British education

British education

                              British education

     British education emas us to develop fully the abilities  of individuals,  for  their  own  benefit and of society as a whole. Compulsory schooling takes place  between  the  agers  of  5  and 16, but some pupils remain at shool for 2  years  more,  to  prepare for further higher education.  Post shool education is  organized flaxebly, to  provide  a wide range of opportunities for academic and vacational education and to  continue  studying  through  out life.

     Administration of  state  schools  is  decentralised.   The department of  education  and science is responsible for national education policy,  but it doesn't run  any  schools,  if  doesn't employ teachers, or prescribe corricular or textbooks. All shools are given a considerable amount of freedom.  According to the law only one subject is compulsary. That is religious instruction.

     Children recieve preschool education under the age of  5  in nursery schools or in infant's classes in primary schools.

     Most pupils receive free education finenst from public  fonds  and  the small proportions attend schools wholy independent.  Most independent schools are single-sex,  but  the  number  of  mixing schools is growing.

     Education within the  mantained  schools   system   usually comprises two  stages:  primary and secondary education.  Primary schools are  subdevided  into  infant  schools (ages  5 - 7), and junior  schools  (ages  7 - 11).  Infant schools are informal and children are encouraged to read,  write and make use  of  numbers and develop the creative abilities. Primary children do all their work with the same class teacher exept for PT and music. The work is beist upon the pupils interests as far as possible.

    The junior stage extence over four years. Children have  set pirits of arithmetic,  reading,  composition,  history, geography nature study and others.  At this stage of schooling pupils  were often placed in A, B, C and D streams  according their abilities. The most able children were put in the A stream, the list able in the D  stream.  Till  reccantly most junior shool children had to seat for the eleven-plus examination.  It usually consisted of an arithmetic paper and an entelligent test. According to the results of the exam children  are  sent  to Grammar, Technical or Secondary modern schools.      So called comprehansive schools began to appear after  World War 2.  They are muchly mixed schools which can provide education for over 1000 pupils.  Ideally they provide all the courses given in Grammar, Technical and Secondary modern schools.

     By the law all children  must  receive  full-time  education between the  ages  of 5 and 16.  Formally each child can remain a school for a further 2 or 3 years and continue his studies in the sixth form  up  to  the  age  of 18 or 19.  The course is usually subdevided into the lower 6 and the upper 6.  The  corricular  is narrowed to 5 subjects of which a pupil can choose 2 or 3.

     The main  examinations  for  secondary  school  pupils   are general  certeficate  of education (the GCE) exam and certificate of secondary education (the CSE) exam. The GSE exam is held at two levels:  ordinary  level (0  level) and advanced level (A level).

     Candidats set for 0 level papers at 15 - 16 years away.  GCE level is usually taken at the end on  the  sixth  form.  The  CSE level exam  is  taken after 5 years of secondary education by the pupils who are of everage abilities of their age.

                                 My future profession

     What I  would  like  to  become?  This  question  pasels  me greatly. Every job has its elements of difficulties and interest. I think that nearly all the professions  are  very  important  in life.  But  to  choose  the  right  occupation is very difficult, because we must take in to consideration many  factors.  We  must consider  our  personal  taste and our kind of mind.  At the same time we must satisfy the requirements of our society and  peoples needs in one profession or another.

     The end of school is the beginning of an  independent  life, the  beginning  of  a more serious examination.  In order to pass that very serious exam we must choose the road in life which will help  us  best  to  live  and  work.  Each boy and girl has every opportunity to develop  mind  and  use  knowledge  and  education received  at  school.  Some  may  prefer  to work in factories or works, others want to go  into  construction:  to  take  part  in building power stations and new towns. Many opportunities to work and to satisfy at the same time the requirements of  the  society and your  own  personal  interest are offered in the sfere of the services transport, communications and many others.

     I have  a  specially  liking for to became a programmist.  I like this profession because it very interest.

                             Art gallereys of London

    Speaking about art gallereys of London we should first of all mention  The  national gallery,  The national portret galerey and The tate gallery. I would like to tell you about National portret gallery and about Tate gallery.

