My school
So school “started on Monday, 7. January of this
year. I say “started” because we
didn’t teach that first week. The
school is in the process of building a new classroom because we don’t have
enough room for our new incoming class.
The students were helping the masons build, doing everything from
carrying water, bags of cement, and bricks. They also spent several days having to clean the
school. It was definitely a
different use of student time here than in the US. However, that meant that the first week there was no
teaching on my part. I planned a
great deal, learned some Kisambaa from the mason, and tried to say hi to as
many of my students as possible.
The second week, I was at school for 3 days (during which I hardly
taught because we had meetings or students were still working and had to miss
my class, which drove me crazy) before being sent to Lushoto for a conference
about teaching basic English to the incoming students.
In
these pictures, you can see my students out in the schoolyard, cleaning, and
what our classrooms look like.
Students are supposed to bring their own desks and chairs. If they don’t have it, they’re supposed
to stand, sit on the floor, or share with a friend. It’s not unusual to see 3 kids sharing a single chair and
desk. They’re very good at sharing
with others, as the communal culture definitely tries to support other people
in the community. We have chalkboards,
but sometimes run out of chalk.
That’s the worst! Besides
that, I buy big flipchart paper (about 2ft by 4ft) and use permanent markers to
write things down, like reading passages.
Those are the teaching materials I have available. A bit different form the SmartBoard and
classroom set of textbooks I had during student teaching. Here, we don’t have enough books to let
students use them, so they copy down stuff in their exercise books, which is
filled with notes that they copy directly from the board, regardless of whether
or not they understand it.
There
was one day that I brought some magazines that Peace Corps brought me. I only had enough to give each of my 3
classes approximately 20 copies each.
I put the magazines on a desk and told them they could just come and get
them. The moment I left the room,
I heard a wild and crazy mad rush for the books. Chairs flying, students shoving each other, desperate for
something to read. Students crave reading
or some other thing to distract themselves, as there is so little that they
actually have.
I
know this is a bit of a superficial description of my school, but I’m running
out of time before my bus leaves town and I wanted to get this posted before I
leave internet for a few weeks. I’ll
try to be better next time I’m in town to write more blog posts.
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The new classroom. Still not finished, but it's getting there. |
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Some of my students stopped to let me snap a picture. These are form 2 to form 4 students, with ages anywhere between 13 and 20. |
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The school yard where we have assemblies, also known as "parades." |
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Some students cleaning the surrounding area of the school. They generally use pine tree branches to sweep the yard. I personally don't understand why they have to sweep dirt, but it's what people do everywhere in Tanzania. |
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View from my school. Yeah, it's awesome. |
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Another view. |
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And again. I love the view from my school. |
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One of the classrooms. The students were out cleaning and stuff. There is nothing over the windows and the roof is tin (which makes it super loud when it's raining.) |
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Students hanging outside of the classrooms. |
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An inside view of one of the classrooms. |
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Same room. |
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These are the new form 1 students. These are all the desks in the room, cuz the students have just arrived and not all of them have brought their desks and chairs yet. |
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Some lollygaggers. |
I seriously do not know how you do it. I have become so dependent on Smart Board and computers! I will share this with my class and let you know what they think.
ReplyDeleteI shared your letter to Beattie with my class today. As one kid, a real pain in the butt, said "It touched me." I will send them as soon as possible.
ReplyDelete