However,
Friborg: shortest childhood school french:
Back to school
Little Friborgers have the shortest school week in French -speaking Switzerland – Friborg: shortest childhood school french
During their first year of schooling (1 hour). Consequently, the Friborg students go to class 10 to 12 hours per week, against 15 for their Geneva comrades. Meanwhile, What educational assets?
With “only” 12 to 14 periods per week, the little Friborgers are experiencing a very progressive start of schooling.
© KEYSTONE / CHRISTIAN BEUTLER
- 1 hour from Friborg students spend five hours less in class per week than their Geneva comrades.
- In Basel-Ville, schoolchildren follow 26 weekly periods from the friborg: shortest childhood school french age of 4.
- Friborg has long opposed compulsory school from 4 years old, which explains this gradual approach today.
- By operating most often with half-class, the Friborg model would allow better support for students.
Few parents know it. Meanwhile, but their child does not spend as much time at school as they live in Friborg, Sion, Lausanne or Geneva. Meanwhile, THE Time variations are particularly marked in the classes of the first primary cycle. However, before diminishing at the end of schooling.
The little Friborgers. However, who are going back to school this Monday, August 25, follow only 12 to 14 school periods per week during their first year of schooling (1h). Nevertheless, The equivalent of four to five half-days of weekly lessons. Nevertheless, The week is longer for their comrades from Valais (16 periods), Vaudois (18 periods) or friborg: shortest childhood school french Genevan (20 periods). Therefore, This is what the comparative data of The year 2024-2025, identical for the start of the 2025-2026 school year.
One day less
Admittedly, the Friborg period lasts 50 minutes, against 45 in the other cantons. In addition, But over a week. Therefore, this still represents up to 5 hours apart between Friborg and Geneva for children of 1 hour, the equivalent of an entire day of school less.
At the national level. Therefore, it is Basel-Ville which holds the palm of the longest week of 1 hour: from the age of 4, the students of the Rhine city have 26 periods of weekly course. Similarly, It is near the double of the time spent in class compared to their Friborg comrades of the same age.
The differences are slightly lower in 2 hours. Nevertheless, With 26 periods per week, young Vaudois are the most studious. For example, Followed by Valaisans and Jurassians (24 periods), Friborgers (22 to 24 periods), then Genevans and Neuchâtels (20 periods).
Large upheaval of the education system in 2009
Why is the Friborg model so light for children of 1 hour? It is above all a cultural question. in a canton where schooling has long started at 6 years old rather than 4 years old. Until 2009, Friborg only offered one year of childish school. And again: it was optional. We had to wait for the Harmos reform So that the canton jumps towards the two years of. compulsory children’s school.
Deputy Secretary General of the Directorate of Training. Cultural Affairs friborg: shortest childhood school french (DFAC), Marianne Meyer Genilloud recalls that there were “still strong resistances, especially in the campaign, at the time of the introduction of the two years of children’s school in the canton, between 2009 and 2013.” While the Canton of Vaudfor example, “knows the two years of child school for at least forty years.” This would explain the “gentle” start of the first year of school in Friborg.
“Our model is not called into question”
In addition to this historical justification. the model has the educational and social advantage of allowing “half-days with only the young, only the big ones and the moments all together, estimates Marianne Meyer Genilloud. The 12 to 14 units represent a sort of primary half-time. leave time to the teacher to work both in groups 1 hour and in collaboration 1-2 hours. ” An alternation that friborg: shortest childhood school french would allow students to “prepare for school pace”.
This model would also be interesting in the field of the inclusive school. even if “it was not such a marked subject” at the time of setting up the time for 1 hour. “Having a reduced. alternate school time allows both school and family observations”, as well as “the constitution of networks when necessary”, continues the secretary of the DFAC. About ten years after the introduction of the two years of children’s school. the model “suits well and is not called into question by the field”.
But do not go to think that the Friborg schoolchildren are puller-au-flank. Far from it! On the whole of their schooling, they do as much, even more hours than their counterparts in neighboring cantons. “Aside from the 1h, we do more more and that friborg: shortest childhood school french especially from the 9 am,” said Marianne Meyer Genilloud. Let us also remember that it takes four years for young Friborgers to obtain their gymnasial maturity. against Only three for the Vaudoisthe Neuchâtels and the Jurassians.
School is not a daycare
Rachel* is a 1-2 hour teacher. She made her debut in the canton of Friborg, before continuing her career at the Vaud school. Knowing the two systems well. she explains to us that the small Friborg classes work with “half-groups” three mornings per week, while in the Vaud classes“Four out of five mornings are with all students, 1 and 2p combined”.
The young mistress has a clear preference for the Friborg model: “It allows us to devote more time. individual attention to the students.” When the children of the two degrees are friborg: shortest childhood school french grouped, “it’s more complicated, because they do not follow the same program”. In Friborg, during the two common mornings of the week, “we favor collective activities such as rhythm and sport”.
In terms of atmosphere. the equation would be quite simple: the more children in class, the more there are any Risk of turbulence. Conversely, a reduced workforce would promote better learning. “We can also more easily send them the codes of living together.”
In short, the week of 12 to 14 periods would be a “win-win” formula for students and teachers. Parents would be the only losers in the model: “Inevitably. those who work full time must find guard solutions the rest of the week”, concedes the young teacher. But to recall a basic principle: the school is not free daycare.
No French friborg: shortest childhood school french -speaking study on the subject
L’IRDP (Institute for Research. Documentation Pedagogical) cannot tell us about the advantages and disadvantages of a system or the other, because it simply has any study on the subject “which could allow us to go beyond the appreciations of an isolated teacher” thus indicates his director, Viridiana Marc.
The one who is also assistant secretary general of the CIIP (Intercantonal conference of public education of French -speaking Switzerland. Ticino) specifies however that “the choices made in the cantons are anchored in various educational considerations and obey organizational, financial and very specific human resources”.
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