     The national gallery houses one  of  the  richest  and  most extensive collections of painting in the world.  It stands to the north of the Trafalgar Square.  the  gallerey  was  desighned  by William  Wilkins and build in 1834-37.  The collection covers all schools and periods of painting,  but is a specially  famous  for it's  examples  of  Rembrant and Rubents.  The british schools is only moderately  represented  as  the  national  collections  are shared with the Tate gallerey.  The National gallerey was founded in 1824  when  the  government  bought  the  collection  of  John Angerstein which included 38 paintings.

     The Tate gallery houses the national collection  of  british painting  from  the 16-th century to the present day.  It is also the national gallerey for  modern  art,  including  painting  and sculpture made in Britain,  Europe,  America and other countries. It was opened in 1897 as the national gallerey of british art. It owes  it's establishment to Suie Henritate who built the gallerey and gave his own collection of 65 painting.

                                           British theatres

     Until reccently  the history of the english theatre has been build around actors rather then companies.  It has been  hard  to find any London theatre that even had a consistent policy.  There are no permanent staff in British theatres.  Apply  is  rehearsed for  a  few  weeks by a company of actors working together mostly for the first time and it is allowed to run as long as  it  draws the odious and pays it's way.

     Another peculiarity of the theatres in Great Britain  is  an follows:  there  are  two kinds of seats,  which can be booked an advanced (bookable),  and unbookable once have no numbers and the spectators  occupy  them  on  the  principal:  first come - first served.  And ancient times plays were acted inside  churches  and later on the market places.

     The first theatre in England "The Blackfries" build in 1576, and  "The  Globe" build in 1599,  which is closely connected with William Shakespeare.  Speaking about our times we should first of all mention "The English National theatre","The Royal Shakespeare company" and "Covent Garden".

     "Covent Garden" used to be a fashionable promenade - it was, before then,  a convent garden - but when it became overrun  with flower-sellers,  orange-vendors and vegetable-growers, the people moved to more exclusive surroundings farther west,  such as  "St. Jame's Square".

     The first "Covent Garden theatre" was build in 1732.  It was burnt down in 1808 and rebuild exactly a year after. It opened in September 1809, with Shakespeare's "Macbeth". Since the middle of the  last  century  "Covent Garden" became exclusively devoted to opera.

     Now "Covent  Garden"  in busier than ever,  it is one of the few well-known opera houses open for 11 months of the year and it employs  over  600 people both of the Opera company and the Royal Ballet.

                            THE NATIONAL  THEATRE 

     It  took  over the  hundred years to establish a national theatre company.  It's  first  director  from  1962  was Lawrence Olivier.  This is the first state theatre Britain has ever had. A special building for it was opened in 1976. It has three theatres in one:  "The Oliver  theatre",  the  biggest  is  for  the  main classical repertoire;  "The Lyttilton",  a bit smaller is for new writing and for visiting foreigh  countries  and  "The  Cottesloe theatre",  the  smallest  is  used  for  experimental writing and productions.  "The Royal Shakespeare company" are devided between the  country  and  the  capital and it's produces plays mainly by Shakespeare and his contempraries when it performs is  "Stratford -on-Avon",  and modern plays in it's two auditoria in the Cities, Barbican centre.

                                        Moscow theatres

     For decades Moscow  has  had  a  reputation  as  a  city  of theatres.  The birth plays of the historic "Bolshoy",  "Maly" and "Moscow Art" theatres the city has been and steel is a centre for the  development exploretary modern ideas in the dramatic art and is famous for it's  great  number  of  highlygifted,  interesting directors, actors, playwrigts and artists.

     Every evening the doors of Moscow theatres open  to  streams of theatre-gowers. The best Moscow theatres devoded themselves to developing the principals of directing and acting  laid  down  by Stanislavsky,   Meerhold,  Nemerovich-Danchenko,  Vachtangov  and others.  The discoveries and successes of Moscow  theatres  today exists due to experience and triumphs of preceding generations.

     I'd like to tell you about the Bolshoy Theatre. The magestic building of  the  Bolshoy  Theatre  stands  in  Theatre Square in Moscow's central quater,  not  far  from  Kremlin.  This  is  the leading   Russian   opera  house  with  the  best  vocalists  and choreographers in it's company.

