The majority of my year will be spent in schools, working with students and teachers, so I will be learning a great deal about the Norwegian school system (and will probably spend a great deal of time on this blog talking about it). But, my first experience with the school system has been with my kids. I wanted to share a bit about how that has been so far since we have been here a month. (I can’t believe it’s been a month.) My next two posts will be about their schooling so far. This one will focus on how primary schools work and post two will be on my kids’ experiences.
I feel I need to start every blog about education in Norway by saying that Norway is small—around 5 million people—so what they can do with their school system should be compared to a state school system and not our national school system (although I think we could apply much of it to a larger, national system).
Before we came, we spent some time talking about schools. Many people thought we would send Jack and Lucy to private school or international school, but we opted for the public school (since that’s kind of my thing). Both of them are considered in primary school, which in Norway is equivalent to grades 1-8 in the United States. (In Norway, kindergartens are for children up to 6 years old.) Children are placed in grades based on the year they were born, not a date cutoff within the year. So, all children born in 2006 are in 7th grade this year and all born in 2010 are in 3rd grade.
Also, all primary schools do not give pupils (what they call people in are not at university) grades. They give them extensive feedback and portfolios. Pupils get written and oral feedback and teachers are in close communication with pupils and parents.
When you know where you will be living in Norway, you contact your neighborhood school who is required to either place your child in a class or find a school near for your child to attend if their school is full. If you are coming to Norway from another country, you are then sent for an assessment. The assessment decides where children are academically (if they are at grade level with the Norwegian education system) and also how fluent they are in Norwegian.
We went to the assessment at Språksenteret (Norwegian Language School) where they gave Jack and Lucy short assessments—one on one with a teacher—in English, math, social studies, science, and religion to see where they were at. They then recommended a school for both of them based on the assessment.
If pupils who are new to Norway have not had previous education or are not at grade level with Norwegian schools, they are sent to an A, B, C class, where they focus on getting pupils to grade level as well as work on Norwegian. If they are at grade level but don’t know Norwegian, they are sent to one of the schools in Oslo that has a reception class, which is a smaller class for children to continue their grade level education as well as learn Norwegian. Usually, they stay in a reception class for around a year, maybe two, until they know enough Norwegian to transfer to their neighborhood school and a regular class.
If a pupil is between ages 10-15 and strong academically, they can attend school at Språksenteret where in addition to academics they do intensive language training and usually within four or five months are fluent enough to transfer to their neighborhood school to continue their education in traditional classes.
Språksenteret has pupils from all over the world who are learning Norwegian. Classes in all these programs are relatively small with a great deal of one on one teaching. At Språksenteret, once the pupil is ready to transfer to their home school, they spend some time visiting the home school to make sure they are comfortable there. Usually, this is once a week for a month.
Jack is going to Språksenteret and Lucy is in a reception class at Bolteløkka skole. My next post will focus on the day to day for both of them in their new schools.