Which school to send the child to? This is what the parents of all children whose age creeps up to the seven-year-old bar are asked. After all, I want everything at once: both teachers that are good, but fair, and adequate training programs, and classmates are good, and English is compulsory ... It’s good that now in every city there is a fairly large selection of secondary schools, you can choose a school gymnasium / lyceum) to your liking. For example, the gymnasium "Perspective" in Samara - what makes it remarkable?
Gymnasium, not school
If in pre-revolutionary times there were either vocational schools for simpletons, or gymnasiums for the upper classes. Whereas during the Soviet period there were all secondary schools and pioneers everywhere, now there are many educational institutions with a wide variety of them. There are schools, and lyceums, and colleges, and gymnasiums, and even academies. And yet, is there a fundamental difference between them? What is the difference between a school and a gymnasium?
As a rule, there are several differences. Firstly, it is understood that the gymnasium is of a higher rank, therefore, they accept children there, which is smarter and more clever. This does not mean, of course, that all the students in high schools are round students, talents, medalists and obedient guys. Not at all, hooligans, losers and other blockheads are everywhere.
Secondly, if ordinary schools are more often of a technical nature, then in a gymnasium there is usually a humanitarian bias. Languages, Russian and literature, history and social studies, social sciences - all this can be given much more attention in grammar schools than physics or chemistry (but this does not mean that the latter will be taught poorly or poorly).
Even in gymnasiums, as a rule, there are a fairly large number of elective circles at which the child can gain additional and / or advanced skills, where he will be comprehensively developed. In addition, gymnasium education presupposes the existence of stronger, more demanding training programs. Here they give more material in the class and ask more at home, here they demand more and ask more. Often the level of assessment in gymnasiums is also different - somewhere there are units, and somewhere in general assessment is not on a five-, but on a six- or ten-point scale.
Another difference between the gymnasium and the school is the presence of specialized classes, which necessarily appear, as a rule, at the senior level. Most often this is the tenth grade, less often there is a profile division already in the ninth or even in the eighth. Profiles are usually humanitarian - they pay more attention to literature and history, linguistic - they study language / languages more actively, and technical - here more hours are devoted to mathematics with physics. Sometimes such profiles are called physical-mathematical, etc.
Do not forget about the form. Although now they are again trying to introduce it everywhere, including in simple schools, still not all schools follow this idea. As for the gymnasiums, then in them a dress code in clothes is strictly required.
Finally, the last difference is the number of languages studied. In ordinary schools, one language is studied, usually English. Very, very rarely you can find an ordinary high school, where children learn a second language. And for grammar schools, two languages are commonplace. Gymnasiums with a language bias generally offer their students three languages, or even more.
Gymnasium "Perspective" in Samara: the origins
Samara gymnasium owes its birth to God to Vladimir Ivanovich Shamotin. The talented and not indifferent Samara teacher, who became the director of this gymnasium, considered the “Perspective” created by him to be the work of his whole life. Therefore, it will be completely logical and fair to devote a couple of minutes to the “founding father” before telling about the school itself.
Vladimir Shamotin: an excursion into the biography
A brief biography of the first director and founder of the school "Perspective" in Samara is as follows. He was born in 1952 in the then Kuibyshev. In 1969 he graduated from high school, in 1970 went to college, studied at a locksmith. Two years later, he was drafted into the army, after which he entered the Kuibyshev Pedagogical Institute at the Faculty of Biology and Chemistry. He received the specialty of a teacher of biology and chemistry. He taught at school, was either a biology teacher, then a chemistry teacher, then a director at all. And then Shamotin rose to the deputy head of the RONO, and then to the deputy head of the GORONO. And all this - until 1993, until the fall. It was then that a new educational institution appeared in Samara - the Perspective school, which Shamotin headed. And all around, and he himself called this gymnasium a matter of his life, his beloved brainchild. Grammar schools Vladimir Ivanovich gave all his strength, all his energy - until 2001, when he was gone.
General information
Gymnasium "Perspective" in Samara was conceived by Vladimir Shamotin as a humanitarian educational institution with intensive study of languages, in particular English. It was originally created just like a gymnasium (often secondary schools subsequently receive the status of a gymnasium, but this is not the case). In developing the programs and bases of the institution, Shamotin relied on the principles and theories of such teachers as Zankov, Elkonin, Davydov, Tyup, and also drew attention to world experience, in particular the American one.
Two years after the opening of the gymnasium "Perspective" Samara became the so-called school-complex. Then it was a novelty, a curiosity, and now more and more such people appear in the country. What is a school complex? This means that in addition to the usual school education, the level of preschool education also appeared in it. Thus, the structure of the gymnasium from the age of ninety-five includes three levels: first, a kindergarten, then the initial stage of education, and, finally, the senior link. Today, more than seven hundred children study at the gymnasium on the street of the Soviet Army. Of these, sixty are still preschool children.
Since the late nineties of the last century, the primary school of the Perspective school in Samara includes four classes instead of three. This remains to this day.
As for the equipment of this educational institution, it contains everything necessary for full-fledged training and development: a simulator and a gym, language laboratory, media library, library, computer equipment.
