the young 1970 generation was addicted to Rolling Stones and the Beatles we learned english by the lyrics of our favourite heroes. Actually we sang these songs together in the classroom to get used to the melody and sound of a foreign language. ( And at the schoolyard we were showing off, since we knew the lyrics and were able to sing the songs) Thats how my teachers made me love your beautifull language so much
@@MyMerryMessyGermanLife Well looking in the mirror prooves you wrong 😊 But its nothing wrong getting old . Every morning i get up saying: Upps i am still alive. So every morning i got a positiv feedback. Thats german humor 😁
Thank you so much for this video. My family and I (transplants from Los Angeles more than 3 yrs ago) are currently going through the process of trying to enroll my 9 year old son into a gymnasium for his 5th grade class next Fall. His getting good grades in most of his classes except for the German language as I had expected but he is getting better at it. Similar to your experience, we had also heard how demanding the gymnasium curriculum was and may create unwanted stress in the child's educational attainment. Your video kinda gave me a positive assurances that the gymnasium path for my 9 year old could be the right choice for him in the future. We prefer the gymnasium to university path instead and I'm sure the other paths (Realschule/gessamtschule/hauptschule) are also good paths to get into a university. I know I'm biased towards the university route and my background (undergrad - University of Southern California and Masters - Stanford University) dictates my decisions.
My family is in Northern California and our preschool and kindergarten age children go to the German international school here. Would love to hear more about your transition from California to Germany!
@@MA-zg2pz OMG there's so many factors of transition to cover. But to specifically focus on my children's (6 and a 9 yrs old) education, my wife and I decided that a full-immersion in German language was necessary and therefore a grundschule after the kindergarten was our decision. For sure, there were ups and downs during the process but they were able to pick-up the language within a year. It also helps that my wife is from Vienna, Austria and she speaks German to the kids even when we were in the States and that tremendously helped.
In the beginning when I saw "the first Frost" my mind immediately went "Hm, Grünkohlzeit" but that is probably more a northern Germany thing. The reason there is nothing special when entering 6th grade is that kids are normally already a year at the new school since we distinguish the 3 parts into 1-4 Grundschule, 5-10 Mittelschule (regardless of Hauptschule, Realschule or Gymnasium) and 11-13 (some cases 10-12 or 11-12) as Oberschule/Oberstufe, with the last part only being accesible via a Gymnasium or another specific kind of school, not the usual Haupt- or Realschule. I can see that some schools are adverse to put foreign kids into a Gymnasium because usually kids that come to Germany have not learnt German before they arrived and you kids did, which made them more of a positive abnormality. In regards to the emphasis on languages I think that might be a school specific thing. Some of the schools here have some subjects they heavily focus aside from the mandatory curriculum. I have seen (and heard as a rumour while being in school) about certain schools being the best for specific subjects. A reason for people to move to a big city is sometimes because they want a bigger variety of choice of schools and the more rural you live the less choices you have unless your kids are willing to travel a long time to school. I think with the amount of time Ella has to learn German it is probably a lot easier to get her into the Gymnasium when she reaches that age and you decide it is her best option. Have a nice week.
The bus situation you experience is totally normal. There are only school busses for Grundschule or Förderschule, but never for any other schools. When I was in this age I had to drive 45 minutes right through a big city. Some of my classmates even had to take the train. In big cities the busses usually come more frequently, but they are also not reliable. I always was 40 min too early at school since you get in trouble when being late. They dont care if it is your fault or not, they just say, you have to find another solution then.
Welcome to german public transport nightmares. As Eisbehr already said You shouldn't expect the situation to change much unless you make your voices heard by the officials of your municipality. And BTW this video is an excellent start. :) In Germany schooling is mandatory. Parents can not opt their kids out of the system even if they wanted to. As a consequence your children are entitled to being provided a safe way to school and back home. Please keep that in mind when you approach Your Schulamt about the situation. Also remember that you are not just asking for something for yourself. Instead You help to promote and improve a public good. Public transport is in many places outsourced to private enterprise and these of course try to cut cost in order to stay competitive. Still you can expect the contracts to include an obligation to provide a reliable service. And even more so when the passengers are school children whio are entitled to special care as I already pointed out. That's why these services are always subsidised. In Niedersachsen where I live every school has an 'Elternverein' and I bet that's not any different at your place. These guys will be very helpful in finding other parents whose children share the same ordeal. Also they should know whom to approach and get the ball rolling.
In our public middle school (between Chicago and Milwaukee), foreign language is mandatory beginning in the 6th grade. Students may choose between Spanish, French, German, or Chinese. They must take it 6th through 8th grades, and then it is required for two of the four years of high school (though most take it all four years where we live). But part of the reason that we live where we live - the public schools are exceptional and actually have a better reputation than the private schools. In fact, there is a public high school in our area that offers study abroad summer programs for credit!
Especially when you live in the country side the bus situation can be very challenging ;). There was actually a school bus when I went to Gymnasium many years ago. It stopped at the normal bus stops though to pick the kids up. But really I haven't heard anything about schoolbuses in Germany from anyone lately. Maybe they just don't exist anymore... Here (very big city) kids take public transportation to school or walk or ride their bikes. Most kids at my son's school come by subway. We live less then a kilometer away from the school, so my kids can walk there. And that is really such a relief! I wouldn't want my 10 vears old boy alone in the subway. But it ist very common and normal.
In Deutschland gibt es 2 Halbjahre für Schüler das 1 beginnt nach den Sommerferien bis Ende Januar und das 2 beginnt in Februar bis zu den Sommerferien In Germany there are 2 halves of the school year the first starts after the summer holidays and ends at the end of Janurary and the second half starts at the beginnig of Februrary until the summer holidays Das ist der Grund warum die Noten erst ab Februar gewertet werde That´s the reason why their grades are only counted at the start of Februrary
There is something called "freigestellte Schülerbeförderung" for settlements that don't have a connection to public transport and are further away from the next school or public transport station than 1.5 km. And those vans and small buses take kids from their "Weiler" (Settlement of 2 to 10 farms/homes) to school or the next possible bus/train station, where they join their classmates. In the freigestellte Schülerbeförderung there is usually some coordination with the kid schedules, but in general they're similar organized like other public transport with centralized pick up spots and bus schedules.
Re your question about school busses / how kids get to Gymnasium and back home... I went to different Gymnasien in different places, and normally it's the other way around than you said /thought : School organized busses are exclusively a thing in very small villages where it's hard to get around by public transportation. In cities there usually are no school busses, but kids take the normal busses or Straßenbahn. In Germany kids learn during Grundschule how to get around safely by bike or walking (like you've experienced it too, biking courses, learning what the street signs mean etc), and also by public transportation. Once they've reached Gymnasium age kids are considered old enough to get from point A to B. Of course parents might decide individually to rather drive their kids, or whatever works, but generally speaking that's how it works. School busses are an American thing and here only used as an exception in very small remote places where there is no other option. Im glad you're happy here and that you're here at all making my country that I love a diverse colorful place 🌸 My husband is Canadian and moved here 4 years ago. Discovering a new culture (we lived in Canada before we moved back here, so I've had that experience too luckily) is so exciting and really broadens one's horizon!
1) in größeren Städten gibt es mehr öffentlichen Nahverkehr, aber keine speziellen Schulbusse. 2) 45 min Wartezeit nach der Schule sollte kein Problem sein, wenn man in einer etwas größeren Stadt ist. Die bringt man als Schüler auch in der 6. Klasse problemlos herum. 3) Gerade Arbeiter im öffentlichen Raum, also Straßenbauer oder überhaupt Bauleute, sind sehr hilfsbereit.
Yeah the school bus situation sounds really familiar. (I also lived in rural Bavaria). Public Transport only really existed for schools (well not officially but no one else used them) but for some reason the bus companies running the lines always insisted on incompatible schedules. I had to go 3km to the next village for Gymnasium and 1st period started at 8:10 the bus might be at my stop anywhere between 7:35 and 8:20 (note the regular arrival time was 7:45) so you had to be there by 7:30 or risk missing the bus if it came early bc the driver would just take on the kids standing there and be off 2 min later (it came with real consequences there would not be another bus so you could walk and maybe make 2nd period or find an aquantaince to drive you/tramp. 3 to 4 km might not sound much but if there is no real path and you have to scale wine hills through -2 degrees drizzly windy weather with your heavy school bag that can take ages). If it came late then youd just miss school, annoying for 1st period exams but sadly unavoidable. After school there were 2 options either the 6th period bus or the 9th period bus if you missed the one at 13:20 (the one stroke of luck another route had the start time at 13:05 with 13:00 being the end of 6th period) then tough luck you could either walk home or wait until 16:00 for the next and last bus home. The 9th period ended at 16:05 btw so if you had a "nice" teacher that didnt let you leave that was it you had to walk. There were also School organized buses officially just for students but those were only for kids who lived somewhere really far of, or during the last day of school before big holidays (if you were lucky and school admin rembemered to do it) bc then youd be finished after 4th period and there were no buses then if the school didnt organize any. And I finished Gymnasium last year .... . My brother still attends, they still havent changed it. Edit: Just thought of it while reading the comments we only had that one Gymnasium which also incorporated a Realschule (and a boarding school). There was another Private Catholic Girls Realschule in a small town which also had Grund and Hauptschule. One bus drove for everything (on that side of the 15 min radius) but Haupt and Grundschule and the Private school kids werent allowed to take the school organized buses so it could happen that there were to many kids for one bus but there wouldnt be another so youd make it fit seat 3 people on top of each other until the last one just barly squeezed through the door. Even during Covid. *Sorry for the tangents
I think the kids are doing so well because they see your positive attitude towards learning and all things new. Also you put in this much effort to find the right school for them. If parents consistently show that learning and school are important to them, children are more inclined to follow their lead. Speaking from experience, the boys will happily wait for the later bus when they are a bit older to avoid the "babies" from lower grades. I used to have a 30 minute bus ride to school but in the summer we sometimes even rode our bikes to school for nearly an hour because taking the bike was our own decision rather than have the bus foisted on us. You can tell we were rebels without a clue 😋
Question about school buses: I live in a very rural area. We don't have much public transport here. We had school buses from year one to ten. One school bus driving to Grundschule and another one driving to "Orientierungsstufe" and Hauptschule / Realschule and the first four years of Gymnasium (id est year 7 to 10, at the time, while we still had "Orientierungsstufe"). In order to continue with Gymnasium you had to go to another place (a small town in the opposite direction of the village where I attended school from grade 5 to 10 :-) A bus would go to that little town as well, although I had to bike 2 kilometres before reaching the appropriate bus stop. I think this bus was actually a public transport vehicle. But it got used only by pupils. Adults used to drive around in their cars. And the pupils that were allowed to drive would also go by car and take others with them. Even in eleventh grade older pupils would sometimes take me along and sometimes I would go by bus. In grade 12 and 13 I would mostly be driven by car by fellow students or drive myself. This was around millennial times ;-) Sorry about the very extensive answer 😬
I already took public transport when I was in first grade and when I got into 5th grade and started at the Gymnasium, I even had to take two busses to go to school. I luckily never had many problems with being late to school, only once or twice a year when the bus wouldn't come because of "bad weather" (more like 1cm of snow here in Hamburg). For me it was more the Problem, that I always got to school more than 20 minutes before the class started and I always had to wait at least 10 minutes before any of my friends got there. I also had to leave the house at 7am when the school started at 8am.
