The Opportunity of Education for All
Interruptions in the educational biography of pupils are avoided as much as possible, in favour of the comprehensive education concept which applies from the age of school readiness through to the 12th year. Developmental problems, whether of individual or social origin, can more easily be overcome. Comprehensive education also means for us that the highly gifted belong together with the less able, just as in life.
The experience of great differences in natural talent, character, joy in learning, as well as in psychological and physical dispositions, educates the peer group of children into socially intelligent companions. They learn to live with differences among their fellows. The foregoing of promotion and selection makes it possible, that also in the upper classes children with behavioural difficulties and special needs can successfully integrate themselves.
Moving on without having to repeat a year
This special integrated school type does not use end-of-year reports that mean a pupil might have to repeat the year if he/she didn’t reach the target, as is done in most other schools in continental Europe. The school is not the place for competitive behaviour, but the development of individual faculties and social responsibility. Peer group classes make for age-appropriate psychological development, particularly in the social and emotional realm. Very often conventionally gifted pupils develop alongside other less able pupils but with above average social and emotional capacities. In the realm of art or craft teaching the relationships are often inverted.
Translated by Britta Edwards