New stuff everywhere

Sorry, seems like WordPress had been down for some hours. Now it has come back and looks kind of different. Well, I’ll try to find my way around. For one thing it seems to be possible now to comment on pages other than blog entries. Let’s see if I can disable that again. It doesn’t make much sense on an about page, now does it? Anyway, I hope you’ll be able to read this.

Going on a field trip! Good idea?

I just enjoyed some time in Berlin – just for fun. But being a teacher you always keep an eye open for potential class trip destinations, and believe me there are plenty of those in Berlin. Just the sights are great, not just the usual ones you find on postcards. Here are two sights I enjoyed. I know the photos are really bad, but unfortunately my cell phone can’t do any better.

The first store sign reads “Bordel”, but it’s really just a barber’s shop. Don’t know, if my students can handle that much frivolity.

And the second one tells us that this is “no travel agency” – well, duh.

Anyway, this inspired me to start a photo blog with my students. It might sensitize their perception of their environment, and it will be fun at the same time. Let’s see what their arts teacher thinks about this. After all we haven’t quite started on our podcasts, yet, either. But I believe it’s a good sign, if there are still so many interesting projects out there. They will most certainly keep us busy until 10^th grade.

What has been going on?

I just added a new page to this site explaining what we have been doing so far with our laptop computer class. However, all the information is in German for the time being, since it was previously published on a separate project on the school’s website.

Anyway, when I look at what we have accomplished so far in only nine months, I cannot but be quite impressed by these kids. Sure, there still is room for improvement, but the results also show that working with computers full time can really enhance the curriculum. After all, despite fears at the beginning of the project that this class might lack behind because of the additional burden of having to learn how to use their Linux software, they are doing just great in direct comparison.

Fast, faster, what’s next?

I couldn’t believe what I just read. The formerly state-owned telephone company Deutsche Telekom intends to upgrade schools to high speed DSL access. Too good to be true? Well, we shall see. For future reference, here is the link.

Why am I so doubtful? Years ago the city of Wolfsburg announced over the media that all schools would be provided with internet access, actually every single classroom was to be connected to it. At least for our school this never happened. However, some schools got it and are complaining now since their internet access was implemented through some lousy citrix farm which is slow and prone to problems of all kinds. So in the end we don’t have to be too sad about not getting it, however it would have saved us a lot of money to get a LAN infrastructure installed in every classroom. Well, you see where I stand when it comes to publicity stunts.

Anyway, back to the Telekom offer, faster internet access would definitely be welcome with a class of 30 students all using laptop computers. After all, downloading a podcast on 30 machines simultaneously really isn’t much fun, since our local proxy doesn’t cache data of that size.

Me fail English? That’s unpossible!

I couldn’t help but laugh when I saw this poem online. It illustrates so well why it’s pretty difficult for high school students to spell English words correctly and why it may be helpful to adjust orthography once in a while.

However, Germans take it to another extreme. Only after five years we are, again, to face another change in orthography. Well, it seems to pay well for the publishers of classroom textbooks.

Anyway, here’s the poem:

Our Strange Lingo

When the English tongue we speak.
Why is break not rhymed with freak?
Will you tell me why it's true
We say sew but likewise few?
And the maker of the verse,
Cannot rhyme his horse with worse?
Beard is not the same as heard
Cord is different from word.
Cow is cow but low is low
Shoe is never rhymed with foe.
Think of hose, dose,and lose
And think of goose and yet with choose
Think of comb, tomb and bomb,
Doll and roll or home and some.
Since pay is rhymed with say
Why not paid with said I pray?
Think of blood, food and good.
Mould is not pronounced like could.
Wherefore done, but gone and lone -
Is there any reason known?
To sum up all, it seems to me
Sound and letters don't agree.

This was written by Lord Cromer and published in the Spectator of August 9th, 1902