Your both hair looks really great. Especially Sarah's because you are a "flippy" woman with a flippy family, so it totally fits to your character - I like it a lot!
The schoolyear is divided into two half years. So you'll get a Halbjahreszeugnis, half year school report. Thats probably why your kids dont get graded until February.
The grading system is based on the test scores as well as oral participation. So the Halbjahreszeugnis was always a nice reminder to me how well I participated in the classes.
Okay very good to know! We are always learning from the comments in our videos. It’s so awesome!
Especially in subjects like foreign languages, German and History oral participation counts a great deal.
Eigentlich bewerten wir Schüler folgendermaßen: Klassen 5-6: je drei Klassenarbeiten pro Halbjahr im Mathe, Deutsch, Englisch. Und ein weiteres Fach. Das weitere Fach schreibt nur 2 Klassenarbeiten pro Fach. Ab der 9. Klasse sind es nur 2 Klassenarbeiten für alle Hauptfächer. Dafür sind sie umfangreicher. Weitere Bewertungen in den Hauptfächer: Tests (z. B: Vokabeltests) Projekte und mündliche Mitarbeit (im Unterricht). Die anderen Fächer schreiben Tests oder führen Mappen für Projekte, o.Ä. Für Kinder, die noch die dt. Sprache erlernen müssen, galt eine 2-Jahresfrist, in der sie nicht bewertet werden. Kinder werden quartalsweise bewertet. Zum Halbjahr gibt es Zeugnisse. Mitten im Halbjahr gibt es den Elternsprechtag. Da wird eine Notenübersicht für alle unterrichteten Fächer erstellt und den Eltern vom Klassenlehrer gezeigt. Die Lehrer/innen sprechen dann mit Eltern über den Lernstand/Lernfortschritt der Kinder/Jugendliche. Diese Elternsprechtage vergeben Termine Uhrzeiten, wann man da sein sollte. Manchmal muss man warten, denn es gibt immer viel zu besprechen. Sorry, my English is not the best for this subject.
@@gvicze Danke für die Infos
@@gvicze Aua, da hat man uns damals aber mehr gefordert. Die Faustregel lautete: Wochenstundenzahl = Schulaufgabenzahl. Ein Lateinlehrer war noch etwas schlauer: er hielt noch eine sechste Schulaufgabe ab - für die, die eine versäumt hatten. Für die anderen zählte es als Extemporale.
When I was in Gymnasium - a loooong time ago in some small town in Northrhine-Westphalia - there was this boy from South Africa that came to us in 8th grade. He didn't speak a word of German when he first came but he and his younger sister learned quickly and fit in in no time.
(Decades later, I ran across this guy in Berlin, where I live now. He thanked me over and over again for helping him feel at home during those first weeks and months. I never realized that I had helped him at all, let alone this much. I just sat next to him in class and we became friends, that was all.)
Awe that’s so wonderful that you were able to help him. Just being a friend to a foreigner is a really big deal. We can feel quite lonely and scared at first, so having friends makes a huge difference! ❤️
A lovely story. We arrived here from Greece, it took time to adjust, our kids never complained they understood we had to leave Greece then our kids thrived. I am so impressed by the German system. Very pleased indeed.
@@MyMerryMessyGermanLife When your child goes to a German Gymnasium you carefully should check before if this Gymnasium has a main emphasis: Is your child more a musician/artist (then you should send him/her to a so-called "Waldorfschule", teaching a lot of arts, music and craft), is the child more interested in science (then a Naturwissenschaftliches Gymnasium is suitable) or sports (a special "Sport-Gymnasium" where athletes are trained for a professional sports-career)? If your child is in the wrong emphasis it can give a rude awakening after some years... I was on a very old "Humanitisches Privatgymnasium" (with the emphasis on old languages like Latin, Old-Greek , Old-Hebrew was also possible), luckily I learn languages fairly easy.
TBH the difference is not as big as some make it out to be.
Universities can only expect you to have what is requires at Abitur level, so everyone mostly starts from scratch anyway.
It can be dangerous to start out thinking you know a lot of material already.
@@MyMerryMessyGermanLife Do not send your child to a "Waldorfschule" as another user recommended...! They teach accordingly to an ideology called 'Anthroposophie' which basically is a lot of woo, especially when it comes to technology and the natural sciences, and their history curriculum is basically made up bullshit by their founder that includes Atlantis being real. Many of the so called 'Querdenker' in the South-West have ties to those schools or that ideology. Be aware of that!
You should talk to your "Gemeinderat" about that bus problem. Are there more kids who are in need of this bus? The "Gemeinde" can eventually contact the bus company - at least that happened in my "Gemeinde" when I was a kid and we needed a special bus for getting to our school.
That‘s what I was thinking. Also get the school involved and ask for support.
Okay thank you - we will do that! Great suggestion.
Yes, my region also contracted a bus company to cover extra busses in the morning and afternoon. Only if you missed them, you had to rely on the public ones. But other citizens weren’t banned from them ever.
Taking public transport is quite normal in Germany and often it's school transportation diguised as public transport for financial reasons. BUT hearing you talk about the busses being late...when I went to school we had the same issue and eventually parents complained because 1. your kids have a right to education and that is being hindered if they cannot get to school on time. 2. Your kids also HAVE to be in school and cannot be due to poorly organized transportation. 3. Several students being constantly late impacts the education and progress of all other students in their class.
Given that there is only one bus in the morning, maybe think about taking this up with the school and the transportation provider.
For my kids we had to fight for a change of schedule because the were not able to catch the bus on time for the way home.
As mentioned in my comment. When my siblings and I went to school, we had the same issue with coming late to school. I remember that there had been some sort of agreement, that, if we had waited at least 15 minutes for the bus, we had to call the school secretary, to inform them that the bus didn´t show up, and we could go home. This has usually been an issue in winter. There had been many cases, where the bus operator informed us. There used to be a small shop close to the bus stop in our village. So, if they knew they were late, they called them, and kindly asked the shop owner to inform us.
Great suggestion, thank you. We will contact them!
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@@muesztaerrieh Same thing for me in the 1980s in a small village: it was minus 20 degrees Celsius and lots of fresh snow, and the elder children told us: we’d have to wait for maximum 1h, and if the bus didn’t come, we would go home. An older woman living right next to the bus stop saw the dozen children out in the cold and let us in and made tea and gave us some Christmas cookies she had made, so we wouldn’t have to wait out in the cold, and in the end we went home and enjoyed our free day, because the bus never came, and nobody was reprimanded, because we had waited the usual time, and lots of buses didn’t arrive that day (- pretty much an act of God / a case of force majeure (“höhere Gewalt”) due to weather).
"School bus" is an American thing. In Europe I would not generally expect the concept, except for children with special needs. As you had to come to the rescue and helped another child out, are there enough children in the village to start child pooling? I mean, if each day another parent could do the duties for 5 or 6 of them, that might work. Note the daily trips on PT with school friends has a developmental side as well. Nice video. Nice hair, you two :) - the dark chestnut brown is really cute and how it was modeled too.
Yeah carpooling is a good idea! And yeah you’re right about how taking the bus allows the kids to make friends. Our boys were just invited to another kids’ house on Friday, and he was a kid they met on the bus!
I lived in a village with NO public transportation. So yes, school buses do exist in Germany as well.
Dependng on how far they live from school. In my secondary school back then there were kids that lived in up to 15km distance, so for those who could not walk there was buses to collect and drop them to their villages and towns
@@MyMerryMessyGermanLife Germans don't really do carpooling to get their children to school and back again.
If you're a kid in Germany and need to get anywhere, you generally either walk, ride a bike or take public transportation. Dedicated school buses exist (especially in rural areas), but aren't the rule. How far do you live from the school?
There are no super special yellow buses like in the US. But regular bus companies run buses at certain times that are really only used by students. They may even have some sign designating them as a school bus
The reason why they are Gastschüler until February probably is because this is the time that marks half of the school year.
