Tuesday, April 24, 2007

Adult eduction in Denmark from the Czech eyes

In my work I try to compare the Danish and the Czech education system for adults. In the first part I briefly pay to attention to the Danish and the Czech education system for adults. In the second part I speak about my experiences from Danish schools for adults and about experiences from the Czech education. In the end I evaluate and compare both systems. The theoretical information forms only a small part of my work the main part is about my experiences and my opinions.
I chose this topic because I study the Education for adults in the Czech Republic. I wanted to know how it is working here and when I found some information about Danish adult education the differences and good system was interesting for me and I decided to write about it.

Sunday, April 22, 2007

Skolen ved Stadion

I spent fourteen day of my practise in the Skolen ved Stadion. It is the primary and lower secondary school in Haderslev offering special education for children with general learning difficulties and provides education to children whose development requires special support.
The common basic education is here divided to three levels according to the age. The children in similar age but different level are together in the same classroom. The teachers are working with pupils in small groups and the education is based on the needs of each individual child.
The school cooperate with specialists - the children go on dentist, logopaedist, ergoterapist and psychologist – and support a special service the transport between home and school for pupils.
The contact with parents is very important. Two times a year the parents meet together in the school and two times have an individual meeting with teacher. The teachers also arrange a meeting for grandparents.



Trin 1B


On the practice I was together with Helena also from the Czech Republic and we staid with the class 1B with eight pupils from first level all the time. We decided to visit the pupils before the start of our practise and brought them some sweets. It was a good idea because when we started on Monday the children knew us and were not so shy.
The children were very nice and we made contact with them very quickly. They have very different problems for example the Yasmmine has the Down syndrome, Martin was born with chromosome problem and Sandra has a low IQ because her mother was drinking when she was pregnant.
Every day starts with the morning songs. All pupils and teachers met together in the hall and sang two songs. When someone had birthday everybody was singing the birthday song. After everybody went to the classrooms and the work started. Every day the children had different programme.
Monday – learning with workbooks and work with paper,
Tuesday – cooking,
Wednesday – music and gymnastic,
Thursday – shopping in the Super Best and learning with workbooks,
Friday – swimming and a special work.

The work with children was especially for improving basic practical skills and how to behave in society. The teachers had a very good relationship with children and they spoke with children about normal life and about experiences from weekend or from holiday.
We spent all activities with children and helped with work in the classroom. Sometimes we had problem with understanding because some of the children spoke Danish language. But we learnt some sights, which the teachers and children use when they speak, and also some Danish words and after the communication were better.
The last day of our practise we prepared some cookies and an activity. The children had to sketch in a drawing of mole from the Czech famous cartoon and after coloured it.
Our stay in the Skolen ved Stadion was a splendid experience and I can imagine working with these children in this school.








Tuesday, April 17, 2007

International Week

International week is five days in May where the Erasmus students in Haderslev meet together with students from Comenius programme and have activities together.
We spent our week with students from Portugal, Spain, Italy and Belgium.
Sandra, Helena and I we offered accommodation for one student in our flat so we spent one nice week with Carla from Portugal.

Every day we had a special programme:

Monday
All students met together in a big room in school. After we said something about us and had a game to getting to know. Than we had a group dancing, the basic of Danish language and a group work about introduction countries and stereotypes. My group has to write the keywords about Belgium and painted some picture. I was a little angry because some group that presented the Czech Republic said almost the bed thinks in our country and they thought that we are a poverty country. I was hurt because of they meaning but although it were stereotypes. But maybe it is a signal for the Czech Republic that we should make better representation of our country.

Tuesday
On Tuesday we made a trip to the oldest town in Denmark to Ribe. The weather was very nice so we could admire the Ribe Cathedral and the Sct. Catharinae Church. Ribe is a town of Vikings so we could not miss the Vikings museum. After we had a free time for taking a coffee or walking in the very nice picturesque streets.

Wednesday
Wednesday was a day of songs and singing. In the morning we started with song for children. The students from each country had to sing and show some song and say what kind of skills are the children learnt. I prepared with Helena song when you are saying the names of part of body and show them.
After lunch break we spoke about body language and we had small exercise when always one from a group showed some gesture and others tried to explain what it means.
From 18:30 starts the big evening of Eurovision song contest. Every country could prepare some song and made fun for the others. Helena and I we found the Czech song on last moment and we had only two hours and half for preparation the costumes. We chose music from the famous Czech historical film and we also made small performance in our costumes. We did not win the competition but we enjoyed it. The all evening was wonderful and after we had party all foreign students together and we dance and chat.

