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Values in the school work
- Homeroom hours
Homeroom hours are every week meetings between the form teacher and the students from their class. It is perfect time to talk to the students, to ask them what they like and would like to change in their school, to know their opinions about school festivals, lessons and school workers. It is the time we can talk about youth problems, bulling, first loves, responsibility and legal implications of breaking the law. Homeroom hours may be spend on discussing what is important in our students’ lives but also on meeting with people who advise how to live sensibly (policemen, firefighters, doctors, volunteers), explain the young why it is worth to be educated (university students, scientists) or what to do after finishing our school (headmaster, job advisors). On homeroom hours teachers encourage the students that they and their future are the most important for us and we, the teachers are to help them.
- Psychological and pedagogical support hours
Students who have any problems with learning (including reading, orthography, writing, pronunciation, counting) and misbehaving (aggression, vulgarisms physical and psychological violence) have right to attend additional meetings not only with the teachers but also with the school tutor and counsellor. On the psychological and pedagogical support hours we try to know our students better and more carefully to be able to help them to overcome school and personal difficulties. We strongly believe that having a conversation, arranging appointments with specialists can help the students. And if we add additional school lessons on which the teachers explains the lesson problem once again – students may feel more confident, important, not anonymous and may not want to leave the school earlier than they are expected.
- School projects
School project are demanding short or long term activities concentrated on teaching the students how to work in groups and have a good fun at the same time. School projects are usually interdisciplinary, so two or three different teachers work with a group of 10 to 20 students to solve a problem. On the additional meetings we show that, e.g. chemistry and biology, physics and mathematics, history and Polish are strongly connected with each other. We want our students to work hard and think carefully on the subjects they are interested in, but not to forget they do it for themselves to gain new skills and knowledge. They make experiments and prepare lectures themselves, meet famous people at the university and become “experts” in a given discipline. Students like this feeling of being important, extraordinary and appreciated. As the result, they want to learn more and more.
- Special interests groups
Special interests groups give the students opportunity to gain new knowledge and learn new skills every week, but also show how important it is to come to the school building not only to get marks. On such geography, physics, English, music lessons students from different classes gather together regularly, discuss a given problem and solve it. They can take part in special interests groups meetings and it does not matter if they are average or brilliant students. They cooperate and the teacher is the guide who helps them to find a common language. In this way we try to show in our school that all ideas are worth working on them, that sometimes common work is more important than writing tests. Students like such solutions and lots of them come to school even early in the morning to meet with friends and the teachers, spend time together, attend the school life and of course learn.
- School trips
There are classes as well as the whole school trips organized in our school.
On the school trips students from different classes and at different age visit interesting places spending time together with pupils and older students they know usually only from corridors. They go, e.g. to Warsaw and Berlin, help each other while doing shopping and playing city games. Because of such trips older children feel they are needed by the younger, and the younger do realize that they can count on the older. After coming back, they create stronger small society and they find out, they want to be part of it and not to leave the group.
All classes from our school go for several one-day trips to cinemas, theatres, museums and culture festivals. Teachers concentrate then on nice atmosphere within the group, take care of the shyest and the cowardliest students. We want them to feel more confident in the group, to encourage them to take part in school feasts. Majority of classes go for several-days trips once a year. Usually it is the students who choose the place we visit, sometimes we prepare meals, make the beds, clean and organize the evening activities ourselves. During such trips some students show how much they can do, they surprise us – and at the same time make new friends and gain their respect. They do not think about early leaving school any more.