At that time, they also get their "Halbjahreszeugnisse" (=half-year-reports, which are not that important, but gibe an overview of the grades achieved in the previous months)
(They usually get a Halbjahreszeugnis and at the end of each school year, a Jahreszeugnis. The Jahreszeugnis, includes the marks of the whole school year and they are now crucial for being able to move to the next grade).
Therefore, since they are Gastschüler, they are not under pressure because of the Halbjahreszeugnis, they get the chance to have a "fresh start" when half of the school year is over and only get their marks of the second half-year counted for their Jahreszeugnisse.
... & Schönen 1. Advent!💫🕯❄
Such a helpful comment, thank you!
One of the things I love about your channel (Note: just one of many!) is that your intros feature so much of the beauty of German nature. Thank you.
Oh I’m glad you like that part! It’s my favorite thing to film.
I grew up in a rural area in Germany (Baden-Württemberg), where pupils were supposed to commute to school by public transport. It usually worked very well for those who came by train, but service was always rather dodgy for those who had to take the bus. After a year or so, most pupils started to ride their bikes to school, even the ones that lived pretty far sway. They would ride in big groups, at least from spring to autumn.
Good to know! Yeah that would work well in the spring and autumn. But we need the bus during the winter. It’s so icy around here. Hmm, okay we can talk to the other parents.
Glad to hear that you have found the right school for everyone of your kids. My kids are half-American and experienced both American elementary schools and elementary school, Gymnasium and Realschule and FOS in Bavaria.
I absolutely love your videos - it reminds me of all the „cultural shocks“ I had when we lived in the U.S.
You’re such a positive open-minded family interested in other cultures.
That’s why I always look forward to seeing your updates of your life in Bavaria.
Viele liebe Grüße aus der Nähe von Nürnberg!
Hallo Carola! Thank you so much, we’re so glad you enjoy our videos. And so cool that you’ve also experienced culture shocks - it’s something that’s hard to relate to unless you’ve lived in another country!
Lp
Leider
@@MyMerryMessyGermanLife I went to kindergarten, 1st and the first part of 2nd grade in New York State. Then my family moved to Northern Germany. Our tiny village school there had one classroom, one teacher and about thirty-five pupils grades 1 - 8. Oh boy - culture shocks galore!
Oh Wow someone else from Bavaria! I grew up and went to school in a small town called Schwabach, you probably know of it being that it’s only 20Km outside of Nürnberg 🙂
@@emmaonthefarm1085 yes, that’s pretty much around the corner 👍😊
I took the train to Gymnasium every morning. I got up at 5am and my dad drove me to the train station on top of the 30min train ride. In the town of my school I then had to walk up a little hill for around 15min. But I loved to have time with all my friends on my way and I loved my Gymnasium.
Hope you have a great day!
Greetings from Salzburg
I truly commend you for the choice of holding back giving kids smartphones, I have a kid in my family that already is kind of addicted and not even 8 years old. But I also think that a cellphone is really needed when starting the 5th grade, it's just part of being a part of society and more importantly like you stated ensures that the kids and you can stay in contact, wherever they are. I got mine in the 5th class and that was 2007 when mobile phone still were pretty basic, but honestly I'm really glad I didn't have this brain-rewiring distraction device of a smartphone that I use today. I think it helps staying focused on other parts in life and let's the brain enough free space to "unfold" and mature. Sure, neural stimuli and consuming media are important but IMO boredom is quite underestimated for its value of generating ideas/creativity. From what I've seen and heard from you so far, I really appreciate your openminded-ness and approach to parenting!
At least in my part of Germany, people also "shop around" for a Gymnasium they like. In my city, we had four Gymnasiums, each with a slighty different focus. At one, you'd have more math classes and start younger with sciences like chemistry, while I took additional classes in arts at my Gymnasium. About a year before changing shools, there would be "Tag der offenen Tür", where students could visit the different schools (usually with their parents). Then, you'd apply centrally, giving your top two choices and cross your fingers ;)
Okay good to know! It seems to be the same here in southern Bayern. People shop around to find the best fit.
Tag der öffnen Tür was really important. Mostly for the focus of a school/Gymnasium. We had like 4 schools (3 Gymansien and 1 Gesamtschule) I watched the lessons and for me I choose the secondary school with focus on languages. I actually am really happy about it, because the other two were rather muscial/mathematician focus and science focus.
I f.ex. was in a bilingual class (that's how it was called back than - 20 years ago) where I had French as major (5 school hours per week in 5th class) and English as 2nd foreign language (3 school hours per week in 5th class). As I was in a bilingual class with the focus on French, in later school years we had like some Nebenfächer in French (history, politics and geography - continuously till grade 10, 3 hours per week). We also had many chances at our Gymnasium to speak English and French- we had a partner school in the UK and in France. The English classes even had the opportunity of an exchange to UK in 7th grade (2 weeks) and our French focus class had an exchange to Toulouse in 6th grade (3 weeks).
And the exchange students than also came to Germany the next year. The exchange was only pupils and I think 3 teachers (just FYI because you had a video about self reliance and independence of children jn Germany) and we had assigned host families. Before going to Toulouse we were Pen pals with the French students of the partner school. In Mittelstufe we had a Model European Parliament project where representatives of European countries stayed here in Germany for I think 2 weeks recreating the European Parliament and the EU in general. We hosted a Beitish and Greek representative.
And as Germans are often much influenced by Hollywood and the Englis-speaking media, we had so many chances to improve English during that time. Also from grade 10-11 many pupils had the chance of doing a year or half a year abroad - most pupils at that time went to English-speaking countries (USA, Canada, Australia or New Zealand were in the leading spots back than).
In the Mittelstufe we also had some more English hours per week and we could pick Wahlfächer: f.ex. music/arts, Religion/ethics and Spanish/Latin. So since grade 8 I even had Latin and could take my Latinum at grade 12th. It's not the biggest use nowadays but for me- as I like Roman languages - it was good.
At the end of my school "carrier" aka Oberstufe I had my majors in French and English and could almost drop all of the Naturwissenschaften (except biology and maths - maths unfortunately wasn't optional). For me this was a blessing because the sciences (physics and chemistry) I actually hated during school - I know Kevin is an engineer, so for you that might not be understandable - so I was glad just to take biology (which was more like learning by heart) and maths.
For the language I could take in Einführungsphase (grade 11) even Spanish. But unfortunately because I already had 2 foreign languages as major in grade 12th and 13th and Latin on top I actually had to drop Spanish after grade 11. But with the background of Latin and French I started improving my Spanish during my vocational education phase (berufliche Ausbildungsphase) and as I started working in 2017, since than I learned and am still learning Italian - the Latin I had in school is a real advantage here😊
So to conclude, I think it's really important to know the abilities and maybe the "strengths" of your kids and choose the school according to that.
Well sure it was also a big advantage for me to have a few classmates of my Grundschule in class. But my than BFF went to a Gesamtschule because of her grades - she didn't fit (according to grades) the Gymnasialniveau.
I'm a German with Korean roots (one of my parent came to Germany jn the 80s and stayed here; I do speak fluently Korean) and our class was really diverse for that time because we had many children from French-speaking countries. Actually our school had a good diverse mixture.... So yeah, just wanted to share this.
I love your videos. For me it's always helpful to learn and improve my English and your clips are so interesting and as you don't have a strong accent it's so cool to watch them. Keep up👍🏻👍🏻
P.S.: So yeah, it's actually 4 languages I can fluently converse (German - 1st native language, Korean - 2nd native language; English and French - foreign language I'm able to fluently converse) and 2 I have the basics which are good for holiday use (Spanish, Italian)
Me again: I remember that we had a French girl who came to Germany in grade 6. As her parents were both French, she had to adjust in a functioning class community and had also the language barrier. But I remember that when she was in grade 8 she really was fluent in German with a little French accent. So I think your kids will adapt pretty fast.❤
When my younger son started taking the bus by himself, he got lost several times, too. And he was extremly scared, too.
I talked to him and we made a plan, what he could do in such a situation (in that time kids didn't have phones, yet): He should watch out for a trustworthy adult and explain the situation. So, the adult could tell him in which direction to go.
Of course the first thing your kids should do when getting lost is calling you. But I think a plan b could give them some more confidence.
Maybe when you make sightseeing trips, occasually you could ask people for the right way. Because of the great navigation tools we have today probably children haven't experienced such situations with their parents very often.
That’s a good idea to have a plan B!
That’s so true. With smartphones we don’t really ask for directions anymore. It could be a strange concept to kids. I never thought about that.
I guess a solution without smartphone could be a local map. Seems a little outdated, maybe, but nevertheless effective. A small one just showing the area right around the school should be sufficient. Back in the days "before smartphone navigation", situations having to ask for the right way were pretty scarce as well, at least in my experience. Maybe the expectations of finding your destination were lower, always getting right were you want to go on your first try without ever having looked at any map at all was sheer dumb luck. And even with a map, you might not have found what you wanted right away, depending on the quality of the map... fun times ;) it was basically more laid back, because navigation did not have to be perfect. I mean, I don't expect everybody to find their way just by looking at a map at home and following it in their mind - you can always print it out, maybe buy one or even get one for free at a tourist information or town hall. (opportunities vary greatly from my experience)
That reminds me of my cousin (in the 1970s), who went to the police station that was luckily nearby to explain that she missed her bus station *.
The policemen were: a) so nice to call us and b) explain to her how to get back to our part of town and told us which bus she is now taking.
* The old express bus system required you to press the stop button in any case, otherwise the bus would simply drive through if no one wanted to get off or get on at the station.