     The Bolshoi  traces  it's  history  to  1776 when a standing opera company was organized in Moscow.  The first opera shown  in Bolshoi  theatre was opera "life of tsar" (now "Ivan Susanin"). At later times operas by Dargomyzhsky,  Serov, Tcaikovsky, Borodin, Moussorgsky, Rimsky-Korsakov and Rubinstein were produced here.

     At the same time the Bolshoi company staged the best  operas and  ballets by West European composers-Mozart,  Rossini,  Weber, Verdi and others.

     The bolshoi  ballet company enjoys well-deserved fame as the world's finest.  This is equally true of it's brilliant realistic style of perfomance and repertoire.

                                      My favorite painter

     One of my favorite artists is Rembrant is the greatest Dutch master,  one  of  the supreme geneuses in the history of art.  To this day the art of Rembrant remains one  of  the  most  profound witness  of  the  progress of the soul in it's earthly pilgrimage towards the  realisation  of  higher  destiny.  The  son  of  the prosperous  miller,  Rembrant  was  born  in  Leiden in 1608.  He studied at Leiden University, but his real vocation was painting. His rapid sugsess promoted him to move to the Amsterdam in 1631.

   In 1632 Rembrant bought a splendid house, started a collection of  paintings and rarities.

    The universal artist dealt with many world subjects.  Rembrant created a number of portraits and  some group portraits which were traditional to the Dutch art. The best of them are "Anatomy lesson of Dr. Tulp" and "The night watch".

     In 1655  Rembrant  found  himself  in  the  midst of several financial troubles. At that period he painted "The Polish Rider", which is an allegory of the man's earthly journey.

     Probably in 1669,  the  year  of  his  own  death,  Rembrant painted  his famous "Return of the Prological son",  which stands at the ultimate peak of Cristian spirituality,  illuminating  the relationship of the self to the eternity.

    The biblical theme was very important to Rembrant. He painted "Artakserks, Oman and Eshpir", "The Saint Family".

     Rembrant was not understood when he was alive.  He  died  in poverty. But it is the spirituality of his art that distinguishes Rembrant from his Dutch contemporaries making  him  the  greatest artist of the world.

                                          Art in Moscow

      Speaking about art gallereys of Moscow we must  mention  the most famous gallereys.

     The State Tretyakov gallery is one of the best known picture gallereys  in Russia.  It takes it's name from it's founder Pavel Tretyakov, a Moscow mercant. In the 19'th century Tretyakov began to  collect russian paintings.  He visitet all the exibitions and art studios and  bought  the  best  pictures.  Little  by  little Tretyakov  extended  his  interests  and began to collect earlier Russian paintings.  In 1881 Tretyakov opened in St.  Peterburg his collection to the  public,  11 years later he donated it to the city of Moscow. Since then the gallerey has received hundred paintings from  other museums and private collections.  The Tretyakov gallerey reflects the whole history of Russian paintings from 11'th century to  the present day. The gallery contains such halls devon-ded to the works of 18'th century painters, as Рокотов, Левитский, Боровиковский. The first half of the 19'th century is reprisentive by brilliant paintings by Брюллов, Веницианов and others. The gallery has the best collection of "передвиженники" , such as Кромской, Перов, and such

great names as Суриков, Репин, Вознецов, Левитан.

     Also I'd like to tell you about state pushkin museum of fine art. The building was built in Greek stile by Roman Klein in 1898 - 1912 to house a museum of fine art,  founded of  initiative  of professor Ivan Cvetayev. Since 1937 it has be known as The Puskin museum of fine art.  It has one of  the  worlds  largest  ancient collections of european art.  Now the picture gallerey has over 2 thousands works of various schools of painting which enaibous  us to  understand  and  appreciate  the  variaty of staills over the centuries.

    The Pushkin  museum pereodically hald's exibition of the art of various countries and of individual outstanding artist of past and present.

                     Theatres, music halls and cinemas

     Theatres are  very much the same in London as anywhere else; the chief theatres ,music halls and cinemas are in the West  End. If  you  are  staying  in  London for a few days,  you'll have no difficulty whatever in finding somewhere to  spend  an  enjoyable evening. You'll find opera, balley, comedy, drama, revue, musical comedy and variety.  Films are shown in the  cinemas  during  the greatest part of the day.

