I had the opportunity to visit a school in Plymouth which houses students ages 12 through 18 in what they call years 7-13. The particular high school we were at was in the part of town where lower economic families tend to live.
We had a very welcoming liaison who hosted Tina, Kailey and I for the morning on Monday and lunch and afternoon classes on Tuesday. The British school system is very complex with many slight differences to ours. The biggest differences are in the way teachers can go about getting their training, religion lessons in schools funded by the government, and the way students are grouped and passed through each grade. They do not require an individual to pass any certain grade. The focus seems to be more in the experience of being a member of the group.
Just like in the states, I got the impression after watching that different classes that teachers have different approached to classroom behavior techniques... some weren't as effective as others! They only had 8 school days left until "summer holiday," which is about 6 weeks. Thus, students were excited and were not always focusing like they should have!
The students were very excited to meet and here people from "America" speak. One young boy asked me, "Is it true that american girls fancy British boys?" I got all sorts of similar questions. Most students didn't know where Michigan was but several if the students know about Detroit. The Brits think we are "gangsters" and that we all carry guns, thanks to lovely Hollywood. We are doing podcasts that will tell you more about our experiences in the schools. The nine of us in the program were broken into groups of three to visit the schools. My group will be visiting a primary school Thursday.
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