Our younger child went to school in the next big city and luckily the older schoolmates were always helpful when
for example the route was blocked and everyone had to find another way. When our child was one of the elders, they looked after the younger ones as well. (Abitur 2010)
@@MyMerryMessyGermanLife Children here are usually trained not to ask "anybody" on the street for help when they are in trouble, but rather to go to a shop and ask the salespeople there. It's kind of a security issue. I don't want to scare you, but children approaching strangers on the street are more likely to be exploited than children asking a clerk in a store for help. I am very sorry that your kids had this bad experience with the busses. The American school bus system also has advantages. Other than that, they look super cool!
I had to use the public Bus. it is quite normal in Germany. I had no problems during my school time because the bus schedule was very good. In the morning there was a bus every 7 minutes. I live in a 15.000 citizens "big" Gemeinde in Hessen. I think it depends where you life and how the local politics do their homework with building up a good infrastructure. Bavaria is special even for Germans. It is like a totally different country inside Germany. Beautiful but not representing Germany as a whole
I would question if there is one "Bundesland" representing the whole of germany, not even Hessen...i mean, isnt that a beautiful part of the federal system? different places coming together?
@@Max_Winters yeah from what we’ve learned about Germany, it’s quite diverse between the different Bundesländer.
Yeah our bus system is due to the fact that we live in such a small village. A drawback to smaller places!
@@MyMerryMessyGermanLife i think if your school sees your children coming in late from that only bus in the morning they will ask the operator themselves, because its not your kids fault. you know we had that topic in Gymnasium every single day, when school started.. oh they are late because of the train/bus. school and village/town/local authorities will help out.
German way of growing up, you learn from expirience an become more independent.
They’re probably starting to grade your kids in February because the second semester starts then. At least this is the case for me as I’m currently doing an exchange in England.
Yes, in Germany, the school year is divided into two semesters (Halbjahre) and now your sons have one semester to get a grip on the system and at the start of the new semester they will start to get grades.
I had to take the train to go to the Gymnasium. We were 6 kids from my village who went to the same class (3 boys and 3 girls). One day we got on the wrong train, it was an express train and did not stop in our village. We stood by the door ready to disembark and when the train did not stop one of the boys started to panic and started crying. The conductor came and gave him some sweets and calmed him down and told him we could just take the next train back and he was going to show us where to go. He also taught us how to recognize the Express train on the time table. I still remember when I saw our regular stop flying by I immediately started working out how to get back. I was about 12 at the time.
I just love the community mindset here in Germany and how adults will help kids when they see them struggling. It’s something we don’t have much of in the US anymore, mainly due to the whole infrastructure being based on cars!
My kids take public transportation to gymnasium. There is no “school bus”. The bus runs every 10 minutes at peak times, every 20 at off peak times, so the kids can take the bus at which ever time they want. Every line also has an E(xtra) bus around the time when most kids get out of school. We have about 8 Gymnasium and 5 Realschule, x Gesamtschulen….in the city so kids going to a further school or have to switch to the tram, take an earlier bus. Also the older the kids, the later the bus they take so they can sleep to the last minute and run into class before the bell. lol
In my opinion 5th is super easy as is 6th. A lot more subjects are introduced in 7th. 8th is ok 9th is pretty tough, 10th is ok again. And from what I hear and have seen so far, 11this difficult again and 12th not quite so bad again however the stress of Abi Prüfungen is real. So I think for your kids coming in at grades 5 and 6 it is optimal to get them right up to speed. They are smart kids and will do amazingly well, I’m sure.
The stories you told about your kids taking public transportation totally took me back to when I was in Realschule! I grew up in a tiny village, so the public transportation sucked. The busses were late pretty much every time, sometimes, on the way back home, the bus got too full and the bus couldn't stop at our bus stop anymore because there were too many kids (and the next bus wouldnt come for the next two hours). Once, eleven years old, I got dropped off at a completely different station because of road construction that I have never seen before and he just dropped me off. Cried for an hour until I rang at some strangers house to ring my parents (my parents gave me a phone for the exact same reason you did, but right in that second, it was dead!). so the experiences of your kids kinda made me chuckle a little bit because apparently it is very common but oh dear, let me tell you, i absolutely hate busses and i am 23 now, but you wont find me in a bus very often now :D
Oh how sad you cried for an hour! It can be so scary as a kid. And good to know the public transportation was bad in your small town, too.
About "sitting around just to wait for the bus"... I never had to use the bus, but most kids in my class had to. They usually used the time to start homework together (or, of course, sometimes just hang around, eat,...). Sometimes I was even jealous, because most days I "had" to go home immediately after school. So maybe this is another aspect of self-responsibility: use the time in some way.
Yes! I was glad sometimes when we missed the bus and could hang out in the caferteia and do our homework
I love how you put so much effort in understanding how everything works here and it's beautiful to see how you embrace the culture and how respectful you are. It's hard work and I can imagine how difficult it is with four kids, but it will pay out in the end.
Haircut looks fantastic, btw!
Thank you so very much! Your comment means so much to us.
I'm Bavarian too and yes, it's public transport everywhere. I was often 5-10 min late. Oh but wait for winter when it snows. But weirdly enough it was never an issue. You kinda get there when you get there.
I'm so happy that your boys are feeling welcomed and happy now. I used to work as a school social worker at a Mittelschule and it's definitely more of a "social issue" environment.
And about February - we call it Halbjahr. You even get a Zeugnis called Halbjahreszeugnis, so you know where you are at.
It’s such a relief for us that they’re doing well now. Whew! One big huge hurdle crossed!
Thank you so much for this! My family is moving to Germany in June. I lived in Germany in the 80s, but I was a kid then. I'm just starting to learn all of the things I need to know as a parent. When I lived there I was a military kid, so I went to school on base. I visited the local Gymnasium to see where some of my friends went to school, but never had the pleasure of going myself. You videos are going to really put my kids fears at ease.
Hi! I am looking through all these videos and if you ended up moving. We have four children as well and are always considering a move. My oldest is 12 so it feels like it's now or never. Specifically scared about the school aspect. I see a lot of these videos are older, would love to get in touch with people that are like minded and on the same journey.
Another interesting video, thank you. If children are lost in a city they can look for the sign Notinsel in shops and get help.
Never heard of that🤔
School Buses are so rare in Germany. We use the city bus
I think there are usually dedicated school buses in areas where you don’t have a lot of public transportation.
At my Gymnasium there were a number of school busses that brought the children from the surrounding villages to the Gymnasium and back.
Yeah that makes sense. I think we have 5-7 kids from our town that go to the same gymnasium as our boys, so there’s just not a huge demand for the buses to make it worth their time.
@@MyMerryMessyGermanLife It can be really difficult if you live in a rural area and the school is in a different town. You might consider contacting other kids' parents and trying to organize a car pool. Might be difficult, however, if school days end at different times for each kid. On the other hand, I found that getting familiar with German public transport and dealing with interrupted and unreliable services helped me to learn self-reliance. And in those days (70s), nobody had phones. ;-)
The Italian system is so similar, and I started taking the public bus in middle school at 11yo. Where I am from there was a bus every 30 minutes, a couple more during rush hour for students and workers. And I'm 35 now, and I got my first old Nokia phone at 12 for the same reasons you gave it to your children
Oh really! Good to know it’s similar in Italy!
Thanks so much for putting out part II.
As expected, this was way too short for me again. But I don't complain.
I find it amazing how much effort you put in the quality of your videos - be it subtitles, or dividing into chapters. You rarely ever get to see that elsewhere. And not to mention the excellent camera work. That's the icing on the cake.
What amazes me the most is that you managed to find such a perfect fit for ALL of you, be it your place of residence, work, schools, nature, just everything. And him happy you find such a good school for your oldest, and likely also for the younger ones later on.
Thank you so much for your kind comments. I do work very hard on these videos and it’s so nice when it’s noticed. 😍
@@MyMerryMessyGermanLife and soon you can add subtitles German and French too, and stock up your boys' pocket money for this ;)
@@furzkram oh I do usually have the German subtitles up but on this video I forgot!
@@MyMerryMessyGermanLife I wasn't criticizing, I just thought your boys would like a little side job maybe ... ;-)
@@MyMerryMessyGermanLife I can only agree: Great, interesting, well-produced videos that I am always looking forward to watching. 🥰
11:28 A little tip for your learning German:
"Deutsch" = the German language itself (e.g. "ich lerne Deutsch", "Deutsch als Zweitsprache", "Deutsch als zweite Sprache")
"Deutsche" = a female German person (e.g. "sie ist (eine) Deutsche")
"Deutscher" = a male German person (e.g. "er ist (ein) Deutscher")
"deutsch(e(n/r/s))" = general adjective for something that is German (only capitalized in proper nouns or start of sentence/phrase)
(e.g. "ich trinke deutschen Wein", "er besucht eine deutsche Schule", "es gab deutsches Essen", "die deutsche Kultur erleben")
Also:
"Gast" = guest
"Gastschule" = host school
"Gastschüler" = guest student (for college: "Gaststudent")
😊
So glad to hear the boys are enjoying their new experience at Gymnasium so far! ☺️
Re: busses. I think that might vary. I went to school in a rural, very thinly populated part in Lower Saxony. Since I lived in the town that had the local Gymnasium and Realschule I didn’t take the bus, but many of my friends who lived in smaller towns and villages did. If I recall correctly there were dedicated school buses that ran to the school for first and second period and back after 5th, 6th and 8th. I believe this was because the regular busses ran only a few times during the day and wouldn’t be able to service that huge number of students during certain times. Also because there was such a huge number of students from surrounding towns that had to go to Realschule or Gymnasium in my town it probably was the most sensible and economic solution for the Bezirk. If there had been several other school options within 25km range this might not have been the case.
