Man the time is flying by. I’ve been busy both in and out of the classroom.
a few weekends ago I went to Tom’s site for pizza. Tom has a brick bread oven that he made a few months ago and this was the second time that we made pizza. Tom teaches at a secondary school and that particular Saturday was Parent’s day so most of the teachers were around and Tom wanted to make enough pizza for all of them. When I say we made bread, I mean that Tom mostly did all of the work and I just stirred the sauce. Tom eventually asked if I was “good with fires” and offered to give me the duty of making a “big fire” to which I gladly accepted. To those of you that are not familiar with brick ovens, the concept is pretty simple.
You light a fire in the oven and the fire heats up the bricks. Just when you think the bricks are hot enough you quickly remove the fire and the remaining ashes and immediately put the bread, pizza or whatever you are baking, inside. We made enough pizza for all of the teachers and even a few loaves of bread. Tom had to run into a meeting so I was left with the responsibility of watching the remaining pizzas in the oven while I answered dozens of questions from his students like “Are you from the same place as Tom? What is your mother tongue? Why don’t you speak Kiswahili as well as Tom?” To which I responded that I am from America but it is a big place and that Tom is from Oregon and I am from Wisconsin. Which brought a barrage of more questions like what state?
Wis-con-sin.
Yeah, but what state? WIS-CON-SIN!
The next weekend I went to Alyssa’s site where we went to the Lewa Conservancy to watch the Safaricom Marathon. This marathon is through a national park, the Lewa Conservancy, and is hugely popular. If I’m not mistaken I believe Runner’s World says it is one of the “top ten marathons that you have to do.”
We woke up at 3 am on Saturday to head to the park because the race started at 7. We managed to get a ride with a team from a nearby university through a friend that was running the race. The bus ride brought back memories of all of the bus rides I’ve been on to go to a race, meet or game and then I realized that I was on a bus to a marathon with some of the best long distance runners in the world. We arrived just before dusk and it was a sight to see the sunrise over the trees. We were one of the first to arrive but soon many people were piling in.
About an hour before the race a few helicopters and small airplanes started to fly real low over the park, to scare away the animals from the course. The runners actually have to sign a waiver that says they will not hold the organizers liable for any injuries, you know like if they got mauled by a lion. Some other PCVs were there that actually ran in the race and it was cool to see them. One of our Kenyan friends, Joshua, was hoping to win the race but he took 8th with a time of 2:27. Yeah, that is ridiculous.
Then on the 4th of July weekend I made the long trip into Nairobi. The Thursday before I was to go to a town called Nyeri to meet with the medical staff to get a flu shot (yes swine flu has made it to Kenya.) After that I headed to Nakuru to meet up with a fellow cheesehead who was nice enough to bring some things to me from my parents. A DVD player and a season of 24! Then I headed into Nairobi to meet up with some volunteer friends. It was great to see a lot of people because we never see each other.
The term ends in a few weeks so I am planning on spending the rest of my weekends here at school before I say good bye to these kids until September.
I started writing this as an email in response to my friend and fellow roommate at THE 2024 Campbell residence but then I figured why not just post it on the website and kill two birds with one stone?
Andy asked me what is the most rewarding thing and the most frustrating thing about teaching?
Well, its hard to pick just one frustrating thing because there are so many. I believe I’ve mentioned many frustrating things but I think so far the MOST frustrating thing is that I have zero training and experience as a teacher. This is very frustrating because at times I do not have any idea what I am doing. And as I result, I not only feel frustrated but also guilty. Guilty that I am learning more about teaching than my students are actually learning what I am teaching.
The most rewarding thing is those rare moments when I actually get through to my students and they actually understand me. This is a rare occasion but fortunately this rewarding feeling occurred this morning.
Lately, I have been trying to make class fun, so I have been trying hard to turn almost everything into a game. On this particular day, I decided to make a time game. I made some clocks in which the hour and minute hands can move. So I divided the class into two teams. Each team had to line up and the first person in line would go first and then go to the back of the line. I would write a time on the chalkboard and the students would have to move the hands on their clock to show the correct time. And obviously, the first person to display the correct time gets a point for that team. We played up to ten. Team One was dominating but then Team Two came back from behind and won.
It was a miracle I tell ya!
Team One was winning 9 to 5 but Team Two scored five points in a row. It was pretty awesome and fun. It was like Ryan Braun hitting a walk off grand slam to win the game by one run.
A friend recently asked me the following question:
”I know you have learned a lot about the kids, and the culture, and the politics of the school system, and I’m interested if this new knowledge has affected the work you do and the goals you set…?”