     The best seats at theatres are  those  in  the  stalls,  the circle and the upper circle.  Then comes the pit, and the last of all the gallery where the seats are cheapest.  Boxes,  of course, are  the most expensive.  Most theatres and music halls have good orchestras with popular conductors.

     You ought  to  make  a  point of going to the opera at least once during the season if you can.  There you can get the best of everything - an exellent orchestras, famous conductors, celebated singers and well dressed audience. But, of course, if you are not fond of music and singing, won't interest you.

     At the West End theatres you can  see  most  of the  famous English   actors   and  actresses.  As  a  rule,  the  plays  are magnificently staged -  costumes,  dresses,  scenery,  everything being  done  of  the most lavish scale.  Choose a good play,  and you'll enjoy yourself thoroughly from the moment the curtain goes up to the end of the last act.  Get your seats beforehand, either at the box-office of theatre itself or at one  of  the  agencies. When you go to a theatre, you'll probably want to seat as near to the stage as possible.  But if you are at  the  cinema,  you  may prefer  to seat some distance from the screen.  In fact,  I would say, the further away the better.

 Music in our life

     Music - it art, reflecting validity in sound art images, one of the forms of public ideology. Having by powerful force direct emotional effect, music during of all history of man-kind plays a huge social, cultural and educational role.

     Leading composers are connected to progressive public movements, life, interests and aspirations people. Each nations differs by peculiar national features. Folk music, being improved by creative efforts of many generations of the people, reaches a high degree of art maturity. On the basis of riches of national music professional musical creativity of composers is developed. Rejection of music from advanced ideas epoch of national culture, national roots of art leads to it’s to decline and degeneration.

      Idea emotional contents of music is passed through sound art images, implemented in musical sounds. The basis of music is the tune. According to the way of performance music is devided into 2 main branches: instrumental and vocal.

      There are a great number of different styles of music, such as Jazz, Pop, Rock, Classic; and new musical directions. One of the new music directions is Rave. I prefer to listen hard-core and more quiet music such as Roxette and others.

       Now days the number of music styles is growing, and every young people, which are fond of music can easily choose that style which appeals to them. 

The use of computers

        Just as television has extended human sight across a barriers of time and distance, so the computers extend the power of the human mind across the existing barriers.

Computers in medicine

        Computers are one of the great importance in modern hospital. The chief use of computers is the storing and sorting  the medical knowledge which has been equired in the last 50 years. No doctor can possible keep up with all discoveries. The only solution of the problem is store medical knowledge in a computer. Today there are medical computer centers were all existing knowledge of simpthoms of various dessieses and of their treatment is stored. Doctors feed data on simpthoms in the computer and get the nessesary information on current diagnostics and treatment.

Computers that can be learn

       Ordinary computer can remember only the data stored in the hard disk. Now scientists have desighned machines, that are capable of learning from experience and remembarary what they have learned. Such a machine is capable of recognising objects without human help or control. Of course, they made many mistakes.

       There is another similar machine which can look at letter alphabet a simple words and they “say” thought a loudes speaker what it has seen. The machine has as thoughtarn learning power.

Computers at the school

       Information science with the ideas and message of processing and storing informations is of great importance today. That’s why computer technology must be told in secondary school. The new subject “basic information science”, and “computing machine” was intreduste for the  siner through the schools. The pupils teach computers to anlestigate school problems. Contact with the machine increases the interest in learning, makes them more serious about studing new subject. School computers are used not  only for  studing information science, but also examinations purposes. Young people who finish must be tried to operate computers.

Exploration

Christopher Columbus

    300-400 years ago a great deal of the world was undiscoveried. But now there seems little more to explore, the wild north was conquered, the jungle was conquered too. And it seems that all the pages of the great book called “The Earth” has been filled in, but exploration still goes on.

    In the 15th century people knew only 3 continents: Europe, Asia and Africa. They knew nothing about America. The man who was thought to be the discoverier of America was born in 1451 in Italy. His name was Cristopher Columbus.

