A short time ago, children all over Bavaria headed back to school for the fall term. Some of them (specifically, the first graders) were carrying unwieldy cardboard cones that were almost as big as the children themselves. I asked my friend eNVie, who recently made a Schultüte (literally: “school cone”) herself, to explain what these things are all about. Parents in Germany, take note. Here’s what she has to say:
Living in Germany for a little over 3 years now, I’ve been struck by the obsession with organic, locally grown food and healthy lifestyles, especially when it comes to raising children. My daughter’s kindergarten only serves organic food, and they monitor what you give your children as snacks. I get yogurts sent back home all the time because of the high sugar content. And don’t even think about sending your kid to school with birthday cupcakes.
So it was a major surprise for me to learn about the German tradition of giving children a 3-foot-tall cone full of candy and presents on their first day of school. I tried to find non-candy fillers for my daughter’s cone that she’d be equally excited about, but seriously what could possibly be more exciting than 3 feet of pure sugar? The mommy in me got her some lame fillers – a coloring book, stickers, a magazine that comes with a sparkly pen and miniature flying horse. These, she more than happily shared with her younger sister. The footlong bar of chocolate never left her side. I think I may have to hide that when she’s not looking, for the sake of her teeth. I did manage to leave my mommy-comfort-zone and buy a family size bag of gummi bears, random fruit flavored candies, candy that comes in plastic eggs with barbie on the cover, more chocolate and yes, even some gum (which my son had to pick out for me – apparently Juicy Fruit isn’t as trendy as it was back in my day).
That was the easy part. Next came the construction of the darned thing. Luckily any art store over here sells the pre-cut, pre-folded cardboard sheet that easily pops into the cone shape. You just have to drive around town to get the specific color your kid wants, because if you’re like me, and don’t plan a year in advance like most good Germans, every store in a 20 mile radius will be out of whatever color your kid decides she has to have. They also sell fully decorated cones that you just have to fill, and kits where you just cut and paste the decorations on, but no, I have to do it the hard way. Thank goodness I didn’t talk myself into trying to make the cone shape from a flat piece of construction paper – oh wait, I did. But that was for my son when we were still living in the US, and I was under the impression my husband, the German, was going to help me.
My daughter got it into her head that she wanted to have the same exact schultuete her cousin had a couple years ago: dark blue wavy construction paper with a grey and white cat (the same exact kind that was in the picture), pink and light blue flowers, but with no kangaroo, and with light blue and white crepe paper on top instead of pink and blue. I only had to go back for supplies about 5 times. I couldn’t tell from the picture that the cat had to be made from that puffy foamy paper they call Moosgummi, or that the cat indeed has four legs (luckily I found enough scraps of the Moosgummi to construct the last leg before my youngest daughter performed her daily paper shredding ritual on it).
12 hours and 4 hot glue gun burns later, I was satisfied. I added her name to personalize it, glued down the white paper on the top so the whole thing didn’t resemble the Statue of Liberty torch so much, and I filled it with over 30 euros worth of fructose, glucose, dextrose and a couple other -ose’s. It was so heavy, we all had to take turns carrying it to the school in the morning. And what did she say when she first saw it in the morning? “And where are the flowers?” Crap. I didn’t think she’d notice.
The tradition of giving a child a Schultüte on her first day of school goes back to the early 1800s. Children were told that school teachers grew Schultüten-trees in the schoolyard, and when the Schultüte were large enough and ready to be plucked, it would be time for school to begin. The sugary sweetness part of the tradition possibly comes from the Jewish community that would start a child’s school career with letter-shaped cookies as a way to remind them of Psalm 119:103, “How sweet are thy words unto my taste, yea sweeter than honey to my mouth.”
The Schultüte’s popularity first spread to larger cities in the early 1900s in Germany, and with the advent of television quickly spread throughout the country in the 1950s. Now, the idea is more to make the first day of school an exciting and memorable experience for the child, and to instill the idea that learning can be fun. Now that I know there was an actual thought process behind these 3-foot bags of sugar, it almost makes my 3rd degree glue gun burns worthwhile.
Oh my god, how hilarious! This would so be me if I had children. Whenever I think about raising kids here in Germany, all I can imagine is me fumbling around with things like Schultüten that I actually have no idea about. It’s almost comforting to see that I wouldn’t be the only one!
I love the Schultueten. As a teacher, I made several ‘tueten’ for my seniors in chorus to celebrate the first day of their LAST year in school since we do not do this for children. They were smaller than German ones, but fun to give out. When my grandnephews were to start school, I purchased actual schultuten in Germany and filled them with various German candies, and American toys, pencils, etc. For each nephew we also had our own little ‘parade’ down the street in the neighborhood. My grandniece will start school soon so she will be the next one….Such fun to share in another country’s cultural traditions.