Thursday
The day starts with school visit. The day before we were divided to groups and every group had one school for visiting. I was in the Real school and took part in two classes. It was a private school with classes from 0 to 9. In the afternoon we worked on portfolios and shared experiences.

Friday
In the morning we had to present our portfolios and said what was interesting for us.
Friday was last day of International week so every country cooked some specialities and we said bye bye.

I enjoyed the week very well. It was very interesting to meet with students from other countries and recognize new costumes and national specialities. With Carla from Portugal I keep in touch and I would like to visit her in the summer.

Copenhagen


Before we were going to Copenhagen we got a contact for one man who is living in the centre and he offered an accommodation. I am happy that we stayed in his flat because we had a nice time here. The man was very nice and hospitable. He prepared a royal breakfast for us and we could speak with them about Copenhagen and living in Denmark.Copenhagen is very cosmopolitan city with the very different people and with many street artists. We were walking and observing all the time and we visited many places there. I liked very much the part of the city near the harbour where is the mermaid, Nyhavn, the building of the stock exchange and finally the Christiania. I like the atmosphere in Christiania because it is very different then in the centre. There are not so many people and it is mystical place for me. We could not miss the special liberty part of Christiania and were here two times because it is very interesting different world.

Odense

The Easter holiday was a very good opportunity how to make a big trip and get to know some new places in Denmark. I was travelling together with my boyfriend Honza and we have chosen to travel by train. Our first stop was Odense the city of H.CH. Andersen.
Odense is the capital of the island Fyn and it is a city with about 180 000 inhabitants. We visited the part of the city where are the old houses and also the Andersen´s museum. We were walking all the day and we saw the Sankt Knuds Kirke, the Andersen´s house and we took lunch in a very nice park Munke Mose. We liked the city full of figures and sculptures from Andresen´s fairy tails so we decided to stay here during the night in a hostel and enjoy evening in a beautiful café with cocktail. The next day we continue on our journey to Copenhagen.




Saturday, April 14, 2007

Travelling

I cannot imagine to be in the Denmark and do not travel. Three months it is an enough time for recognizing the country. The travelling is not cheap here because the public transport is expensive but if you want and save some money it is possible to visit some places. I wanted to see different parts of the Denmark and now I am satisfied because I visited the Seeland (Copenhagen, Roskilde), Odense in the island Fyn and of course nice towns in Jutland (Ribe, Sønderborg, Kolding, Aarhus…). There are more places I would like to see but I also have to let something for next time.







Nightlife

Evening is a very important part of a day because it is a time for relaxing
and spending time together. We have adopted the Danish traditional meeting the Hygge. Almost every evening we have a nice session in a one of our house. I like these meetings very much because we share experiences from a day and from our countries. Sometimes we have a movie night and we are watching the films on computer.
When we want to go out and dance or take a glass of bier the best place for it is the Crazy Daisy. It is a dancing club and a good place for having fun. If you do not want to dance there are other places where to go for example the pub Tribunen where is sometimes the live music or the Kafka café the nice place for chatting and getting a good coffee.
Every Friday it is open a pub for students in our school. The young people meet here and drink beer, playing the table football or they have a special actions here - carnivals or gangster evening. The Friday café is open from the afternoon to the twelve. We do not have this kind of cafes in the Czech Republic but I think it is a good occasion how to spend time with friends from school and be closer to university.

Accommodation

Before we were going to the Denmark we could choose what kind of accommodation we want. My choice was flat about 20 minutes from the CVU. I share the flat with two girls - Helena is from the Czech Republic and Sandra from Belgium. We live in an area Varbergparken where are the social houses so it is a place where almost living immigrants and old people. It is a special place and many Danish people do not want to live here but we havn´t had any problems yet and I like living here.
In the flat every girl has own private room and we have bathroom, kitchen and living room together. The living room is my favourite part because we meet here and chat, drink tee, eat cookies or play games.
In the beginning the flat was nearly empty but we made a decoration and now it is a very cosy home.