Same regulation as when I went to school. The public transport bus ran seldom and didn’t stop anywhere near the gymnasium. So there were coaches doing the school tour. They were overcrowded and the pupils at my bus station- we were the last to be picked up - had to stand. Which wasn’t fun if the driver decided to break hard, since a coach has nothing which you can grab…
@@claudiakarl7888 oh man! That’s rough!
@@MyMerryMessyGermanLife It gave you survival instincts. Especially taking into account that our school bus driver most of the time was the senior boss of the coach corporation the school rented the coaches from. And his eyesight wasn’t the best anymore… 😉
Sorry, I am a little bit late to the party - but something caught my eye: When you compared US and German subjects, you compared „local language“ and „foreign language“ - however in Germany we have two foreign languages at the gymnasium (English and French at your sons‘ school). In the US those 6th graders only have English classes, their local language. 1 language (in tthe US) vs. 3 languages (local language + 2 foreign languages) in Germany. I might be biased but I find it pretty cool that in Germany we get to learn so many languages.
Re.: Pottery in art class - these type of classes will have some kind of "themes" per semsters e.g. 6th grade pottery class, next year sketching, water color in 8th grade and so on. Same Sport/P.E.- baketball in 6th grade, gymnastics in 7th, athletics in 8th, etc.
Im very happy your child got to know someone before attending gymnasium. I attended foreign schools (UK, Philippines) before coming to germany and I didnt know anyone. And I can tell you - it was HARD. Teachers can sometimes be ''sub-optimal" for this kind of situation, especially when your guys/gals are more introvert. Make sure they get a friend or two, and be supportive when things do not go well. They may not occasionly, but its rarely your kids fault
Yes! It’s harder for introverts to make friends.
I actually teach German as a second language at my school here in Lower Saxony. We don't have to give grades to our DaZ students for 2 years. The rule is that they don't need to get grades in subjects that require good German language skills to succeed. So we usually grade them in subjects like music and arts but not in German, science or social studies.
Okay very good to know! That’s very fair and reasonable. Do you teach for a Gymnasium?
@@MyMerryMessyGermanLife I teach at a Gesamtschule. But I used to teach at a Realschule before and we did the same. I'm not sure about the rules in Bavaria but maybe you can look into it.
@@MyMerryMessyGermanLife I teach German as a second language at a Gymnasium in North Rhine-Westfalia and we've got the same 2 years without grades - rule plus support in learning German. Additionally, if parents elaborate on their children's good skills and grades in previous schools, it's no problem to be accepted at the Gymnasium (for a two year test phase).
I always feel sorry for you being in the state with the strictest rules in Germany in your situation.
@@wissensdigger6717 yes, so do I, and it sometimes makes me angry - but that's Bavaria 🤔
Wait, DaZ is actually a thing? I was only aware of DaF.
Live and learn!
God, Bavaria is so gorgeous. So happy for y'all!
Fellow US southerner here moving to Frankfurt in May. I have been binging all your vids to prep for my move. Thank you so much always for making them!
Usually there are normal City busses with routes optimised to cover schools and in the morning when school starts they are filled with pupils. Depending on the place, if you're in school or even uni, you get a public transit pass that either covers the whole local network or is tailored to cover only your typical ride from home to school.
I grew up in Austria though, and my gymnasium was a fancy one on a hill far outside the city. It was serviced by an intercity bus that had a route optimised for student pickup from the main city, via small villages to the gymnasium up the hill, with a timetable around the schools schedule. It was a normal intercity bus though, and occasionally one or two adults on their way to God-knows-where would get on in a village. The volume of all conversations suddenly dropped with an adult present, and we all showed our best behaviour (it was a Catholic school) Looking back it feels quite amusing.
We are a Chilean-German family of 5 that has just arrived to Bayern, near Erlangen, three weeks ago. You have no idea how great has been to watch your videos, specially the ones about schooling!
Our oldest daughter, who speaks only a few words in German, is in 7th grade and we visited the local Gymnasium to talk to the principal about her situation. It was exactly as you mentioned, "no, she cannot come to the Gymnasium, she has to go to Mittelschule and then apply in one or two years". No alternatives, no help. It was literally a slap in the face and we felt terrible feeling that her education was being compromised.
While looking for a solution, we found about the InGym project, which is a path for foreign kids with educational background similar to the Gymnasium to get into one in Germany. Tomorrow we have the final meeting, hopefully everything ends well.
Thank you so much for your videos, inspiration and courage!
Oh wow, yeah, gosh literally had the same exact experience as us! But this InGym project sounds really cool. I hope that works out for you.
@@MyMerryMessyGermanLife well, it worked!! She passed the exams and will star the 6 months integration program at a Gymnasium in Nuremberg and after that she will be transferred to our local Gymnasium. It is a great alternative for foreign kids!!
I was really looking forward to this episode and hearing about how your sons are doing at Gymnasium. I did think they would be fine. Yes, some students find Gymnasium too much of a challenge, but many do not. So glad you are all settling down as far as Gymnasium is concerned!
We are, too! Whew! One big huge hurdle crossed. We’re so happy they’re doing well for now.
You two are so wholesome and even though my husband and I don’t even have kids, we do live in Germany (I’m Canadian, he’s German), and I enjoy hearing from other people who have moved here about how they overcome their challenges. Good for your kids for being able to learn so much in such little time! Kids are so adaptable that way. PS love the hair - you’re one of those lucky people that a lot of different hair styles look good on because your hair has so much body 👩🏻🦱💁🏻♀️💇🏻♀️
I don't think school busses are a thing in Germany. As for Berlin we just have city busses as well and I never heard of dedicated school busses from friends that grew up in different places of Germany either. Funny thing: we did have specific busses who took us once a week to the nearby swimming hall for our swimming class (which is mandatory in Germany in different grades). If some of the classmates live in the same town maybe you could organize a "parant taxi"? It's possible there are parents who drive their own kids on a daily basis and would be able to pick up your kids as well (at least in the morning, because (like you already know😉) classes can finish at different times for each class). Thanks for sharing your experiences and struggles with us! It's so interesting and informative to get another perspective on everything. I hope you know you are doing a great job with everything so far👍
Well, there are bus runs specifically for school, but anybody can buy a ticket to use it too.
@@ThePixel1983 in NRW children get a Ticket for a year without paying. Depends from the Distance
@@Miristzuheiss Yeah, that's what it was like in northern Bavaria too.
I was in “middle school”, then known as “Junior High School” in the 1960’s. Our ages were 13 to 15. Even in those “early” years of my life, I knew that I wanted to experience cultures further away than Mexico, which was only 10 miles away from where I lived in Southern California. My parents had only recently crawled into the bottom of the US middle class and I was the first female in both my mother’s and my father’s families to graduate from high school. My truly genius 16 year old idea to achieve my wish was that I would become an international airline stewardess. So I studied French. Understand that in those years “authority”, represented by teachers, doctors, politicians, etc, stood so far above any “ordinary” human being, that their decisions were nearly ever questioned. So when my high school counselor told me that I was “too intelligent” to become an airline stewardess I believed him. French for nothing except the possibility to enter college. So when I actually did live in Paris France, my French was so uncertain that I believed that I was incompetent. And arrogant Parisians were only too eager to confirm that I was right. Trust me, just like everywhere in any country, there are people who desperately need to be right. Due to my circumstances of being in Paris (as a partner to a Vice President of Apple Computer), my “status” was constantly challenged. Exactly because I had never before been evaluated on the grounds of a relationship, I became uncertain of my own worth when evaluated from an international unknown standard. What I eventually understood is that there are Parisians who perceive themselves as “upper class” who have this need to be special. I loathed Paris for many years because of the prejudice I encountered in those first months. Eventually I learned to separate those first experiences of specific people from the awesome experience of the city. From urbane Paris I then moved to the countryside of Northern Germany. My partner then is German and she wanted to live closer to her family. She worked in Paris during the week and then flew home to Northern Germany on the weekends. I lived in the house she had bought there which was being renovated. The experience of living in a house built in the 1800’s which was receiving a new thatched roof was extraordinary and delightful. The mice in the kitchen, not so much. Whew! Didn’t intend to write so much. Yeah, culture shock. Paris, Northern German countryside and for the last 25 years, Sweden. And despite all of the trauma of my first years in Europe, I am daily grateful to be here 35 years later. Bless you for granting your children the wonderful possibilities of experiencing other cultures within the safety of a loving and supportive family! ❤️🙏
I grew up in Berlin. Big city. In the 70s I walked to my Grundschule alone when I was 6 yo. In the 80s I took my bike to go to my Gymnasium when I was 12. No school bus. No Ted Bundy.
So nice to hear your perspective. We went to the USA for a short while and also had different perspectives. The bus story with the construction side was hilarious. In the USA it is stranger danger concept everywhere. Here in Western Europe strangers are just people around you who might help you to solve a problem. So we learn our children whom to address and what to ask. It is such a different approach isn’t it.
My 2 cents from Austria: Here in Vienna there actually are school buses! They are from the American school and the Vienna International School. :-) Besides from that, it’s normal to take public transportation to school. My older son is in 5th grade now too and his commute is 30 minutes by tram and train (yes, including change at a big and busy station). We practiced with him several times before the school started and yes, we also bought him a phone. But it’s amazing how quickly children adapt to new situations and how they grow with the challenges.
11:40 In großen Städten gibt es häufig so genannte Vorbereitungsklassen, auch an Gymnasien
WhatsApp has a "Send live location for x minutes" feature, so next time they get lost, you can track them in real time and nudge them into the right location.