My goals for the most part are constantly changing. I see so many different areas in which I can try to improve but I am only here for two years and I can’t do everything. An issue I definitely want to tackle is HIV/AIDS education. As always, my counterpart Patrick is a great resource because he is always willing and eager to help. The two of us would like to maybe start a Health Club for the students and use that as a way to teach AIDS awareness or maybe we could have a class devoted entirely to HIV/AIDS and other health related issues.
As I have said before, Kenya places a huge emphasis on standardized testing. So this term, I have spent a lot of time researching past tests to see what I should teach my students. I do not necessarily agree with what is on the test but they need to do well on them in order to have any success in Kenya. If they want to go onto to secondary school and even college, they must do well on the tests.
I have learned that there is a huge communication gap between the students and the majority of the teachers. As I wrote in my previous post, I have seen a solid effort on the part of some of the teachers, but they are still teaching the students as if they were hearing students. One goal I have is to try and close this gap.
I’ve thought about dedicating all of my effort into teaching the students English and reading so that they can better understand the teachers in all of the other subjects. Some of the older students are so far behind that I have to accept that I cannot really help them academically. I am only here for two years and I cannot undo years of neglect from past teachers. I do feel that my time is best spent working with students in lower primary. So I am throwing around the idea of maybe teaching all of the English and reading classes in lower primary. Of course this means that I will have to deal with those crazy kids in class one again for part of the day.
I would also like to somehow get the teachers to improve their KSL. How I plan to achieve this goal is beyond me. I really have no idea how to teach English to deaf students and I do not know how I can motivate the teachers to improve their KSL.
As for the school system, it is corrupt just like everything else in Kenya. So I’m not even going to touch that one.
As I said, my goals are constantly changing so who knows what I will want to do tomorrow.
I previously wrote about an example of one of my better days. Most days are great but every once in a while I feel like I just walked off the plane and I’m shocked all over again.
It seems that the majority of my students are very smart and are picking up on what I am teaching. But a few of them just don’t seem to get it at all. Sometimes I wonder if they are dyslexic. There is a spelling test every Friday and a couple of the students do not even come remotely close to spelling the words correctly. I realized that the handful of bright students were taught by the previous volunteer and she did a damn good job with them. The others are the few students who were not taught by that volunteer.
A friend brought to my attention something that I never thought of before. Its not only that they never had a good teacher present the information in a useful way but most importantly, those few students never had someone to help them develop their brain when they were younger. They’ve never had a person work with them to help their brain grow. She told me that the simplest concepts probably was never introduced to them and makes it more difficult for them to learn anything since they do not have a solid foundation.
I have also found that the students have no ambition to study or try to learn on their own. They do not even understand what it means to study. This occurred to me one night when my students were in the classroom. We recently had lights put into the classrooms so the students are supposed to “study” every night from 7 to 8:30. All they do is look through the books and I’m sure they do not even know what they are looking at. Furthermore, why would they have any ambition to study? I mean, think about it. Most students in America, even at an early age know that you need to get good grades and do well in school if you want to get a good job someday. We are always told that if you go to college, you’ll likely find a better job as opposed to not going to college. I’ve wondered lately if some of the students even know what college is. I have tried to think of ways to teach them how to study. Sometimes for homework, I will write something on the board and just have them write it over and over in hopes that the repetition will help them memorize it.
I had this conversation with Patrick earlier this week. He was saying that one of the problems is that the students do not have any role models. Hopefully I can change that by arranging for some successful deaf adults to come and visit. And maybe I can somehow portray myself as a good role model, but I think its more important that they meet Kenyans who are deaf.
Finally, the teachers really are not that bad but they don’t change their ways. Before I just thought they were bad teachers, but they are trying hard and they genuinely care about the students. I had an interesting conversation about this with another volunteer on instant messenger recently. I felt it would be a good idea to post part of that conversation since it provides a good insight to what our lives are like as deaf education volunteers:
Matt(9:50:47 PM): its like there is no light going off in their heads saying "man, these scores suck, we need to try something else because what we are doing isn’t working."
Charlotte(9:51:14 PM): yeah but that’s the thing - they don’t have anything to compare the scores with
Charlotte(9:51:19 PM): that’s the way it always have been
Charlotte(9:51:30 PM): we come from the US - we know that the scores can be better
Matt(9:51:37 PM): very good point
Charlotte(9:51:44 PM): it took me a few months to realize that
Charlotte(9:52:07 PM): and then i started talking with the kenyan teachers about my educational experience
Charlotte(9:52:07 PM): about my deaf friends
Charlotte(9:52:10 PM): and they’re shocked
Charlotte(9:52:35 PM): so it’s an interesting process for me - maybe it’ll help some of the teachers think about how they’re teaching
Matt(9:53:05 PM): i realized something similar too
Matt(9:53:21 PM): i think we have all complained about how bad the teachers are
Matt(9:53:51 PM): but at my school, some of them show up every day, sure they start their classes a little late but everything starts late in Africa.
