Tales of Education…

Ok, I haven't written much about the education system here…other than the fact that it is different from back home. VERY different.

Basically, each class meets once a week in a two-hour long seminar (which includes a ten-minute coffee break in the middle). Some (rare) classes meet twice a week. I have already described to you the ordeal we had in signing up for class. To refresh your memories, we were called up one by one and asked which classes we wanted to take. Then the person handwrote it out and handed you a copy with the times those classes are supposed to meet. If those classes even exist.

Oh and all the classes don't start the same week. The higher the level, the later it starts. We had one class start in week 4 because we sneaking in on part of M.A. program for Children's Lit.

You see, the tutors for those classes look at the demand and choose the classes they wish to teach…not necessarily the ones you signed up for. That is precisely what happened to us. We signed up for a certain Victorian Literature class. The head of the American Studies corrected our schedules and gave a different room number for our class. That was fine. On the day the class was supposed to start, we wandered around campus trying to find the right building. We got lost, so we asked our friends to security guards to help us out. They call us the Terrible Twins :) One of them looked it up on his computer while we listened to a discourse between the other guard and a British student about some lass who left her lad and how he came back and painted all the walls in her house black, so she had a black house. "And I bet you've never heard the like," he said. They think we are very funny and constantly teach us about local history. They made sure that we went to see the witch's stool on the River Stour. Anyway, we got the right room for our class and went on our way.

The door said Victorian Literature, so we went in and got good seats. At the start of the lecture, the tutor announced that it was on modernism. We both froze. Every time he said the word Victorian, we jumped. It was a very interesting lecture on the disintegration of art in the period, but we were almost too stunned to take notes.

After class, we spoke to him and well…to cut a long story of emails and searching…we got is figured out. We went to the American Studies office and got in the right class (on a different day, and different time). We missed our first class. That's just the way they roll around here.

If you think our problem was annoying, I know other people with worse problems.

Such is the English Education "system."

Our Children's Lit class is fun though. The professor is a "very nice bloke," as one of our other tutors put it. He never looks at the class during the lecture, but stares constantly at the ceiling. You guessed, he never sees anyone who wants to make a comment.

I'm not so sure about this, but I don't think British students raise their hands to make a point in a small discussion group. I've not seen one do it so far. Not like I have many classes with British students. Of the two classes that are supposed to be with Brit students, only one is made up of mostly Brits (two other Americans). In the other one, the Americans dominate.

Oh, and homework…doesn't really exist. Whatever you want to learn, you study. Sort of… You are not required to learn every single thing that the tutor teaches you. You focus on a certain area intensely in an essay and a written exam. That's your grade right there. No participation grades, no little assignments…one big paper. I'm a little unnerved about it myself.

Better go study :)

Cheers!

--Mary