Here for the holidays: German exchange students share their country's Christmas traditions

Like every student we love holidays. On our holidays we sleep long or go on vacation. One family activity we do is baking cookies called Plaetzchen. Everybody makes them, and there are lots of different kinds of them. In Germany we celebrate the 24th of December and open all of our presents on that day. We also have several church services on the 24th.

In the southern parts of Germany we also go sledding, skiing and ice skating. The children over there have a calendar from the first to the 24th of December called Advendskalender. For every day there is a piece of chocolate for the children.

Most families have real Christmas trees and some put real candles on them. Instead of Santa Claus we have an angel called Christkindl, who brings the presents. We listen to Christmas music like "Silent Night." Most people don't decorate their homes like Americans do.

During December we have markets where foods, drinks and manger figures are sold from small carts. Some markets have choir singing and bands playing Christmas songs. These markets are called Christkindlmarkt. We get out of school for three weeks at Christmas. Other things we do during this time would be visiting relatives.

The food here is different. Generally Germans eat heathier than Americans. We also eat less meat.

Our school system is also dissimilar, because we have three different school levels. The Gymnasium is the highest one and goes from fifth to 13th grade. The Realschule is the middle one and goes from fifth to 10th grade. The lowest one is the Hauptschule, and it goes from fifth to ninth grade.

You have to graduate from a Gymnasium to go to college. Colleges in Germany are free.

School in Germany also lasts on until 1 p.m. and we have more breaks. But still school in America is a lot of fun, since we have fewer subjects and you can choose them. The teachers here are also friendlier and care about their students.

One thing German schools should have are school sports, like basketball, volleyball, football and cross country. We think it would be pretty cool to have them over there.

We are impressed with how nice most of the Americans are, and we really like it here in America.

Christian Sandherr and Lisa Schneider are foreign exchange students at Oak Ridge High School. Christian is a junior from Neu-Isenburg, Germany, and Lisa is a sophomore from Breitenhill, Germany.