Friday news from grammar school
Dear parents and legal guardians, supporters of our school,
As the song goes "time flies like crazy", so before we realised it, the first month of school is almost over. For now, for the vast majority of students in full-time form, for which we are of course happy. However, on the other hand, we do not close our eyes to the possibility that we will have to have or already do have some classes in quarantine.
We prepared for distance learning over the summer, we shared what worked and what didn't in the spring, and we reflected on everything in the internal methodological guidelines for teachers, as well as in our Ten for Distance Learning, which is intended for you and the students, and which can be found in the attachment. In it, we tried to summarise what awaits us during possible online learning. From a logistical point of view, perhaps the most important thing is that students start each online lesson through the MS Teams application so that they always see their teacher at the beginning of the class (except for VV, TV and HV lessons). They then decide on the structure of the lesson and whether students will remain in online mode, or if another form will be chosen for the class. Following recommendations from experts and our experience, we do not want students to spend the whole day at their computers, which is why teachers will choose various activities as the content of their lessons, as is the case with regular classes. An excellent example of an atypical activity took place this week in Septima within the Foreign Languages Department.
Students were persuaded that a language is truly a communication tool by sharing the results of their conversations with native speakers. Over the past few months, each student has had the task of conducting a structured interview with a native speaker outside the OPEN GATE community. The students virtually travelled a large part of the world because they conducted conversations not only with French, Spaniards and Austrians but also Swiss, Germans, Argentines, Salvadorans and Cubans.
The conclusion of today's letter will be a little more personal. Whenever I have time in the evening, I try to ask my two sons before they fall asleep what they did that day and what they liked the most. I think that I could take a similar approach to my latest working week and share with you what made me happy at work. Fortunately, there was quite a lot of that in the week that just ended, for example, we had a delightful and constructive atmosphere during the school board meeting on Thursday. I was also pleased that the students traditionally organised the elections to the student council entirely independently, and I am very much looking forward to working with its new leadership, Merlin Garbini and Martin Kubíček. Paradoxically, my Wednesday supervision in the cafeteria, which is usually a teacher’s nightmare at other schools, is also very nice. It allows me not only to appreciate how well the students follow our hygienic measures but above all; I have the opportunity to chat with students from all classes. And believe me, these dialogues are very enriching. I sometimes need to remember to have my own lunch ! I am really glad that whenever I come to the teacher's table in the dining room, I can always find happy and smiling colleagues around me. Not that we don't complain to each other from time to time, but it is still evident from the conversations that all teachers like their work at our school.
I hope that you enjoy your work, as much as me and my colleagues.
For OG,