The bus situation is annoying. I guess it is less problematic when you grow up in a city, but good that they manage to become self reliant! Great parenting :)
Oh a good feature! Thanks for letting us know about that. That’s right - the bus situation was difficult but it was a great lesson in self-reliance and independence for the boys.
@@MyMerryMessyGermanLife the kids needs a phone with a good battery life then
A big Hello to my favourite American family!
I'm from Graz, Austria, which is the 2nd biggest city with a population of 280.000. Graz has a lot of schools and even 4 universities. There are no dedicated school buses at all - not even for elementary schools. Everybody walks or takes the public transport except the really posh kids which are chauffeured with private cars. In the country there are general school-buses which have fixed routes - but only if there is no public bus or train service.
About Gymnasium: I also attended a Gymnasium (scientific branch) here in Graz and I loved it. At the beginning I wanted to become an airplane engineer (this was the time Concorde was developed) but then I ended up in University studying the Law... And now I´m an attorney to criminal law which I love doing. The education in Gymnasium kept all future paths open until it was the right time for me to decide where to go next. You made the right decision for your kids to offer them an education which allows them to choose whatever further career path they will take in the future.
Hi from Austria 👋 I don't know, if the school system is exactly the same in Bavaria, but for the "no Grades until February" question it might work like here: our school-year has two terms: Winter (mid September- mid February) and summer (mid February - end June/ begin of july) wirh one week break between these two.
At the end of the first term, you'll get a "school-message" with all grades your kid(s) "earned" (normally a mixture of their test/ schularbeit grades and the amount of their engagement during classes/Mitarbeit). This is only an information to check, how your child(ren) is (are) doing at school. (And to maybe "motivate" them to work a little bit more on a specific class 😉)
At the end of the second term, you'll get the final school report, which is important to level up to the next grade.
The bus story is a great example of showing how kids learn from new situations. They got lost and managed to navigate their way with your help. Also next time they might be brave enough to ask a stranger for help, thanks to that construction worker. This builds confidence for all new situations. The kids learn to think about several approaches they could try before using the phone as backup plan.
As I could remember, when I was in my Realschule, we had every year at the start of the new schoolyear a church sevice in a church near the school.
After that the schoolyear started well.
It was in Baden-Württemberg in a porotestant church in a katholic town
Late January/early February is when the Halbjahr (half year , semester) ends and children get their interim report cards. They will probably only count your sons' grades from the second Halbjahr this year.
Beautiful couple! Beautiful family! 💖💖💖
Can confirm that the bus situation was the most stressful part about going to Gymnasium. I grew up in a very small village and we only had two busses going through our village in the morning (one that arrived at school for 1. Stunde and one for 2. Stunde) and I often got to class late. The few busses going after school didn't even stop in our village, so I had a 20-minute walk on top of 30-minute bus ride where I often didn't even have a place to sit because it was so crammed. I remember it being very stressful and exhausting. I was so happy when I got a discman and was at least able to retreat into my inner world a little. But I still loved Gymnasium for all the input and intellectual challenges it offered me, so it was worth it :)
Nice shoots at the beginning, amazing. And you have arrived in Germany, you struggle with the same situations as we struggle with. Gymnasium is a hard school, our child is there too. She say it's hard, but she want stay there and so she has to study a lot for her own. And she realize for herself, it' s for her future life. But we are in the good situation, the school is only 800m away, not 25km. Stay awesome again.
It is completely normal for school kids to take public transport in Germany. I did it from year 1 - 13 myself.
One thing you might not know about is Volkshochschule or Zweiter Bildungsweg. It is basically an evening school where you can get every school degree even later in life. In my Bundesland it is even free of charge but that maybe is different for other states. I myself went to it to get a degree in my early twentys because of personal problems back at normal school age.
Very cool! I didn’t know about this.
@@MyMerryMessyGermanLife Volkshochschulen also offer a great variety of art courses for enthusiasts and hobbyists, like for example photography, graphic design, video editing , painting etc. ...
they also offer really good good german courses specially designed for adult expats and immigrants
Germany is very good at providing additional ways to get a school degree outside of traditional school. And opening up Uni and FHs to people without an Abitur.
educated people at any age have a higher rate of success looking for jobs. should be obvious. Unfortunately, here in the US they make the people pay for their own education. no job training from the Arbeitsamt... lot's of private universities and to pay for tradeschools here in the US. At the same time it is often easier here to get a job without the prerequisite education. If you can get the job, and you can do the work. Not so easy in Germany.
The German school year is divided into two halves; since in Bavaria the school year began in mid-September, the first half end in February. That is why your two sons are at school as guest students until the half-year. After that - and this is my assumption now - you will be allowed to decide together with the school whether your sons are at the right school.
The both of you are such great team. You did so much to improve your sons German skills! I am totally convinced that they will make it. Please stay commited and awesome! I keep my fingers crossed for all of your kids!
Danke, euch auch einen schönen 1. Advent.
I love your new haircut. My hair is below my waist. I just keep mine in a dirty bun to manage it. I am an online private English grammar and writing tutor for two girls who lived for a few years in the US. The oldest is in the 6th grade in Gymnasium. The school system here is very different from the US. It is interesting to talk with her before our tutor sessions about what she is learning in her English classes here in Germany. Great video. Thank you for sharing.
Thank you! So cool you’re a German tutor to two German girls!
Hallo, liebe Marry, Ihr seid wirklich ganz wunderbare, vorbildliche Eltern mit so viel aufrichtiger beglückender Liebe und guter Ideen zur allerbesten Entwicklung Euerer zauberhaften Kinder!
Viele unserer deutschen Landsleute unterstützen Euch mit ihren besten Gedanken und aufrichtigen Gebeten, daß Ihr Euch weiterhin in unserem schönen Deutschland so gut entwickeln und glücklich leben könnte!
In Zukunft wißt Ihr, daß Ihre immer aller Anschläge am Schwarzen-Brett der Schule sorgfältig lesen müßt, um auf dem aktuellen Stand der Organisation zu sein!
Auch wir als Deutsche Familie hatten es nach unserem Umzug in den Bayerischen-Wald sehr schwer, da es hier leider nicht üblich ist mit den Neubürgern mitzudenken und ihnen das Leben zu erleichtern, ehern im Gegenteil, nach dem bösen Motto: "Wir haben Euch nicht gerufen, geht dahin zurück, wo ihr hergekommen seid!" - Wurde mir hier von einem Lehrer wörtlich so ins Gesicht geschrieen!
I grew up in Berlin and it's like you said, more public transportation, so no reason for school buses. But what you say about the buses throws me back to my childhood xD I needed to take two buses to school and especially in winter, bus missed / canceled / too late in the morning: Sprinting back home to wake Dad that he's taking you to school, or in the afternoon in the winter, walking somewhere in the dark in a strange area, because there is "replacement rail traffic". But you learn and yes, cell phones help immensely! The change from elementary school to Gymnasium was a similar experience for me as it was for your boys: finally I can fit in! so many great friends with similar interests and great teachers who assume you want to learn.
Yeah. Being German is not easy. What else is new.
I’m your mirror image. A German family in the US. You’re blessed.
It is also normal for school kids to ask random people on the street for help and usually people help if they can.
I'm from Rheinland Pfalz and finished Gymnasium in 2020. The Bus problem was normal. In the begiining it got so bad, that parents complained and then it got better for a while, but then they just changed the schedule, so the Bus wasn't "late" as much.... And then most of the time I had like 5-8 min to go like 600/700 m with a lot of traffic lights. It wasn't as bad after school, but the Bus was delayed like 10 min most of the time...
I come from a rural area in Germany and my school actually had a school bus. Every morning the bus picked up children from the nearby villages and brought them to a bus stop right before the school. If you missed that one bus you had a problem though, because that bus only came once a day. We also had a bus for gymnasium that brought the kids to the next town. I think in a very rural area you are most likely to have a school bus.
Unless it has change since my siblings and I went to school, it doesn´t have anything to do with a rural area, having most likely school busses. I think it depends on the state you´re living in, and if the district you live in is wealthy or not.
@@muesztaerrieh I never heard of a german or austria school that has an own school bus, nit even the richest communities or schools, it is just not our culture
In Austria kids use the Public transportation to get to school too. The student ID states which trains, busses or trans they can use to get to school. And yes, erratic bus drivers often drop kids off late!
I live in a bigger city in northern Germany. We don’t have School buses as you know them from America, but in the morning and around noon, when school starts or ends, there are extra buses going on the lines that are going by schools to accommodate the students that are using them.
Concerning passing grades etc.: You got the basics perfectly (which is more than many Bavarians do...)! 5 and 6 are the first non passing grades, therefore one 5 in the report cart will be excused. If you have a 5 in two Vorrückungsfächer (non-extracurriculars and also not art, music, PE) you will be asked if you want your child to do the Nachprüfung (45-60 mins written exam about everything that was covered in the subject in the whole school ear) (§33 GSO), or just fail and repeat. As a rough guideline: depending on subject and grade you will get a 4 in written tests between 50% and 60%.
If your child almost passes the grade, but not quite, there is also the option of "Vorrücken auf Probe (§31 GSO) where the class conference could argue that the development was great, but that the bad grades from the beginning of the school year held your kids back too much, but they will manage the next year. They would then pass on a probationary basis and the issue would be revisited on december 15th the following school year.
If your child is in the non-passing area of grades you should also get a Maiwarnung (warning in may) which also contains possible reasons and options on how to move forward. And parent-teacher-conferences are a thing, too, ofc.
HOWEVER! Your children are Gastschüler, therefore their grades don't count! Like, at all. The "German doesn't count for two years" only applies if their grades count (i.e. you and the school decide that their German is good enough that they can participate and collect grades like a native, but will obviously struggle with German essay writing).