Matt(9:54:36 PM): i found one teacher falling asleep on her desk after classes were finished because i know she was trying so hard all day, but like you said, they just don’t know and they haven’t seen what we’ve seen in the US
Matt(9:54:54 PM): they don’t know to try something different.
Yesterday was a pretty awesome day. I was riding high after a great weekend in which I got a lot done. Patrick and I met with the deaf adult group that we started and we are seeing a lot of success. After a couple of months we have raised a decent amount of money for this group. We had a great meeting in which we shared ideas for what we should do with the money. For those of you that don’t remember, this is a self-help group so we intend to use the money to benefit the members of the group in some way or maybe help one member at a time. Some ideas were pretty simple, buying some baby chicks, raising them and then selling them when they mature. Baby chicks are cheap around 50 to 100 shillings and a full grown chicken sells for maybe 400 shillings so we can make a profit over time to share with the group(ok, I’m completely guessing with these numbers but you get the idea). Another idea was to buy some new and better carpentry equipment for the carpenters in the group. Some people even suggested to start a hotel (not a real American hotel but a small cafe). Some members want to start a shop.
After the meeting, Patrick and I were like a couple of excited kids in a candy store because we were so happy that our group is working. We both have high hopes for the group such as helping some of the very few students that can make it to college pay for it.
Then Monday rolls around. All of my students showed up on time and I was just in the zone. I found some things that were working and I went with it. We are learning the days of the week and the months of the year. And they are getting it! I also brought out a new book and I feel like my skills of reading in sign have really improved as I had everyone’s complete attention and they were really into the story. I am also getting the feeling from them that they know not to mess with me which means I have done a good job of making sure they know the rules and the consequences of not following them. Last week I caught two students clearly cheating on a test immediately after I had specifically reminded them of the rule NOT TO CHEAT. I was livid. I made one cheater clean the entire classroom by himself and the other had to wash all of the dishes and utensils after lunch.
Anyways, back to yesterday. I gave them some assignments to do and I was happy. I also had some time to myself to read my book. But as great as I was feeling, the best part was yet to come.
Just before dinner, I went back to my classroom to grab a notebook when Glory peeked in. If you remember, Glory is the adorable little girl from my old class that follows me around a lot. She came in and was followed by a few more little girls from the nursery. Spontaneously, I thought this would be a good time to try reading to them and see if I can captivate them. But of course, I wanted Maureen to be there, my old teacher’s pet and friend that I still sneak a candy bar to every now and then. I told one of the girls to go get her and that I was going to read to them, In a few seconds, Maureen was running across the school yard with a HUGE smile on her face.
I sat them down in a circle and tried my best to read the story. When I finished I turned around to find 5 beautiful little girls beaming. I even asked them a question about the story, and they answered it correctly!!!!
Great day all around.
Alright, I know, I know, its been a while since I’ve made a post. But I have been VERY busy.
I am enjoying my new class. It is actually kind of fun. The first few days I worked hard on making sure they knew the rules and understood them. The rules are as follows:
1) Be on time.
2) No choo during class.
3) Pay attention!
4) NO cheating!
5) Respect others.
We spent a lot of time learning the rules because I wanted to be absolutely sure that they fully understand them. We even had a test on the rules at the end of the week. Of course, class 3 is more mature than class one, so that has made things easier. Using a tip from the previous volunteer, I have begun tossing a ball around the class. When I see that they are not paying attention I throw the ball at them and then they have to spell one of the weekly vocabulary words. In addition, when they are not following the rules, I write a tally next to their name on the board. If they receive a tally, they need to help me out after class, usually by getting my water and carrying it to my house or by cleaning the classroom. The more tallies they accumulate they more work they have to do. The second or third day I was having a hard time with the entire class, so I made all of them clean the lunchroom and all of the dishes after lunch.
The first week I thought it was crucial they understand the consequences for bad behavior. Starting this week, I have begun to reward them for good behavior. I have a “reward chart” in which each day they can earn a star (thanks mom for the stickers!). If they have 3 or more tallies they do not receive a star that day. Once they have earned five stars, they will receive an award of some kind. Maybe a new pencil, an eraser, or they get to play a card game with me.
I am very happy so far with my class. At the end of each day, I collapse and sometimes am in bed as early as 8:30. I have put a lot of effort into understanding each individual person. We have reviewed a lot material and I give them some assignments that allow me to easily gauge their skill level. Now, that I have a better understanding of the class, I am organizing topics that I want them to understand. I spent a lot of time on each topic. For example, every Monday I give them ten new words that they have to learn and they are tested on them on Friday. Everyday, we practice and practice those words. Almost every real teacher I have talked to in America has said that repetition is vital.
