The Life of the Teenagers in Belarus

(For the Ukrainian project The Life of the Teenagers in Different Countries)

Nadezhda Chernook, Maria Khanetskaya, Victoria Tsvechkovskaya

 We think that life of teenagers in Belarus  is not very different from that of other countries.

 As for their tastes we can say that now young people have different preferences in music. The most popular styles are Dubstep, Rock, Drum’n’Bass, Pop and etc. In literature like in the movies young people prefer documentaries, comedies, thrillers. In sport boys are addicted to football, basketball. Workout is also popular now. But girls are not inferior to the boys, playing volleyball, dancing.

We guess most of teenagers at school like breaks :) But some lessons are popular among the teens: English, P.E, Geography, History.

As for food we prefer healthy one.

 What concerns watching TV and reading, we prefer to watch TV, because there are many different interesting and informative TV programs, which help us know what's going on.

 Usually we spend our free time with our parents and our friends. We live in a small town and family relations in most of the families are very close.

 The students in our group do not have a particular style of clothes. We wear clothes that we like and which we prefer.

  With some of our friends we share the problems that we cannot share with our parents. But they are only our best friends whom we trust.

 Surely we can discuss some of our personal problems with our parents, for example, problems connected with our friends.

 We study at a very small school (218 students) and have good relations with our teachers. We all are like a big family so there are no reasons for any problems.

  We follow a healthy way of life because it's great to be healthy

 Speaking about all the teenagers in the country we admit that sometimes young people become addicted to alcohol, nicotine and drugs, but not so many. Now healthy lifestyle is popular, everyone wants to become healthier. As for us, we think healthy lifestyle is much better than different addictions. We’ve never understood, why teenagers start smoking or drinking alcohol just for becoming older. It’s silly.

In our country we have not so many opportunities to have a part-time job, unfortunately. But one can find a job during their summer vacations. For example, you can help farmers in harvest-time.

Our families have a lot of traditions and customs. Every year in our families a new custom appears. We like to visit our grandparents in the village, sing songs sitting by the fireplace. Also we adore camping. Two times a year our best friends come to us  and we celebrate New Year’s day and Independence Day.

With our parents we celebrate most of our holidays: New Year’s Day, Easter, Maslenitsa, Independence Day.

With our friends we sometimes celebrate New Year’s Day , Kupalle and our birthdays.

As for us, holidays are full of joy. We’re looking forward to the holidays  for two weeks before them.

High School in Belarus

 (For the Educational Wiki TV Project)

Victoria Zakharevich, Ekaterina Pochopko, Maria Kotovich (the 10-th grade)

-We study at a secondary comprehensive school № 1 in Miory. In Belarus we also have lyceums. We can enroll in lyceums after 9th grade. Also we have to pass exams.

-Students start High School at the age of 15 and finish High School at the age of 17 in Belarus.

-In our High School there are no specific names for each year.

-Our classes correspond to the school programme. We also have optional classes in various subjects that have different names. For example “The Culture of Communication”, “The Secrets of Syntax and Punctuation”, “Revision Mathematical Course”, etc.

-We have 11 grades. High school is  10^th, 11^th grades. We have ten-point estimation system. 10 is the best mark.

-We have breaks between every lesson. The smallest is 5 minutes (after the first lesson), the others are 10,15,20 minutes.

-We have 4 holidays not counting various special days. Autumn, winter, spring and summer holidays. Summer holidays are the longest (3 months)

-It’s a good idea that we can choose electives ourselves.

We have a good approach to every student . Everyone develops his abilities and talents.

-Each lesson in our school is interesting and informative. Besides the usual forms of the lesson teachers often use modern teaching methods. They are debates, conferences, seminars, lessons with interactive games, computer technologies. They promote the development of logic, attention and ability to express our point of view.

-Each subject is interesting in their own way. But our favorite subjects are History, English, Math, the Belarusian and Russian languages.

-Our typical home task usually consists of one or two written assignments and a few oral assignments. Also the teacher can ask us to perform a creative task with the use of additional literature to get high scores. On average we spend about 2 hours a day on homework.

-A teacher evaluates the student’s work fairly and independently. The minimum score for the work is a one, maximum is a ten. The estimation depends on the quality of the work, originality of the material, reliability of the information, on the accurate and correct submission of the material.