Last week we had visitors from politics at my school on Elisabeth-Kohn-Straße, where I work as a teacher. The Bavarian Prime Minister Markus Söder and his Minister of Education Anna Stolz wanted to find out how digitalization is progressing in a pilot school. Our middle school is one such school. To do this, Söder and Stolz stopped by a colleague’s German class. There, children who have come to us from abroad learn German before they can attend a regular class.
The lesson went well, my colleague reported afterwards. Everyone was good and hardworking. I am convinced that this was a real challenge for the children to put their best foot forward in the presence of the Prime Minister. However, they appeared confident and calm when using tablets and interactive boards. Digitization is an everyday skill for the children in German classes and routine for us teachers. We use digital technology regularly.
Prime Minister Markus Söder and Minister of Education Anna Stolz visit the middle school on Elisabeth-Kohn-Straße, where our SZ columnist teaches a bridging class. The school is taking part in the “Digital School of the Future” pilot test. Here the children learn successfully with tablets.
(Photo: Sven Hoppe/dpa)
I teach a bridge class. It is comparable to the German classes, but is only attended by Ukrainian children. From my work I know what a great help it is to have digital technology available. Such classes are often very heterogeneous, both culturally and in terms of their level of German language skills. Last year I had a new student every two weeks. The influx of refugees from Ukraine was enormous at the time.
Many of these children didn’t know a word of German, while others who had been here for a long time already spoke German quite well. That’s why the question kept coming up as to how we teachers manage to teach the children together despite their different language levels. Tablets help us with this, so we can set digital tasks for the new students or offer an interactive language game with which they can learn German more quickly and with pleasure.
In my bridge class, the situation has stabilized over time, thanks to digital support. In the German classes, my colleagues manage to keep the classes together every day and teach the children something. It’s a good thing that digital devices and various apps can make lessons more exciting, especially when students are running out of motivation. Digitalization in schools is an important key to success in education. I’m glad that this is already part of everyday life at our school and that we are well equipped with digital devices – not just in the German classes, but in all classes.
After Markus Söder and Anna Stolz said goodbye, I once again realized what great colleagues I have who are highly qualified and incorporate digitalized elements into their lessons every day. What a shame that there aren’t nearly enough teachers like this who can teach digitally professionally. This cannot be achieved without lateral entrants due to the lack of staff. In addition, it is not only the technology that is needed, but also further training in order to use the devices sensibly in the classroom. This should be at the top of the Education Minister’s priority list if she wants to effectively implement digitalization in schools.
Emiliia Dieniezhna, 35, fled from Kiev with her then four-year-old daughter Ewa Pullach near Munich. She works on a voluntary basis for the non-governmental organization NAKO, whose goal is to fight corruption in Ukraine. She also teaches German to Ukrainian refugee children. She writes a weekly column for the SZ about her view of events in her home country from Munich.