Marc bends deeply over the sheet of paper. Painting letter by letter. And with a real feather, whose keel the eight-year-old boy dips in ink again and again. "I make so many spelling mistakes with my pen", does marc. To then fill in the blanks of a medieval hero without hesitation. Marc’s hero is king arthur. Whose hobbies are eating, fighting, drinking, sleeping. At least that is what the little schoolboy thinks.
And with him 220 other boys and girls of the elementary school bischberg dive into the world of the middle ages. An entire project week is planned on the occasion of the 1000-year anniversary of the town: open lessons in cross-grade groups, which the teachers conduct with 30 students from bamberg university – mostly prospective elementary school teachers.
"The middle ages in school is written over this week, which academic advisor detlef goller of the chair for german philology of the middle ages offers in a leading role: "it is sensational and unusual that a school will leave a whole week to us", goller is pleased. Together with principal angela hartl, he planned and designed this project week
. "We as an elementary school cannot do it alone in this quality", female the principal. She is all the more impressed by the high level of commitment shown by the students and the obvious enthusiasm with which the schoolchildren go about their work. Detlef goller does not want this kind of teaching to be "bespabung" but rather as "knowledge transfer": how did people live in the middle ages?? How does middle high german sound? It’s amazing how easily the nibelungenlied rolls off the tongue of the young students. How they get into the mindset of knights, damsels and peasants when they build castles, knead bread dough or chop vegetables for a stew with the simplest of guesses.
"The middle ages are closer to the children than goethe", says goller and refers to the hype surrounding harry potter or the "lord of the rings". The project week tries to "convey a realistic picture of the middle ages", that was not only dark. The effect on the students should not be underestimated either: on the one hand, they were able to combine theory with practice, and on the other hand, they were able to test teaching materials that the chair had developed and that are being implemented in selected sequences throughout bavaria.
In the "handicrafts and cooking" group the children learn about old professions like blacksmith, miller or buttner. And then it continues playfully: henrik (7) and johannes (8), for example, twitch their crayons to color in a picture of a blacksmith. "This is more fun than usual, is true already!", beams the two.
Celina (9) and eleni (9) are also eager to shape hub shells out of clay, which are then fired in the clay kiln. "The children are very motivated, explains doris putzka, specialist teacher for handicrafts and textile design, who gently supports the little professionals. There are "jugglers and musicians" in the next classroom building instruments like drums and rattles. In another, a small middle high german dictionary is being created, in which words such as "ros" and "ros" can be found (horse) or "stretch" (knights) are noted.
"The effort was worth it, you have to give the kids some confidence, detlef goller sums up the project week. "Because the grades were split up, the children got to know each other better", adds principal hartl. She is grateful that funds from the community of bischberg, the university and the parents’ council as well as donations of materials have made this project week possible. The parents of the schoolchildren were able to see for themselves at the final school festival what their children had learned about the middle ages over the course of the day.