Children in Germany usually like to go to school. However, their enthusiasm diminishes during school hours, as a representative survey commissioned by the KiKA children's channel revealed.
While first- and second-graders still say about 90 percent that they are satisfied, the approval rating for fifth and sixth graders drops to 73 percent. Looking at all six grades together, eight out of ten children like to go to school or very much. The girls tend to say something more often than boys do.
Information about the study
Who conducted and funded the study?
The study was commissioned and financed by the ARD and ZDF children's channel KiKA. It was carried out by the market research institute iconkids and youth.
How was the data collected?
From February 21 to March 29, 373 interviewers interviewed 1296 first- to sixth-graders using a standardized questionnaire. The sample was based on a representative distribution of age and gender, migration background, grade level, school type, level of education of the parents, marital status, population of the municipality and state. The results obtained are therefore representative of first- to sixth-graders in Germany.
What was the purpose of the investigation?
The aim of the survey was to incorporate the children's view of their lifeworld school into the work on the formats and programs at the KiKA.
The most satisfied students are therefore in Thuringia. Here, nine out of ten children like school and lessons. In neighboring Saxony-Anhalt and in Rhineland-Palatinate, there are the most young critics. On average, only seven out of ten respondents like to go to school or very much.
Most students like to go to school here
Percentage of students by states who say they are happy to go to school.
The best thing about the children is that they can meet friends at school and take a break. Class teachers are also very popular with the children. The great majority of first- to sixth-graders are also pleased about the prospect of taking part in class. Homework and performance checks, on the other hand, only generate anticipation for just under three out of ten children.
School children in Germany, however, would like to start later with the first lesson. On average, according to the survey, they would like to start school at 8.40. The interviewers had asked, "When would you like to start the first lesson?" Almost all children gave a specific time in response, mostly the information was between 8.30 and 8.50 clock.
The vote of the children coincides with recommendations of the German Society for Sleep Research and Sleep Medicine, which pleads for a later school start. Half an hour less sleep could reduce school performance by 30 percent. In Germany, the school usually starts at eight o'clock. This is earlier than in many neighboring countries, which often start at half past eight.
more on the subject
When suggesting what could be improved at their school, 30 percent of the surveyed children call the playground if the answer option is open. In second place of the ranking is "Nothing", followed by the rooms and the toilets.
In terms of food, technology or cleanliness, on the other hand, only very few children see any need for improvement. These are the topics that often torment the minds and politics. Many people have scary memories of the toilets of their school days, the topic was even present in the last federal election campaign.
About the food in schools regularly makes the German Society for nutrition a head - and usually criticizes. And digitization and the digital pact have recently driven education policy like no other topic. The young students, it seems, are much calmer here.
However, the technology would still be expandable in most federal states, as also emerges from the survey.
- According to the children, computers or laptops are at least sometimes used at 56 percent in the classroom. In the first two classes this is 27 percent, while more than 90 percent of the fifth and sixth years indicate this.
- Twenty-two percent of children agree that there are too few computers or laptops for all students. Almost a third, on the other hand, thinks there are "enough people".
- At home, more than every second child in the third grade uses the Internet for homework, papers, and learning, regardless of gender.
- Interactive boards, so-called whiteboards, are present in at least some classrooms in 42 percent of the surveyed students. The equipment is best in Thuringia, Brandenburg and Berlin.
About the quality of the lessons, the numbers say nothing. Didactics say one device per pupil does not have to be and the technology can not compensate for missing educational concepts. Some teachers also wish the chalkboard back.
So widespread are electronic blackboards
Percentage of students by states that have a whiteboard in at least one room in their school
Your mobile phone is only allowed to use a minority of respondents in the school: According to the first to sixth graders, more than two thirds of the schools have a mobile phone ban. If the children could decide about it, the majority of the respondents would allow the mobile phone for the break and for excursions.
The participation in the mobile phone rules is more important to the older students with 85 percent than the first and second graders, of which 60 percent want to be involved in cell phone use. The most important thing for the children is to participate in the class-speaker election. 65 percent would also like to influence the design of the lessons.
The performance of elementary students is often statistically recorded, for example in the IQB education trend or the igloo comparison test. Schoolchildren, on the other hand, hardly have the opportunity to express their opinion and influence it. At least the OECD education report from the previous year has been refilled in this area: For the first time was examined whether children and young people feel integrated in their school and how satisfied they are with their lives.