Not too sure on the transition from Gastschüler to regular students, tbh, but it seems like you found a school that is prepared to suppport you and your children, which is awesome!
I always had a 5 in math (dyscalculia, but undiagnosed until i was 16 and I had the 5 starting at 5th grade) and I never failed or had to do the Nachprüfung. That was in Baden Württemberg and I always had a 1 in English which is apparently why I did not fail. I'm so glad it worked like that or I'd have no diploma by now. Just getting a 5 was hard, I got a straight up 6 on many tests.
Where I went to school in Germany, we always had a school bus. But that was probably because my school was in a cluster of 4 different schools (2 Gymnasiums, 1 Hauptschule, 1 Realschule) so every morning, a bus would come to my village and pick everyone (like, almost every kid of the whole village) up for these schools. Of course, you could also get on a regular bus a bit later and still get there on time but this bus was almost always full with people who went to work or other students who wanted to sleep 5 minutes longer.
For my way home, we also got busses which drove to all the villages around. It wasn't timed the best, because the way to the bus stop would take about 4 minutes and we only had maybe 5 before the bus would just drive away, but still. So it probably depends on where you go to school and if a school bus really is needed or not.
Yeah it was the same when I lived in a tiny village (actually it was only a collection of a farm and five houses) near "Radevormwald". There was no regular bus at the times I would have needed one. So there where schoolbusses going to all the villages collecting kids for all schools from elementary school to Gymnasium and bring them back at three different times around noon and every afternnoon. Since I was older I used my bike in summer because I was at the second hold of of the schoolbus and it was quite a journey after entering. With my bike it was much shorter and quicker.
I also lived in larger cities while going to school (Dortmund and Kassel) and while I was lucky to be able to walk in Dortmund I had to take the tram in Kassel for a 20min ride when I was in 5-8 grade.
Hello and have a nice First Advent! As many others already pointed out, usually kids just take a public bus to school which can be quite the adventure in rural areas. It took some of my classmates an hour or more and 2 different buses or bus and train to get to school, where they had to wait another half an hour until class started. So you could see a group of kids sitting in the cafeteria doing their homework last minute or just studying every morning.
I'm glad that things start to work out for your children. As hard as it is/ was for them, it will be a lot easier for your younger ones, with all the experience to pass down.
As you already figured out, kids usually start in class 5 and stay together with the same teacher and classmates at least until class 10, so students who join later on, will not get the same introduction and have to figure out a lot of things on the go.
I changed Gymnasiums after grade 7, I can't remember how I managed to survive the first week there, with no teacher helping me to find my class and so on and solely depending on my classmates, a horror scenario for introverts :D. Buuut... it always did work out for me as it will for your kids, I'm sure.
Also, considering you live near the Alps with a lot of snow during winters: you should expect something like "schneefrei", meaning either the school closes completely or students from different villages can't attend school because the buses don't run. Fun times :D. It was such a pity that my bus was always running, because I was living near a main road. A few other kids from villages on a hill missed several days each year, because there was no such thing as homeschooling a few years ago.
Wishing you all the best and see you next week.
The class system is usually used up to the Oberstufe, that is the last 3 years of gymnasium. Up until then the students stay together in a class and taught together (except Religion). The Oberstufe is taught in courses, where each course is made up of different students but only from the same year.
Your handling of the drop-off incident was very German. :)
German Gymnasiums simply are... the best type of school in Germany. I myself am a teacher and I teach at what is now called "Gemeinschaftsschule" - a school that offers everything for everyone in different academic learning levels... but the Gymnasium still reigns supreme in Germany.
Haha I remember the Diercke Weltatlas I borrowed from the school. At the end of sixth grade (like 15 years ago) I forgot to return it ... I still have it =D
Thanks a lot for this video.
So many memories came up by watching it.
The reason: many years ago we moved with our family from Germany to Thailand.
We had a very similar experience when we tried to put our children in school.
But after a while we got used to the different system and our children were much better by integrating than me.
They entered the 1st and 2nd grade and it was so easy for them to learn Thai language.
They are trained by german culture to stand on their own feet. I realised that the children here are much more guided by parents and teachers.
I think the disadvantage of such a system is the lower degree of freedom.
Please go on to make such amazing videos. I really enjoy.
Orientation or open door is usually in the spring :) Also, its February because February is the end of the first half year, they will get a report card in February and at the end of year
I grew up in Germany and I’ll have to agree with the others on the transport situation. It’s usually public transport to secondary school, even in the big city I grew up in. And public buses are terribly unreliable, my journey was often an hour or more. Took such a big chunk out of my day but also fun times with friends on the bus 😉
the hair looks fantastic. really suits you and makes you look younger.
Younger! Yay! Thank you.
I grew up in a village in Northern Bavaria and went to Gymnasium in Aschaffenburg. It was considered normal that by fifth grade kids were old enough, in a group of their peers, to take the bus in the morning and go to school by public transport. And it worked fine: in their own way, the older kids would have an eye on the younger ones, and the particular bus (Linie 42, went 7.03 am, I still know that 30 years later) was filled to the brim with kids from 5th to 13th grade who all went to several schools in Aschaffenburg. The parents had trained us a little before, and they had us instructed to stick to our group - so that's what we did.
There could be minor problems when the weather turned bad and the bus just didn't show up - but as it affected ALL the kids who lived along that bus line, the school and the parents knew quickly, and a solution was found soon. In most cases, the stay-at-home moms would collect as many kids as they could in their cars and bring them to a point from whence each kid knew their way to the relevant schools.
On the other hand: even as a 10-year-old, Aschaffenburg was the city I knew well enough that I wouldn't have been lost one or two stops from the one I was used to.
We are taught as children, when you get lost and get scared, ask the next adult for help, but to be careful at the same time. They are allowed to explain the way, but we are not allowed to hop in a car of a stranger...
-27 Celcius here in Anchorage area in Alaska.
I believe February 2022 was chosen as the cut-off date for Gastschüler status because that is when mid-term grades are determined ("Halbjahreszeugnis"). For the school grades, you might consider discussing the details with your kids' teachers. School buses are usually only provided where public transportation is not available. In countries such as France, school buses in rural areas are commonplace.
Thank for for sharing your experiences with the Gymnasium and of course the ATLAS. When I was Garyson's age I was in a German boarding school and the Atlas became my favorite book. I traced the geographical whereabouts of magic movie heroes (Lawrence of Arabia/Mutiny on the Bounty etc.) and learned a lot of Geography then. At that time my father started to work for the newly formed NASA and travelled to the US a lot, so I even took the Atlas to bed to feel closer to him. Oh, and by the way: Sarah, your new haircut is awesome .. almost as awesome as Kevin's :-).
Learning a third language in your second actually can really help with the German grammar and understand the differences between languages. I found it actually really beneficial!
Dear friends
now first of all Kevin is a man of taste, you dear lady look amazing with your new hair 👍👍👍😍
Now for me as a german it is very interesting to see your point of view. I graduated Gymnasium May 1980, so beeing an old fart i can not compare to todays german school system .beeing in Gymnasium, still at these ancient times my first foreign language was......ENGLISH. Now my teachers were excellent. Since they realized that the young 1970 generation was addicted to Rolling Stones and the Beatles we learned english by the lyrics of our favourite heroes. Actually we sang these songs together in the classroom to get used to the melody and sound of a foreign language. ( And at the schoolyard we were showing off, since we knew the lyrics and were able to sing the songs) Thats how my teachers made me love your beautifull language so much
Thank you for the compliments 😍. You’re not an old fart! 🤣 You know English well in order to use that term.
@@MyMerryMessyGermanLife Well looking in the mirror prooves you wrong 😊 But its nothing wrong getting old . Every morning i get up saying: Upps i am still alive. So every morning i got a positiv feedback. Thats german humor 😁
Thank you so much for this video. My family and I (transplants from Los Angeles more than 3 yrs ago) are currently going through the process of trying to enroll my 9 year old son into a gymnasium for his 5th grade class next Fall. His getting good grades in most of his classes except for the German language as I had expected but he is getting better at it. Similar to your experience, we had also heard how demanding the gymnasium curriculum was and may create unwanted stress in the child's educational attainment. Your video kinda gave me a positive assurances that the gymnasium path for my 9 year old could be the right choice for him in the future. We prefer the gymnasium to university path instead and I'm sure the other paths (Realschule/gessamtschule/hauptschule) are also good paths to get into a university. I know I'm biased towards the university route and my background (undergrad - University of Southern California and Masters - Stanford University) dictates my decisions.
My family is in Northern California and our preschool and kindergarten age children go to the German international school here. Would love to hear more about your transition from California to Germany!
@@MA-zg2pz OMG there's so many factors of transition to cover. But to specifically focus on my children's (6 and a 9 yrs old) education, my wife and I decided that a full-immersion in German language was necessary and therefore a grundschule after the kindergarten was our decision. For sure, there were ups and downs during the process but they were able to pick-up the language within a year. It also helps that my wife is from Vienna, Austria and she speaks German to the kids even when we were in the States and that tremendously helped.
In the beginning when I saw "the first Frost" my mind immediately went "Hm, Grünkohlzeit" but that is probably more a northern Germany thing. The reason there is nothing special when entering 6th grade is that kids are normally already a year at the new school since we distinguish the 3 parts into 1-4 Grundschule, 5-10 Mittelschule (regardless of Hauptschule, Realschule or Gymnasium) and 11-13 (some cases 10-12 or 11-12) as Oberschule/Oberstufe, with the last part only being accesible via a Gymnasium or another specific kind of school, not the usual Haupt- or Realschule.
