We trudged a block from the station through a constant drizzle (it was yet another rainy day) and arrived in front of a large white building with sliding glass doors. Thankfully, our program covered the costs of this excursion, so we were able to enjoy the afternoon checking out the museum and its current special exhibition: Mathematics in Nature.
The museum actually gave us a brief 10-minute tour first (which must’ve been the shortest tour I’ve ever gotten in Germany…normally, I feel like they drag on for at least an hour, so this was pleasant). However, since we had all four class levels present, the teachers asked for a tour in English. The tour guide obliged, although with a bit of hesitance and a brief admission that she had originally anticipated speaking in German (by far, my personal preference).
After about 5 minutes of the tour in English though, she asked if it’d be alright if she just spoke in German and have one of the teachers or students translate. Everyone agreed, and it was honestly much better because then she could actually explain details about the exhibits she hadn’t been able to before. ‘Twas also nice that there was very little need for translation.
I know not everyone enjoyed the time we spent at the museum instead of in language class, but I appreciated the opportunity to go to Giessen and check out the museum. At the same time, I did feel like the museum was probably more suitable for younger students. There was a group of elementary school aged kids there with us, and all the exhibits were interactive gadgets and whatnot. Think Pacific Science Center in Seattle or OMSI in Portland.
Nevertheless, interactive gadgets, exhibits for kids, and a group of Fulbrighters make for a fun combination. Naturally, I took a number of pictures. I liked this little contraption a lot.
It was basically a long string pulled tight from the top to the ground next to a wheel with alternating black and white lines. You were supposed to spin the wheel and then pull the string back a bit and let it go. The tension would then cause waves to go up and down the string, which when seen in front of the spinning wheel allows you to better see the individual waves. Not sure I explained that well, but hopefully it makes sense.
We also saw some engineering puzzles like this arch of 21 blocks. After a few attempts, we succeeded…
…much to everyone’s delight.
The entire museum was rather spacious and really not all that full. Some of the captions were in German only; others had both English and German. I forced myself to read the German ones first though, and I’m glad I was able to get the gist of just about everything. I learned some new vocab words too.
This last picture was of a bubble machine. I have no idea what the purpose of it was, but it seemed cool.
Today, I also finally made the suggestion to our teacher to correct our speech more in class. It’s certainly nothing new and completely understandable that we all make mistakes here and there with our grammar, sentence structure, adjective endings, cases, and articles (masculine, feminine, neutral, etc.); however, I find myself constantly checking my dictionary when I hear words being spoken in class with what I perceive to be incorrect articles or otherwise. Most of the time, I find that my initial instinct was correct, but I mainly worry that I’ll mix it up because I hear the same mistakes being made on a regular basis.
Our teacher agreed that we were making a number of mistakes in our speech (that brought a good laugh), but he also explained his philosophy for addressing mistakes in spoken German. He said, from his experience, corrections made when someone is speaking usually cause the person to become so nervous that they forget what they were even trying to say because they’re already busy trying to think of how to construct the sentence. So he prefers making corrections to grammar in our writing, with the hope and expectation that we review all his corrections and re-write corrected sentences, so we can learn from our mistakes.
I’m not sure how many of us actually do that though. I certainly review my corrections, but I haven’t re-written anything. Maybe I should, but at the same time, I do hope for more corrections in our class conversations. He compromised with us and said he’d correct major errors and ones that we keep repeating, but he wouldn’t correct every single mistake with gender, articles, adjective endings, etc. Better than nothing, I guess.
I’ve also been writing emails to friends around Germany in German, which has pleasantly surprised a number of them. It’s good to hear that my skills have improved since they last saw me, since I had only taken one year of German at that time. I’m discovering a new (at least, for me) aspect of written German through texting as well (and Facebook messages). People start omitting subjects from their sentences, which is basically like saying: “Going to the store now. Then coming home.” I suppose that sounds more normal than texting: “I am going to the store now. Then I am coming home.” But, seriously, don’t you capitalize correctly in your emails and use full sentences in your text messages too? J
Anyway, it’s hard to believe it’s the middle of the week already. I finished three transcriptions this weekend, which is not nearly enough considering how much time I had. I will keep working on it. I also received an email from one of my mentees asking me to write a new blog update for Scholarship Junkies like the one I wrote in Athens last year. She said it helped inspire her to do well in her first year of college, and she hopes a new one I write this year will inspire her sister to have a great senior year of high school. If I don’t write this by Saturday, please make sure I do. Thanks.
Ok, time to go to do homework. Toodles.
Sam
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