The first time I had ever heard of “Swiss German” was when I was preparing to move from Düsseldorf, Germany to Rapperswil, Switzerland. My German neighbors had me over for a farewell barbecue and they said to me: “Whatever you do, don’t come back and visit us speaking that Swiss German.” I was aware that the Germans had a somewhat love/hate relationship with their southern neighbors, but I had no idea the Swiss spoke some different form of their common language. In fact, I was quite confident with the German that I had picked up over my three years in Düsseldorf, and I figured it would be quite an easy transition from one country to the other. I was wrong.
Posts tagged education
Homeschooling verboten
I know I just wrote about the German School System a few weeks ago, but a German court decision on homeschooling that was announced today has put that unique aspect of German education in the spotlight. A Bremen couple who have been trying to get permission to homeschool their two young sons had all their legal arguments rejected. A Bremen superior administrative court (Oberverwaltungsgericht) told Dagmar and Tilman Neubronner (and their two attorneys) that they must send Moritz and Thomas to a normal German school and not teach them at home. READ MORE »
The German School System
Today I happened to read an article about reforming the Berlin school system, and I use the term “school” intentionally — rather than “education” system; we’re talking about schools here (and Germany has compulsory school attendance laws rather than compulsory education). The article was entitled “Kulturkampf ums Gymnasium” — roughly “culture war over the Gymnasium.” Of course, as most of my readers know, a Gymnasium in Germany is a public academic secondary school leading to university study. It has nothing to do with an athletic gymnasium (Turnhalle), other than sharing a Greek root word. (English took the sports element, while German took the academic side from Greek gymnasion, a place for training both the mind and body.) READ MORE »
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