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An American School
I have an e-pal called Dana in Year 8, and we have been friends for 6 years.
She lives near my grandparents, so during a trip to see them I spent a day at an American Middle school (years 6, 7&8).
The grounds were almost as big as my secondary school, with 2 state of the art gyms and a brilliant outdoor athletics facility.
Surprisingly, for all of the space, there was only 1/3 if the number of the number of students as the typical English secondary.
It looked more like a beach party than a school, as the students were all wearing their own clothes.
For the boys, most were decked in denim shorts and baggy tee shirts with trainers. Girls were wearing bright crop tops and short shorts.
Perhaps the thing that amazed me most of all was that at least 90% of the girls were wearing flip-flops.
I tried to imagine girls in the UK wearing flip flops to school and the teachers’ reactions…
Not the same as the casually dressed teachers at the middle school I’m sure (some wearing flip-flops of their own!!).
Of course, they probably don’t wear flip flops all year round; it was 89 degrees Fahrenheit during my stay.
Something taken for granted and not considered a luxury at all was the air conditioning installed in the building. Just imagine if we had air conditioning!
A brief note- remember all of the models for R.E and History that we’ve had to make? Dana’s class had to make castles, and all were on display in the library.
My personal favourite was composed of marshmallows, giant marshmallows, sugar cubes and white icing. Rather inventive I thought.
So far, this sounds a little condescending towards the school, but it definitely was not like that. I had a slight shock when I attended the lunch period and following music lesson.
Lunch first- when I was seated around the lunch table Dana and her friends were complaining about how loud and crowded their cafeteria was, but inwardly I smiled.
Only one year is having lunch at a time; there is more than one lunch period, and the cafeteria was at least the size of ours. The noise seemed extremely quiet in comparison to what I am used to.
I was also impressed with the variety and cost of the food available. The price was the same in dollars as in pounds, but there are more dollars to a pound, so actually, it was quite a bit cheaper.
As for music- when we arrived all of the class went into this little cloakroom at the back and got out their own instruments, not borrowed. They then proceeded to practice pieces such as Amazing Grace for a recital the following Tuesday.
I was only watching, or rather listening, and I was surprised at how good everyone was. The classroom was at least 2, maybe 3 times larger as well.
The next and final class of the afternoon was Reading and Language Arts (that’s English to you and me). It was pretty much the same idea really, reading at the start with worksheets and revision.
I had to give a talk during that lesson about where I lived and my school. Let me tell you, they were shocked about how much homework we get, and disbelieving of the fact that we had to wear uniform and only got 40 minutes of lunch break.
I don’t think that they believed me when I told them how many students were in the school. I had great fun trying to explain what plasters, torches, biscuits, sweets, queues, and pantomimes were. In the same order, that would be band-aids, flashlights, candy, cookies,
and lines in American. In the States, there is no equivalent to a pantomime, though they definitely found the idea of men playing women and women playing men, shouting out at the actors and generally taking part appealing I must say.
Before school broke out, Dana gave me a quick tour of the buildings. I discovered that they do not do R.E, French or German, or I.T. Also, Geography and History is just one subject with one teacher and they only have it once a week.
The best thing about visiting a school, rather than being part of a school, was that I did not get any of the homework!!
By Cassie Anne Griffin
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