Week 10 25th March- 1st April ( Cultural/Personal)

This week the weather in the Netherlands was beautiful, spring is well and truly here at last. I took full advantage of this blissful weather by sunbathing outside in the afternoons alongside the canal beside our student accommodation. Also, due to the lovely weather went exploring some of the beautiful parks in Nijmegen.

Exploring Nijmegen

On school placement this week I was given the opportunity to take three science lessons. Unfortunately, the class teacher was on a school trip to Italy and therefore I would be responsible to take the class on my own. I was slightly anxious about the experience but the teacher reassured me he had every confidence that the lessons would be a success. He decided that it would be worthwhile to video-record the lessons and therefore we could watch them back together and discuss my progress. Luckily, the lessons went well, the classes were well behaved and the pupils completed all the work I had planned for them. It will be interesting to see the videos back. I have never had my lessons videoed before so it will be a good experience and I am excited to see the footage. Hopefully, I will learn a lot from this experience and it will undoubtedly help my professional development as a training teacher.

 Old-fashioned windmills in the Open Air museum

This week within the module of 'Dutch culture and society' we had a trip to a museum. The museum we visited was the Open Air Museum in Arnhem which is the town located next to Nijmegen. The museum is similar to the Ulster Folk and transport museum back home. This year the museum was celebrating its 100^th anniversary. The museum boasts a range of Old Dutch farmhouse buildings, windmills, churches, schools and the museum also contains its own fully functional old-fashioned tram. It was interesting to see and hear how people in the Netherlands used to live and make and living. We also where shown how the Dutch used to make paper, milk, cheese and honey. There was a section in the museum that displayed old-style Dutch clothing and head wear. I found the headwear most interesting. In the Netherlands it was traditional for women to wear a Dutch cap or Dutch bonnet. It was usually made of white cotton or lace. However, it is interestingly characterized by triangular flaps or wings that turn up on either side. This can be seen in the photograph below.

       The Dutch cap or bonnet which is characterised by triangular flaps or wings.