Привет всем! At the beginning of the semester, two ladies visited our university building. They were from the Exeter Yaroslavl Twinning Association and were looking for English 'native' speakers to participate in a British quiz organised for the pupils of the "best schools" in Yaroslavl. Our role would be to read out the questions to the students, go around helping them and essentially motivate them. Two of us volunteered to go, but my friend got sick on the day of the quiz, so I ended up going by myself. The teachers and the pupils of school 4 waited for me outside of the university and we headed to the venue together. I was a bit uncomfortable given that I wasn't technically a native speaker but the teachers didn't seem to take issue with the situation. The quiz was fun. The pupils were very nice and did really really well! I was also offered a very tasty and typical Russian meal consisting of оливье, борщ and чёрный хлеб. After the quiz, I exchanged numbers with some teachers and was invited to visit School 4 some time over the semester. I went during my last week in Yaroslavl and asked some questions for you. First some basic information: General education in Russia compromises three stages:
Uniforms are not compulsory for the older pupils, so they usually wear their normal clothes when going to school. Some choose to wear their uniform because of practicality. The dress code doesn't seem too strict for the younger ones either as they all wore it in a different way. All the schools in Yaroslavl are state schools. They are given a number depending on the time they were founded. I was told that children in nursery attend Sunday classes for about a year prior to the start of their formal education in order to all be on the same level. Their progress is assessed and recommendations are made to the parents (of course, this might be particular to School 4). Some schools specialise in a field of study. For example, school 4 has a really good teaching programme for languages and get great results. Pupils start studying English at the age of 8 and French when they're 14 years old. They can also learn other languages if they so desire. Up to the age of 16, all students undergo the same compulsory cursus (science, literature, physical education, philology, IT, music...) to construct a base of skills and knowledge. After that, they are allowed to specialise in either science or philology. When asked what they liked about their school, most students answered the English programme and the friendly teachers. Most said they hated the canteen, but that isn't so surprising. I guess some things transcend cultures. They had to define their school with three adjectives. Here's what they wrote (just a bit of vocab):
Unfortunately the younger ones didn't seem to know much about Scotland except that it's part of the UK. Weirdly enough a 13 year-old pointed out that she just knew that "until 1707 there were many wars between England and Scotland, but after that date they were united under one king". That was bizarre... They really want to visit the UK though, especially big cities like London. Here are some clips from the pupils of the school. This was after 1pm, so the classes had already ended and the older students were obviously long gone, so you get to enjoy the cuteness of these little ones. (Apologies for the filming and editing. I am not very good at these kind of things. I'll get better hopefully.) I hope you enjoyed this blog. Comment below if you have any questions.
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AuthorThird year student at the University of St Andrews, Scotland. Studies Russian, German and International Relations. Loves traveling. Loves languages. Loves to share. Hence, this BLOG! Archives
January 2018
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