Features of the Samara gymnasium
In fact, what is so unusual in one of the gymnasiums of the former Kuybyshev, which even by its very name seems to hint at its dissimilarity to other educational institutions? It’s worth starting at least with the fact that for more than ten years, “Perspective” has been a basic school and an internship site (last seven years) of the Samara Department of Education, as well as the Ministry of Education and Science of the whole region. And since 2010, the gymnasium has been fruitfully cooperating with the University of Cambridge and is its basic school for taking exams in the English language throughout the Volga region. How many schools can boast of this?
If we continue to talk about the features of this educational institution, it should also be noted that three languages are studied here, despite the fact that the main emphasis is on English. They begin to learn English in elementary school, from the eighth grade German is added, and from the fifth you can also study French. This language is not among the mandatory, it is optional, but there are many who wish to speak it in the gymnasium.
Among Samara schools, Shamotin Gymnasium is positioned as an innovative educational institution with similar development programs (of which there are more than twenty) aimed at forming a comprehensively developed and erudite young man.
The leadership of the school "Perspective"
Seventeen years have passed since the death of Vladimir Shamotin, and during this time several people were replaced by the director of a promising gymnasium. Now this position is occupied by Tatyana Vladimirovna Starodubova, who previously worked as a primary school teacher in the aforementioned educational institution.
Then she rose to the position of head teacher of an elementary school, and most recently, about four years ago, she took the director's chair after her predecessor, Natalya Tolstykh, left him.
Methodical associations
In total, five methodical associations function in the Samara gymnasium on the street of the Soviet Army. These are associations of primary classes, foreign languages, humanitarian disciplines, natural-mathematical disciplines and class teachers. There is no point in talking much about the latter, but the first four are of more interest.
Elementary classes
There are eleven people in primary school teachers, and all of them are teachers of the highest category. The educational programs of primary education, which are taught by local teachers, are either the program of Elkonin and Davydov, or the "Promising Primary School". The first is considered to be developmental, aimed at forming the ability of the growing baby to analyze and think deeply, the second is traditional, simpler. Nevertheless, a variety of open classes and seminars are constantly held at the “Promising Primary School” in the gymnasium, so this program is also quite interesting.
From this young age, kids are already accustomed to active research activities - younger students participate in various conferences, competitions and olympiads. As for subjects, they are not particularly different from other schools, except that, as already mentioned, English is already present in elementary school (in many educational institutions it starts only from the fifth grade).
Natural-mathematical disciplines
This association has two teachers of physics, four teachers of mathematics, a chemist, biologist, geographer, computer scientist and three physical instructors. In all these subjects, research is conducted annually. The guys participate in conferences, including visiting ones. Especially often, such events are held with teachers of mathematics and physics.
Humanitarian disciplines
This includes writers and Russian scholars, historians and social scientists, teachers of drawing, music and art culture. The development programs of these disciplines are aimed at self-education of children, at the formation of their planning and analysis skills of their own actions.
Foreign languages
Since the first place in the "Perspective" is English, it is not surprising that it is the "English" among the gymnasium teachers most of all, and they form the basis of this association. Foreign language classes in this institution are characterized by the exchange of experience, visiting open classes, introducing students to the lifestyle of foreign citizens by expanding their general picture of the world with the help of linguistics. All children are prepared for passing international exams at the level of Cambridge (United States).
Paid services
In the gymnasium, not only free tuition, they also provide paid services. These include, for example, circles such as Robotics and Speech Creativity, as well as a preschooler school, an extension course for fourth graders, and additional English courses for international exams. The cost of each specific course can be found by contacting the school directly.
In addition, despite the fact that, like many other educational institutions, the gymnasium is a budgetary institution, parental contributions for certain needs are constantly required here (again, like in other schools). The amount of such contributions, which, in fact, make up the cost of training in the gymnasium "Perspective" Samara, can also be determined immediately before entering it. However, there is no need to be very afraid: contributions to ordinary schools will not significantly exceed the contributions to the gymnasium.
Address of the school "Perspective"
The above institution is not difficult to find. It is located on Sovetskaya Army Street, house number 25. To get to the educational institution, you should go to the Sovetskaya metro station - there will remain about eight hundred meters to the gymnasium.
Institutional reviews
Among the reviews about the Prospect gymnasium in Samara, there are both good and bad, but there are still more first ones. Satisfied write that the teachers of the gymnasium are professionals who perfectly know their subject, that this institution provides a high level of knowledge for future life. Dissatisfied - that the majority of teachers are impolite and do not care about the students, that in recent years they only know in the gymnasium that they "extort" money for one or another need. Like it or not, who knows. In any case, any phenomenon has always had, is and will be two opposite sides.
Interesting facts about the Samara gymnasium
Perspective has its own school radio station. And it is called, of course, also “Perspective”.
This year, the gymnasium celebrates its anniversary - twenty-five years from the date of opening.
In addition to the radio, the gymnasium students have their own television studio, as well as a newspaper and a museum of the history of the gymnasium.
Education in Samara is at a fairly high level, and the prospectus gymnasium, the information about which is indicated above, confirms this. For answers to specific questions, you can contact the school itself by using the phones listed on its website or write there by e-mail.