A regular school day of the “Oberstufe” at Gymnasium Wellingdorf ...

… should actually start with class at 7.50 AM. Well, ours begins between 7.40 and 7.45 AM when we get to our classroom, chat with friends or maybe even use the time to do some homework we haven't done yet. The real first lesson generally starts about two to three minutes after the bell rings as soon as the teacher puts his bag on the desk and hitches his jacket to the window or to the map-stand. After a collective “Good Morning” we get to our homework right away. Sometimes we try to convince the teacher to go for a quick round of Bingo, which is then procrastinated to the end of the lesson to let class end playfully. Whereas our first 5-min-break between 1st and 2nd class plus the first 15-min-break after 2nd hour are often only used to talk and eat, many use the opportunity after 4th hour to run over to LIDL next door, where we can grab all kinds of food as a second breakfast, which normally only consists of chocolate and chips. If there should be a free period in sight, it's spent at LIDL (which must make tons of money out of us) or in the classroom, where we communicate with classmates, listen to music, or even sometimes do “preliminary work”. We all are happy when the bell rings at 1.05 PM for lunch, because prior to that the growling of our stomachs almost drowned out the teachers' voices. Then, when we go to LIDL for the 2nd (for some even 3rd) time, and when we can watch all the younger students from our school have off of school already, we're really jealous, especially on a sunny day.
When the noise level due to tiredness and exhaustion crescendos just a little we hear of some teachers as a reason for this behavior just a single word: “Gruppentische!” (“group tables!”).
However, by now we got so used to this that we don't let the teacher interfere with our planning of the weekend and just continue planning via little notes. But even these last two hours of school   come to an end at some point of time, after each student has been checking the clock at least ten times and examined if the clock didn't just by chance was out of order that day.
Finally we drag ourselves home and start to live!

All in all we already look forward to the next day of school, because we feel comfortable in our class and have fun with many teachers – especially when they crack a joke by accident and we celebrate that for the next couple of days.

A special highlight of the daily school routine is, when we can welcome exchange students at our school, for example from Rennes (France), Toulouse (France), Nebraska, or many other places. When we talk to them, it brings back memories of our own exchange, but also new, unforgettable moments develop, which we will remember for the rest of our lives.



HISTORY

The east bank of Kiel consists of the districts Gaarden, Ellerbek, Wellindorf, and Neumühlen-Dietrichsdorf. Back in the day, these used to be independent villages and were incorporated between 1901 and 1924.
The Gymnasium Wellingdorf was the first Gymnasium on Kiel's east bank.

GAARDEN
Gaarden as we know it today was firstly mentioned documentary in the 12th century and has its origin in two villages: Klösterlich Gaarden and Fürstlich Gaarden. The farmyards of Fürstlich Gaarden were located around the predecessor of the Lübecker Chaussee, whereas the other original village, Klösterlich Gaarden, was situated in the area of the Werftstraße. Both villages were surrounded by idyllic salt marshes and fruit trees, which is the reason why there was only a narrow path consisting of wooden planks to get to Kiel during the humid times of the year due to the miry ground. In the vernacular it is still called “Kippe” today.
In the early 20th century the circumstances in the villages, which were mostly inherited by farmers and craftsmen, changed and the modern Gaarden developed.

In the course of the industrialization shipyards soon replaced the district Klösterlich Gaarden and new railway tracks connected the industrial area with the central station of Kiel.
Multistory tenements were the face of the new area, whereas Fürstlich Gaarden was finally leveled and turned into a freight depot.
Until 1910 the population decupled (4520 inhabitants) and the former villages evolved to an urban neighborhood, holding a city hall and electric utilities.

ELLERBEK
The village Ellerbek arose in the 13th century where the stream “Erlenbach” issued into the Förde. It received a name in Plattdeutsch after this little river. Close to this outlet of the Erlenbach one could board a  ferryboat and cross over to Kiel, because the coast road was often flooded. Besides the shipping, fishery and smoke houses were the most important lines of business. One can trace the international reputation of the Kieler Sprotte to Ellerbek's smoke houses, in which the small fish got cured for their long trips – they were traded up to Saxony and Thuringia. In 1666 the Ellerbek fishermen teamed up as a civil association to fight fire due to the danger of fire in smoke houses, which was later called “Buttgilde” (floudner association), because during celebrations on the Ellerbek beach guests received roasted flounder and other fish delicacies for free.

WELLINGDORF
There is no information on the founding. The site is firstly mentioned in 1315. The name eventually originates in its landscape, which is very undulating - or rather was. Still the word could be deduced from a name of a person.
Wellingdorf was a pure farmers' village, whose houses were on the right and on the left of the Schönberger Straße. This street connected all villages on the east bank with the town Kiel and the Probstei (a district close to Kiel). Around 1855 Wellingdorf inhabited 366 people, who were only nourished by agriculture. Once the farmer Langmaak lived at the place where nowadays the Gymnasium Wellingdorf is at. He owned 33 hectare.

NEUMÜHLEN AND DIETRICHSDORF
To the north side of the river Schwentine the two villaged Neumühlen and Dietrichsdorf were located.
Neumühlen actually was no farmers' village, but had a more industrial character. It was characterized by mills, which gave the village its name, too. All citizens from Kiel and the villages around which ran agriculture had to let the mill grind their grain. For the delivery of grain form the west bank of the Förde a boatman was hired, who brought grain to Neumühlen and watched the milling.
On the other side Dietrichsdorf was a pure farmers' village, which had only 234 residents in 1855. A volatile change started when the shipyard of Georg Howaldt settled in the mouth of the Schwentine river in 1876. Later on it was called Kaiserliche Werft out of which HDW (a big German shipyard from today) developed. The population of Dietrichsdorf increased between 1867 and 1905 from 284 to 5136.

GYMNASIUM WELLINGDORF
The foundation of the Gymnasium Wellingdorf – until 1970 the only Gymnasium on Kiel's east bank – begins in 1914. The population increased rapidly especially on the east bank of the Förde after the foundation of the German Reich in 1871, when the naval base was relocated from Danzig to Kiel. So after years of struggle the school “Königliche Realschule i.E.“ was founded, where students should be educated from 5th to 10th grade. At first there was no building for the school, so the 41 5th -graders and 17 6th -graders had to visit the Gaardener Doppelmittelschule in the beginning and later the Oberrealschule II at the Königsweg and the Fröbelschule between 1914 and 1917.
By 1917 the school had been grown to 4 grades and needed more classrooms. It moved into the east part of Wellingdorf's Mittelschule, which is part of our old school building now, where at that time the architect J. Theede built the Mittelschule for boys and girls in 1911. In 1918 the school is retitled as “Staatliche Realschule zu Kiel”.
In 1919 the first 10th -grader graduated. Starting in 1923 also some girls visited the school. As a state's Oberrealschule this school is allowed to conduct the Abitur examination since 1927. In 1932 the Mittelschule moved out of the building. In the course of the school reform of 1938 our school was retitled as “state's Oberschule for boys”. Around the end of World War II bombs destroyed most parts of the building; over 100 students were lost in action.
Between 1945 and 1954 the reconstruction took place; but already since 1945 students were taught in provisional rooms. The “state's Oberschule Kiel-Wellingdorf” grew quickly, so that in 1958 and 1964 extension buildings had to be added. In 1969 the school was the biggest Gymnasium in the state of Schleswig-Holstein with 1200 students.
The state's Gymnasium is publicly administered by the city Kiel in 1982 and is called “Gymnasium Wellingdorf” since that point. In 1986 the complex of buildings was extended one last time with the building for the upper graders.

Hanna Hohmann, Juni 2011