Greetings from the elementary school in a village named Pyhältö in Hamina! Flat Stanley wanted to see what the school is like and he got to go along with the mother of the family, as she works as a teacher . It is a very small school with only 4 teachers, 2 assistive persons and 46 students. In the school there are grades from 1 to 6 and only three classrooms. So in one classroom there are two grades studying together. In the same building there is also a day care where there are 20 children of ages 1 to 6 years.
In Finland you start preschool when you're 6 years old and you go to the first grade of school when you're 7 years. After the elementary school the children from Pyhältö go to another school near the centre of Hamina. There are classes 7 - 9. After that you have had your basic education and you can choose to go to "lukio", which is a school to prepare you to higher studies like to universities, or you can go to a vocational school to get yourself a profession in 2-3 years, to become for example a hairdresser, a mechanic, a carpenter, a catering person or so on...
This is the Pyhältö school and on the left side there's the day care.
This is from the school yard when the snow is almost gone... Our school starts at eight, nine or ten o'clock. The children come to school by bike, bus or taxi depending on where they live. We have 45 minutes` lessons and between the lessons we have a 15 minutes` recess. During the recesses the children play in the yard. Here we had a place to ice skate during the PE lessons in the winter but now it´s a good place to play different games, for example soccer, which is very popular in Finland. Another popular game is Finnish baseball. It's a little bit different from your baseball but the basic idea is the same to hit the ball and run around the field.
Flat Stanley was a little bit shy this time and he didn't dare to get pictures taken until all the other children had gone home. The school ends at 12, 1 or 2 pm, so each day you have four to six lessons and the schedule is different every day. This is from the 3rd and 4th classroom. There are 14 students in the class, 8 fourth graders and 6 3rd graders. One of the teachers work with a couple of the children from my class because they learn better in a small group.
The 3rd and 4th graders have 23 lessons a week and their subjects are Finnish, English, maths, biology and geography, religious knowledge, music, arts, handicrafts and PE. The subjects that the students usually like the most are PE, handicrafts, music and art. At eleven o'clock we have lunch, which is prepared in our school and is free for everyone (it's paid out of the taxes we pay to the town)
Here's the classroom. Because the school is in the countryside, we have a lot of nature around us. Sometimes we take a little walk around the area nearby. After school the children do their homework and go to their hobbies. Usually the chilren are alone at home before their parents come home from work. For the first and second graders there is also a possibility to stay at school in the day care before their parents come home.
So, this is probably the last time you'll hear about Jaguar Flat Stanley's adventures here in Finland. The family will sure miss him but we think it's time to get him back home before the summer vacation. I sure hope he'll make it in time! It was very nice to have Stanley here, there are so many stories we didn't have time to tell, but I hope Stanley will tell the rest when he gets home to Jaguar! Have a great summer and enjoy the holidays!
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