First, we will answer the general and specific questions:
Concerning school life, we have observed that there are similarities and differences between and within our grandparents’, parents’, and our own generations.
There are many differences within our grandparents’ generation. For example, some of our grandparents went to school and others didn't. This is because school was not compulsory and formal education was not free – not even in public school. There are similarities, too, such as the subjects that were the same. These include mathematics, science, and French.
In our parents’ generation, teenagers usually went to school by bus or on foot. In school, some teachers were more violent than others. All of our parents had a lot of homework to do. We can conclude that there were many similarities between them.
There are many similarities within our own generation. We all have a lot of homework to do. School generally starts at 7:30 am and ends at 4:00 pm. Concerning differences, some teenagers go to school by bus or by car, whereas others go to school on foot. Perhaps the most important difference is that today’s students are selected to attend different schools based on their academic performance. Therefore, school is more competitive in our generation that in previous ones.
Between our grandparents’ and parents’ generations, there were a lot of differences. As stated before, school was compulsory for our parents while in our grandparents’ generation it was not. Our grandparents didn’t learn languages like Spanish, German or English, whereas our parents learned these languages. We can conclude that school was more important in our parents’ generation than in that of our grandparents’.
Between our parents’ and our own generation, there are more similarities than differences. For example, students study the same subjects and we start school at the same time. But there are differences too. For example, the punishments were more violent in our parents’ generation than in ours.
Now we will answer the main question: Do students have to work harder to be successful at school nowadays than at the time your grandparents/parents were teenagers? Nowadays, teenagers have to work harder to be successful at school than at the time of our grandparents and parents. This is because today school is more selective and competitive than it was in the previous generations.
Comparison of our outcomes with the results of Jasudben M.L School: We learnt that our school hours are very different from Indian students’ school hours and that they finish earlier than us. What is similar is the fact that in our grandparents’ generation, teachers were more demanding and stricter than today’s teachers.
Reflection: What went well? What was difficult? What would we do differently?
We worked well together and we were able to conduct the interviews conveniently. We enjoyed the videoconference with India. It was very exciting to exchange views on our topic with the students from India. We liked the whatsapp group because we could communicate with our Indian friends outside class. We found it difficult to meet the deadlines because we couldn’t see each other much outside school. We should have written the ‘comparison and conclusion’ part earlier. We could have added photos of our parents and grandparents. We learnt a lot about what our parents and grandparents did at school. And we realised that at school, rules were stricter in the past than nowadays. We discovered that there were many similarities between our parents’ school life and ours.