Overview
- Public education in Germany is decentralized, i.e. states are responsible for developing their curricula and assessments. Consequently, German schools in Abu Dhabi offer the curriculum of the state they are affiliated with.
- At present, there is only one German school in Abu Dhabi. It offers the Thuringia curriculum, with German as the language of instruction.
- Play-based learning is emphasized in the Kindergarten years. On the other hand, in primary school, German, Science and Mathematics are allocated greater time than other subjects.
- The key differentiating feature of the German system is that after primary school (Grundschule), students are sorted into different streams/tracks in secondary education that can lead to different career pathways.
Progression
- Kindergarten begins at the age of 3 and lasts 3 years.
- Primary school (Grundschule) is from Grades 1-4.
- For the German School in Abu Dhabi, students are placed in one of the following tracks at the end of Grade 5:
- Hauptschule - prepares students for vocational education
- Realschule - an intermediate level of education, with a broad range of educational options
- Gymnasium - for study at higher education institutions;
- Gesamtschule - a combination of the Hauptschule, Realschule and Gymnasium.
- The German school in Abu Dhabi offers all tracks. Typically, a majority of students undertake the Gymnasium track to attend university.
- Students have the option of transitioning from one track to another until Grade 8.
- Students following the Realschule track have the option of leaving school and transferring into vocational training at the end of Grade 10, or alternatively, with sufficiently good grades, transferring to Gymnasium in order to complete the Abitur (university entrance exam) in Grade 12.
|
School Level |
Age |
Grade |
|||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
|
Kindergarten |
3-4 |
KG 1 |
|||
|
4-5 |
KG 2 |
||||
|
5-6 |
KG 3 |
||||
|
Grundschule |
6-7 |
1 |
|||
|
7-8 |
2 |
||||
|
8-9 |
3 |
||||
|
9-10 |
4 |
||||
|
Hauptschule |
Realschule |
Gymnasium |
Gesamtschule |
10-11 |
5 |
|
|
|
|
|
11-12 |
6 |
|
12-13 |
7 |
||||
|
13-14 |
8 |
||||
|
14-15 |
9 |
||||
|
15-16 |
10 |
||||
|
|
|||||
|
|
|
|
16-17 |
11 |
|
|
17-18 |
12 |
||||
Assessments
- In the Kindergarten years, students are assessed by means of teacher observation and assessment of emotional and cognitive development, language, social behavior, artistic and gross and fine motor skills.
- In primary Grades, teachers assess students against standards provided by the respective curriculum framework.
- Students in the Abu Dhabi German school take competency tests at the end of Grades 3, 6 and 8 in German, English and Mathematics.
- At the end of Grade 6, students obtain the German Language certificate by taking an exam.
- Students in the Realschule track are given the opportunity to take the Realschulabschluss exam at the end of Grade 10. It usually consists of both written and oral assessments. With this qualification, students may choose to enroll in a vocational training institute, or transfer to a Gymnasium, provided they have sufficiently good grades.
- The German International Abitur Examination (Deutsches Internationales Abitur/DIA) is the more prestigious version of the German Abitur (school leaving exam) at the end of Grade 12. Part of the written and oral exams for this diploma are taken in an international language, which is English in the case of Abu Dhabi.
Accreditation
- The German Schools Abroad program ensures that the international schools offer an education standard equivalent to that of local schools in Germany. Schools are externally inspected by the German government authorities once every 3 years for quality assurance.
- The German school in Abu Dhabi is sponsored by the German Embassy and recognized officially as a “German School Abroad”, meaning that all report cards and certificates are the same as those issued in Germany.