I can see that some schools are adverse to put foreign kids into a Gymnasium because usually kids that come to Germany have not learnt German before they arrived and you kids did, which made them more of a positive abnormality.
In regards to the emphasis on languages I think that might be a school specific thing. Some of the schools here have some subjects they heavily focus aside from the mandatory curriculum. I have seen (and heard as a rumour while being in school) about certain schools being the best for specific subjects. A reason for people to move to a big city is sometimes because they want a bigger variety of choice of schools and the more rural you live the less choices you have unless your kids are willing to travel a long time to school.
I think with the amount of time Ella has to learn German it is probably a lot easier to get her into the Gymnasium when she reaches that age and you decide it is her best option. Have a nice week.
The bus situation you experience is totally normal. There are only school busses for Grundschule or Förderschule, but never for any other schools. When I was in this age I had to drive 45 minutes right through a big city. Some of my classmates even had to take the train. In big cities the busses usually come more frequently, but they are also not reliable. I always was 40 min too early at school since you get in trouble when being late. They dont care if it is your fault or not, they just say, you have to find another solution then.
Welcome to german public transport nightmares.
As Eisbehr already said You shouldn't expect the situation to change much unless you make your voices heard by the officials of your municipality. And BTW this video is an excellent start. :)
In Germany schooling is mandatory. Parents can not opt their kids out of the system even if they wanted to. As a consequence your children are entitled to being provided a safe way to school and back home. Please keep that in mind when you approach Your Schulamt about the situation. Also remember that you are not just asking for something for yourself. Instead You help to promote and improve a public good.
Public transport is in many places outsourced to private enterprise and these of course try to cut cost in order to stay competitive. Still you can expect the contracts to include an obligation to provide a reliable service. And even more so when the passengers are school children whio are entitled to special care as I already pointed out. That's why these services are always subsidised.
In Niedersachsen where I live every school has an 'Elternverein' and I bet that's not any different at your place. These guys will be very helpful in finding other parents whose children share the same ordeal. Also they should know whom to approach and get the ball rolling.
This is so so helpful, thank you so much for giving us the bigger picture. We will report the situation thanks to the help of comments like your’s!
In our public middle school (between Chicago and Milwaukee), foreign language is mandatory beginning in the 6th grade. Students may choose between Spanish, French, German, or Chinese. They must take it 6th through 8th grades, and then it is required for two of the four years of high school (though most take it all four years where we live). But part of the reason that we live where we live - the public schools are exceptional and actually have a better reputation than the private schools. In fact, there is a public high school in our area that offers study abroad summer programs for credit!
Especially when you live in the country side the bus situation can be very challenging ;). There was actually a school bus when I went to Gymnasium many years ago. It stopped at the normal bus stops though to pick the kids up. But really I haven't heard anything about schoolbuses in Germany from anyone lately. Maybe they just don't exist anymore...
Here (very big city) kids take public transportation to school or walk or ride their bikes. Most kids at my son's school come by subway. We live less then a kilometer away from the school, so my kids can walk there. And that is really such a relief!
I wouldn't want my 10 vears old boy alone in the subway. But it ist very common and normal.
In Deutschland gibt es 2 Halbjahre für Schüler das 1 beginnt nach den Sommerferien bis Ende Januar und das 2 beginnt in Februar bis zu den Sommerferien
In Germany there are 2 halves of the school year the first starts after the summer holidays and ends at the end of Janurary and the second half starts at the beginnig of Februrary until the summer holidays
Das ist der Grund warum die Noten erst ab Februar gewertet werde
That´s the reason why their grades are only counted at the start of Februrary
Here in Hessen in a city of 70.000 we also had schoolbus for Gymnasium. Which was a regular city bus that will only transport school kids.
There is something called "freigestellte Schülerbeförderung" for settlements that don't have a connection to public transport and are further away from the next school or public transport station than 1.5 km. And those vans and small buses take kids from their "Weiler" (Settlement of 2 to 10 farms/homes) to school or the next possible bus/train station, where they join their classmates. In the freigestellte Schülerbeförderung there is usually some coordination with the kid schedules, but in general they're similar organized like other public transport with centralized pick up spots and bus schedules.
Re your question about school busses / how kids get to Gymnasium and back home... I went to different Gymnasien in different places, and normally it's the other way around than you said /thought :
School organized busses are exclusively a thing in very small villages where it's hard to get around by public transportation. In cities there usually are no school busses, but kids take the normal busses or Straßenbahn. In Germany kids learn during Grundschule how to get around safely by bike or walking (like you've experienced it too, biking courses, learning what the street signs mean etc), and also by public transportation. Once they've reached Gymnasium age kids are considered old enough to get from point A to B.
Of course parents might decide individually to rather drive their kids, or whatever works, but generally speaking that's how it works. School busses are an American thing and here only used as an exception in very small remote places where there is no other option.
Im glad you're happy here and that you're here at all making my country that I love a diverse colorful place 🌸 My husband is Canadian and moved here 4 years ago. Discovering a new culture (we lived in Canada before we moved back here, so I've had that experience too luckily) is so exciting and really broadens one's horizon!
1) in größeren Städten gibt es mehr öffentlichen Nahverkehr, aber keine speziellen Schulbusse.
2) 45 min Wartezeit nach der Schule sollte kein Problem sein, wenn man in einer etwas größeren Stadt ist. Die bringt man als Schüler auch in der 6. Klasse problemlos herum.
3) Gerade Arbeiter im öffentlichen Raum, also Straßenbauer oder überhaupt Bauleute, sind sehr hilfsbereit.
Yeah the school bus situation sounds really familiar. (I also lived in rural Bavaria). Public Transport only really existed for schools (well not officially but no one else used them) but for some reason the bus companies running the lines always insisted on incompatible schedules. I had to go 3km to the next village for Gymnasium and 1st period started at 8:10 the bus might be at my stop anywhere between 7:35 and 8:20 (note the regular arrival time was 7:45) so you had to be there by 7:30 or risk missing the bus if it came early bc the driver would just take on the kids standing there and be off 2 min later (it came with real consequences there would not be another bus so you could walk and maybe make 2nd period or find an aquantaince to drive you/tramp. 3 to 4 km might not sound much but if there is no real path and you have to scale wine hills through -2 degrees drizzly windy weather with your heavy school bag that can take ages). If it came late then youd just miss school, annoying for 1st period exams but sadly unavoidable.
After school there were 2 options either the 6th period bus or the 9th period bus if you missed the one at 13:20 (the one stroke of luck another route had the start time at 13:05 with 13:00 being the end of 6th period) then tough luck you could either walk home or wait until 16:00 for the next and last bus home. The 9th period ended at 16:05 btw so if you had a "nice" teacher that didnt let you leave that was it you had to walk. There were also School organized buses officially just for students but those were only for kids who lived somewhere really far of, or during the last day of school before big holidays (if you were lucky and school admin rembemered to do it) bc then youd be finished after 4th period and there were no buses then if the school didnt organize any.
And I finished Gymnasium last year .... . My brother still attends, they still havent changed it.
Edit: Just thought of it while reading the comments we only had that one Gymnasium which also incorporated a Realschule (and a boarding school). There was another Private Catholic Girls Realschule in a small town which also had Grund and Hauptschule. One bus drove for everything (on that side of the 15 min radius) but Haupt and Grundschule and the Private school kids werent allowed to take the school organized buses so it could happen that there were to many kids for one bus but there wouldnt be another so youd make it fit seat 3 people on top of each other until the last one just barly squeezed through the door. Even during Covid.
*Sorry for the tangents
I think the kids are doing so well because they see your positive attitude towards learning and all things new. Also you put in this much effort to find the right school for them. If parents consistently show that learning and school are important to them, children are more inclined to follow their lead.
Speaking from experience, the boys will happily wait for the later bus when they are a bit older to avoid the "babies" from lower grades. I used to have a 30 minute bus ride to school but in the summer we sometimes even rode our bikes to school for nearly an hour because taking the bike was our own decision rather than have the bus foisted on us. You can tell we were rebels without a clue 😋
I love the music at the beginning ...
Thank you!
Question about school buses:
I live in a very rural area.
We don't have much public transport here.
We had school buses from year one to ten.
One school bus driving to Grundschule and another one driving to "Orientierungsstufe" and Hauptschule / Realschule and the first four years of Gymnasium (id est year 7 to 10, at the time, while we still had "Orientierungsstufe").
In order to continue with Gymnasium you had to go to another place (a small town in the opposite direction of the village where I attended school from grade 5 to 10 :-)
A bus would go to that little town as well, although I had to bike 2 kilometres before reaching the appropriate bus stop.
I think this bus was actually a public transport vehicle.
But it got used only by pupils.
Adults used to drive around in their cars.
And the pupils that were allowed to drive would also go by car and take others with them.
Even in eleventh grade older pupils would sometimes take me along and sometimes I would go by bus. In grade 12 and 13 I would mostly be driven by car by fellow students or drive myself.
This was around millennial times ;-)
Sorry about the very extensive answer 😬
I already took public transport when I was in first grade and when I got into 5th grade and started at the Gymnasium, I even had to take two busses to go to school. I luckily never had many problems with being late to school, only once or twice a year when the bus wouldn't come because of "bad weather" (more like 1cm of snow here in Hamburg).
For me it was more the Problem, that I always got to school more than 20 minutes before the class started and I always had to wait at least 10 minutes before any of my friends got there. I also had to leave the house at 7am when the school started at 8am.
Your both hair looks really great. Especially Sarah's because you are a "flippy" woman with a flippy family, so it totally fits to your character - I like it a lot!
February bc. it's the first half of the year, right before Easter holidays, where the kids get their "Halbjahreszeugnis" (mid term report).