Education
Everybody has a right to education in Lithuania. The secondary education is compulsory. Nowadays the life in our country is very difficult and a lot of young people don’t go to school, they haven’t even got secondary education. There are a lot of young people, children especially in big town’s streets. Some of them work washing cars, selling papers, some beg and some have nothing to do. These youngsters very often commit crimes. It is very important that every youngster would attend secondary school. They would be busier and couldn’t commit crimes.
Some years ago secondary schools taught the same subjects, had the same organization of education. Today they are very different: some of them teach humanitarian subjects, some – science. The school curriculum, the organization of the lessons, the timing of the holidays, dressing vary from school to school. Subjects can be taught in three levels even at one school. You can take your examinations in three different levels too. Lithuanian children start attending secondary school when they are six or seven years old. They go to the primary schools which are in the kindergartens mostly. When they are ten or eleven years old they go to a secondary school. Pupils can stay at a secondary school for twelve years, but some of them leave secondary school at the end of the ninth form. They go to vocational junior colleges or manual training schools, where they can get both secondary education and the qualifications necessary for a job. Before that these pupils must take the examinations for the General Certificate of Secondary Education. But not only these, all pupils must take examinations. Everybody can go to a university after graduating from a secondary school, vocational junior college or manual training school. The brightest students have a chance of studying abroad.
Pupils can transfer freely from one school to another. Secondary education is free. Pupils get their textbooks free, too. But some of higher schools and universities are not free. Students who have not very good marks in their Certificates of Secondary Education can study there too. But they have to pay money. Those pupils who are not very good at learning can go to evening school. It is easier to study there.
As for me I attended secondary school No.5 in Marijampolė. I start attending my school when I was six years old. I have been going to this school for twelve years now. Our school is 24 years old. It is not very large: there are about 1000 schoolchildren and about 5 teachers in it. I like my school because there are my friends in it, because my school is famous for skilled teachers. I am on a good footing with them. Some teachers are not very tolerant to schoolchildren who don’t agree with them, but most of them are very generous and nice people; I can go if I have a problem to them. So I am sad at the thought of leaving my school, teachers and class friends. It is definitely our last year at school so I have to do my best.
We have a canteen, a library, some cloak rooms, a big sport hall, a school hall in our school. We have a large playing field near our school. Inside the school building we have a lot of special classrooms where different subjects are taught. The biology room is my favourite because there are many dummies in it. My favourite subjects are English, Biology and Literature. There are some clubs at our school. We have got basketball and football teams. There are some singers and a lot of dancers at our school. On Saturdays we often have dances. We always celebrate various celebrations: The Day of Valentines, The Day of liars, The Day of teachers. We have a nice egg exhibitions in spring. But the most impressive is our New Year carnival.
My parents want me to be a doctor. It is their ambition, and I am planning to study medicine in Kaunas. I want to become a midwife. It’s a very responsible and significant profession. I hate having to ask my mum and dad for money. So I must study. But I don’t want to leave my family and friends. Anyway, I’m scared of living on my own in a big town. I must continue learning for the rest of my life.
Education is very important in person’s life. The years when we attend at school are the happiest. Educated people are intelligent.
The school year begins on the first of September and finishes in June. The school year is divided into three terms.
Free time, entertainment
To my mind entertainment is very important in our life. We are very busy every day & we need to have a rest, to relax almost every person with any spare time has a hobby, & it’s almost impossible to guess from his appearance his personal interest. I can’t say I have a hobby. I like to do many things, but I can’t call them hobby. One of my favourite thing is poetry which helps me to understand the outside world, brings to my mind the strength of the human spirit, the beauty of man. Poetry helps me to educate myself. When I have some spare time I create poems too. I’m going to publish my creative work in the future. But I know I must work very hard if I want to charm my readers. I wont to appeal to people’s hearts & minds of people, to their feeling & ideals. I’m also interested in architecture so I like to visit the places where I can see how people lived in the past, old buildings, castles. I like Gediminas castle, which foundation is guarded by the “Iron wolf” legend, in Vilnius. The vaults Of Vilnius
cathedral attract me too. The castle of Grand Duke Kęstutis in Trakai admires me very much. If you want to visit the places of interest you have to travel. And I like travelling with my family during our holidays & on weekends. We visit a lot of places in the countryside by our bikes. I think biking is even better than riding in a car because you can follow narrow trails in the fields & in the woods where there are no roads. I like ride a bike because I can hear birds sing, listen to the sounds of nature & enjoy the fresh air then. I’m interested in photography too. I always take my camera with me when I’m on holiday. I keep a photograph record of family events. I like to correspond. I have a lot of pen-friends in all over the world. I have a pen-friend in Greece & I have been corresponding for 3 years. I like listen to the radio. My favourite radio station is “Radio centras” . In my opinion this station is for people of all ages, interests & tastes. I like listening comments & discussions on current affairs, interviews with various people. I like different kind of music. The programs of “Radio centras” are followed by music, & that’s why it interests me. TV is very popular in my life. I like to watch TV in the evenings. Entertainment programs are my favourite. I like : “Šou bulvaras”, “Dviračio Šou”, “Taip & Ne”. Very often I watch films too. I don’t go to the cinema because today we can see a lot of interesting films at home. Today cinema attendance fall because many people have video recorders at home. But I like to go to the theatre because it helps me to get back my energy. It’s one of the ways of getting out of depression. In my opinion entertainment makes our life more beautiful.