France 2022 Fulbright Travel Reflection
My guiding questions centered around what I am passionate about teaching: the Holocaust, gifted education and global citizenship. What I learned throughout my travels in France and through observing, meeting and speaking with multiple French teachers is that they are also grappling with difficult topics and historical events while coming through a pandemic with students dealing with trauma and finding their way as they navigate difficult political times.
Q1: Is there a national middle and high school curriculum for teaching about the Holocaust and WWII in France?
Like we in the United States grapple with difficult subjects about American history in our teaching, such as slavery and the removal of indigenous people from their land, teachers in France have to grapple with the complicated history of France during World War II and the Holocaust. A Bordeaux middle school history teacher talked to me for an hour on the phone on a Saturday morning to help answer my question that no other teachers had been able to answer about their Holocaust and WWII curriculum. In a nutshell, it’s complicated. Her history textbooks briefly focus on the resistance movement and the occupation, without delving too much into the deportation of the Jews of France to camps within France and eventually to Auschwitz.
Q2: How do teachers in France accommodate and differentiate for advanced learners in the classroom? Are there certified gifted and talented educators and programs for identified gifted and talented students in public schools?
Not all states in the US have mandated services for gifted and talented students that Kansas provides. In France there is no real differentiation and certainly no specific gifted education pull-out classes or teachers. The exams at the end of the year are essentially the deciding factors for students in their future choices. The rigorous coursework that all students complete in France, much of which is written by hand and not on computers, means that students have to prepare and study in order to pass into the level that they hope to achieve. Students are tracked and choose their path early–in the 8th grade. These paths lead to career choices and include real-world learning, like at Mantes-la-Jolie school on the outskirts of Paris where students were showcasing their advertising, marketing and design skills in a boutique that they created for students to shop. Because the students were in an underserved area without many resources, teachers donate gently used items and some new items to the “store” and students could shop there for beautiful evening wear for the opera in Paris that they went to as a field trip. Students were also baking cookies that they were catering for an open house to be held at the school that evening. This is a contrast to the Lycee Henry IV, a highly competitive school that students apply to enter based on their exam scores. This selection process ensures that the top students from anywhere in France have access to a top academic Lycee regardless of their financial situation. So while they don’t have gifted education per se, they do track students and give rigorous exams to move up to the next level, which essentially aids the intellectually gifted to rise to the top.
Q3: How does the French education system encourage global education and global citizenship?
Because of proximity and EU membership, French education includes global learning. An English class we observed had been to Ireland to practice English and learn about Irish culture. Many teachers have offered to do exchanges with me and to keep in touch through this school year. An English teacher from Bordeaux, who I didn’t even get a chance to meet in person because of COVID, has been talking with me on WhatsApp and we are planning to have our students study common texts this year and discuss them. We have talked about having our students make movies of our schools and present to each other the best of our schools. I will also be working with a teacher from Poitiers who will be bringing students to the United States to visit my school in Overland Park.
OnThe absolute best part of the Fulbright TGC France experience was the time spent with exceptional colleagues who are equally committed to helping students learn no matter what city, what state or what country they are from. Teachers have been through so much since March 2020 and to be surrounded by teachers who are committed to staying in education, despite the mass exodus that is occurring all over the world, including France and the United States, gave me hope for the future as a teacher. This opportunity reinvigorated me and made me come back to Kansas ready and committed to global education and the future that I will be able to provide my students through exchanges with teachers in France and through further learning about France and other countries in the world. Our global pandemic has affected the teachers of France, but they are hanging in there, just like we are, with the welfare of students in our hearts.
Travel is an essential part of life. Although we are still in a global pandemic and travel is very different, we can travel safely (and virtually) to find global experiences to bring into our classrooms. Why are there videos here of Thailand and France? Because Covid 19 changed our world and my Fulbright TGC experience. What was once a travel section centered on Thailand, it's changed with the times: Paris 2022, here we come!