    Knowing that the earth was round he desided to reach India by sailing to the west. It was very difficult for him to organize an expedition as nobody wanted to help him. At last the Spanish government gave him some money. In the 1492 he sailed with 3 small ships in to the Atlantic ocean. They had been sailing for more than 2 months and at last they saw land. Columbus was certain that the lands he discoveried were part of India and he called these islands “The West Indias”. He made 3 voyagers to America. His last voyage was made in 1502-1504. After that, seriously ill, he remained in Spain until his death. He died believing that Cuba was part of Asia. Colum-buse’s voyagers gave Europe first important knowledge of the new world. Many places have been named in his honour. America however was named after another explorer Amerigo Vespucci.

   Americus Vespucius (or Amerigo Vespucci, as the name is spelled in Italian) was born in Florence, Italy, in 1454. He was in Spain at the time of Columbus' first and second voyages. In a letter, written in 1504 and printed in 1505, he claimed to have made four voyages, on the first of which, in 1497, he explored the South American coast. This would make him the first European to land on the American continent, for at that time Columbus had only reached the outlying islands. Most scholars reject Vespucius' version of this voyage. Vespucius perhaps did accompany a Spanish expedition that of Alonzo de Ojeda to South America in 1499, and in 1501 and 1503 he probably went with Portuguese expeditions. Probably he never commanded an expedition himself and, of course, was not the first person to set foot on the continents to which his name is given. Vespucius died in Seville, Spain, in 1512.   

 Learning languages

 The problem of learning languages is very important today. Foreign languages are socially demanded especially at the present time when the progress in science and technology has led to an explosion of knowledge and has contributed to an overflow of information. The total knowledge of mankind is known to double every seven years. Foreign languages are needed as the main and most efficient means of information exchange of the people of our planet.
   Today English is the language of the world. Over 350 million people speak it as a mother tongue. The native speakers of English live in Great Britain, the United States of America, Australia and New Zealand. English is one of the official languages in the Irish Republic, Canada, the South African Republic. As a second language it is used in the former British and US colonies.
   It is the major international language for communication in such areas as science, technology, business and mass entertainment. English is one of the official languages of the United Nations Organization and other political organization. It is the language of the literature, education, modern music, international tourism.
   Russia is integrating into the world community and the problem of learning English for the purpose of communication is espicially urgent today. Learning a foreing language is not as easy thing. It is a long and slow process that takes a lot of time and patience. But to know English is absolutely necessary for every educated person, for every good specialist.
   It is well known that reading books in the original , listening to the BBC news, communicating with the English speaking people will help a lot. When learning a foreign language you learn the culture and history of the native speakers. One must work hard to learn any foreign language.

LONDON, Jack  (1876-1916).

   The novelist and short-story writer Jack London was, in his lifetime, one of the most popular authors in the world. After World War I his fame was eclipsed in the United States by a new generation of writers, but he remained popular in many other countries, especially in the Soviet Union, for his romantic tales of adventure mixed with elemental struggles for survival.

   John Griffith London was born in San Francisco on Jan. 12, 1876. His family was poor, and he was forced to go to work early in life to support himself. At 17 he sailed to Japan and Siberia on a seal-hunting voyage. He was largely self-taught, reading voluminously in libraries and spending a year at the University of California. In the late 1890s he joined the gold rush to the Klondike. This experience gave him material for his first book, 'The Son of Wolf', published in 1900, and for 'Call of the Wild' (1903), one of his most popular stories.

   In his writing career of 17 years, London produced 50 books and many short stories. He wrote mostly for money, to meet ever-increasing expenses. His fame as a writer gave him a ready audience as a spokesman for a peculiar and inconsistent blend of socialism and racial superiority.

   London's works, all hastily written, are of uneven quality. The best books are the Klondike tales, which also include 'White Fang' (1906) and 'Burning Daylight' (1910). His most enduring novel is probably the autobiographical 'Martin Eden' (1909), but the exciting 'Sea Wolf' (1904) continues to have great appeal for young readers.

   In 1910 London settled near Glen Ellen, Calif., where he intended to build his dream home, "Wolf House." After the house burned down before completion in 1913, he was a broken and sick man. His death on Nov. 22, 1916, from an overdose of drugs, was probably a suicide.