Graz

All last week, I was at my teacher orientation in GRAZ! A beautiful, typically Austrian city 2 hours south of Vienna. Graz is also very well known as a student city. Think of it as Austria's Madison...

I took a train from Amstetten on Monday and made it to Graz in the afternoon. The weather was lovely, and we got to stay in a real castle! The food was excellent, and I met a lot of very nice people! This has been great.

I also gained lots of knowledge about the Austrian school system, and the seminar leader gave us some great tips about teaching, and using various materials in the classroom. We also got to meet the head of the Fulbright Commission in Austria (Anita Dall - who is actually switching jobs next week, so we will have to deal with someone else) and I have lots of great people to network with, and a new teachers association to join, TEA - Teachers of English in Austria. They have a seminar in January, which is free for members to attend. AWESOME!

So here are pictures of Graz:

We were given a tour of the city by these Gymnasium students, which was nice. They practiced their English, and were very good about the assignment (though totally typical 15-year-olds -- they ditched us as soon as the tour was over).

I am going to try really hard to remember what they said on the tour, but it was hard to take pictures and listen to them rattling away in their quiet little Austrian accents...so, excuse inaccuracies (there are bound to be a few) and  feel free to comment on the shit I make up, if you know what it really is.

<-- This is some Parliament building or something that was built during the Renaissance (1566?). The photo is taken in the courtyard.




Again, the same building. The stairs lead up to the Mayor's office, or something.

 The main hub of activity in Graz - Jakominiplatz

Statue of some former duke/king/emperor  -->

The four women at each corner represent four tributaries of the Danube.



















 I took this picture while they were talking...those are 2 of the girls at the bottom of the photo XD

Some tower of some old church

A guy surfing in the Mur

True. Nazis are not good.

Another church. This one was not on our tour, we just walked past it.

A view from the bridge

Some other old buildings

Some other bridge the girls giving the tour got all excited about

mountain up to clock

This mountain is apparently the inspiration for the dwarfs' mines in Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs - I'm assuming the Grimm version, not the Disney version.

You can go in and take a tunnel up to the top, where the city clock tower stands. (Glockenspiel?)

A close-up

And...the clock face

These are photos from the top of the mountain.






AND more picture of Graz that did not stand out to me, so I frankly don't remember what they're of...

The oldest church in Graz? This fresco was done in the 1600's

We also got to teach in a classroom in Graz, which was OK. I was not blown away by the experience. We had to create our own, original lesson plan in groups of 4. Let me just say that A) four teachers in one classroom (not counting the original teacher) is WAY too many authority figures. The kids were totally confused & who knows what they got out of it and B) yeah, the kids were kind of bratty and disruptive. That would totally never fly in an American classroom. Not a good one, at least.

Well, yes. I am going to assume that further experiences in Austrian classrooms will be better. Just don't know how long that will take! I start class on Monday...wish me luck!