The Goethe-Institut Chicago is reopening our doors for school classes!
During your 60-minute visit to the Goethe-Institut, we offer your students a program conducted in simple German (English can also be used if necessary). It includes a brief introduction to the work of the Goethe-Institut and an interactive country studies program featuring the new Deutschlandcollage.
As the institute is not fully reopened due to COVID-19, we have made updates in our COVID-19 policy for the class visits. In order to protect both staff and visitors, it is mandatory for everyone to wear a face mask for the entire duration of the visit. Though we strongly encourage vaccination and/or testing for additional safety, proof of these is no longer required to enter the Goethe-Institut.
It is our policy to keep a detailed list of all visitors for purposes of contact tracking in case of an outbreak. For this reason, we will need teachers to provide us with the names of every participating student in advance of their visit. Students should also bring some form of ID.
Between Thanksgiving and the winter holidays, 22 school classes from Illinois and surrounding states visited us for a one-hour visit to the Goethe-Institut followed by a visit to the Christkindlmarket. During the hour-long visit, students either explored current topics about Germany using the interactive map of Germany or discussed the topic of consumption with the help of the song "Zeug" by the band ok.danke.tschüss. The overall response was positive and we were very happy to be able to hold all class visits in presence!
Looking Back at Class visits 2021
In November and December, eight classes with a total of over 130 students visited the Goethe-Institut Chicago. Using our new Deutschlandcollage, the students worked on various topics in groups. Together, they created a quiz and got to know Germany better. The classes rounded off their trip to Chicago with a visit to the Chicago Christmas market. Unfortunately, due to the rising COVID numbers, all class visits had to be cancelled from mid-December onwards.
2020 Virtual Christmas class visits
Due to the Covid-19 pandemic in 2020 Goethe-Institut Chicago offered virtual programming for classes. During their "stay" at Goethe-Institut students from all over the midwest were given a virtual introduction to the Goethe-Institut and then guided through an interactive program by Hanna Kuhn and Christina Pick and introduced to the different realities of life in East and West Germany and political meaning and consequences of the German Reunification.
a look back to December 2019
2019's visits before Christmas took place between December 2 and December 18, 2019. In total, more than 750 students from 23 schools and 4 different states came to the Goethe-Institut Chicago during that time. Fitting the theme of the peaceful revolution, they learned about the 30th anniversary of the fall of the Berlin Wall, the division of Germany, and the Berlin Airlift. We want to thank our visitors for the great interest in our program. We had lots of fun during this time!
We have created an attractive series of free online workshops, presented by our GEMs. Download the informational flyer and forward it to your interested colleagues -- everyone is invited! GEMs Workshops Fall 2022