As I previously wrote, I have started taking Swahili lessons this term. Patrick teaches me every Mon, Wed, and Fri. We’re supposed to meet for only an hour, but they usually last two hours. Things have been going pretty well. He is a very demanding teacher. He even gives me homework! I wouldn’t be surprised if there is a test soon. But I feel very confident that because he is demanding I will become fluent in the language much sooner than I thought. Learning Swahili has brought back some memories of the challenges I had with English growing up with a hearing loss. But more about that later.
Teaching all day, combined with language lessons at the end of the day, makes me incredibly exhausted. But its a rewarding feeling.
A side note, thanks to Sam and KP for the wedding invitations. Obviously, I won’t be able to attend but its nice to know people are thinking of me on the other side of the world.
About half of my class was here on Friday but I was told not to start teaching since the important teacher’s meeting had not taken place. However the students were still told to report to class and all they did was stare at their old workbooks. How productive!
Surprisingly, all of the teachers were here on consecutive days last week. Of course all they did was chat amongst themselves. I don’t really understand why they need to be here if they are not going to do anything. You’d think we would have had the teacher’s meeting last week since there was nothing to do but no, lets wait until Monday when all of the kids are here and we should be teaching.
My mom has been begging me to post some pictures of my house so I will grant her wish since its Mother’s Day.
Happy Mother’s Day!
Ok, this is starting to get out of hand. Nestor has again broken my window. For the third time!
Not only that, he has either urinated and/or defecated outside my door almost everyday since I’ve been back. I’m mean geez, the size of some of these turds this little guy can squeeze out boggles my mind. I don’t know how he does it.
He never ceases to amaze me. I love the little guy and maybe its his way of showing affection or something but holy crap, enough is enough!
I have been battling a bout of an illness commonly experienced by Peace Corp Volunteers. I’ll spare you the details and instead write about the highlights of my trip to the coast.
While in Mombasa, we took a tour of Fort Jesus. Fort Jesus was built by the Portuguese (in the 1600s?) and was eventually taken over by Arabs. That is pretty much all I know about it, so you’ll have to Wikipedia it if you want more information. I just thought it was pretty cool to view the pirate infested Indian Ocean for the first time from atop an ancient fort. We also saw the “Kenya Burning” photography exhibit. The exhibit consisted of pictures of the election violence in Kenya from late 2007/early 2008. Its hard to believe that crisis gripped the country just over a year ago. But its safe now (for the most part.) After our brief stay in Mombasa, we headed north.
The next highlight of the trip was One Love Island. One of the business volunteers works for a tourist organization. By organization, I mean just one man and his mom (and of course his PCV). Basically the man is a huge Bob Marley fan and look- alike who may or may not own a small island. Not surprisingly he named the island, One Love Island. It is a nice little set up. His mom cooks all the food and we just hung out on the island for the day and night. The sleeping arrangements were not the best. At one point in the night I was woken by mosquitoes. So I got up, lathered on the insect repellent, and laid out under the stars for the rest of the night.
After our island trip we went back to Kilifi. We met up with another business volunteer who helps out another tourist organization. This one seemed to be more legitimate. We went snorkeling right off the beach. I was excited to use my “waterproof” camera and I took some sweet underwater pictures. Yes my camera is supposed to be waterproof and yes, it is too good to be true because it does not work now. Damn you Olympus.
That pretty much sums it up. The day after snorkeling I made the long trip home. Oh and we also ate pizza, cheeseburgers and enjoyed cold beer. That was probably the best part.
I’ve been back for a few days now. Since I’m sick I do not have the energy to do anything (as you can probably tell by the length of this post). I have about ten episodes of The Office on my laptop that I have been watching over and over. School supposedly starts on Wednesday. At least that is when the students are supposed to arrive. I wouldn’t be surprised if they do not show up for another week so who knows when I officially start teaching again. I am looking forward to having something to do.
In other news, Nestor just broke my window again for the third time.
I have finally managed to find an internet connection so I can provide my many readers with a quick update and let you know that I am alive.
I have been traveling around Kenya for the last few weeks. First I went to Machakos for the deaf games, then to Nairobi, then back to my site for a week, then back to Nairobi for training, and finally I am in Mombasa.
Training was ok. I get the impression that the Peace Corps is trying hard to change and make training more beneficial for deaf ed. But there still is a long way to go. It was nice to see my Peace Corps family (other volunteers). I have not seen most of the volunteers so it was great to see all of them and exchange stories of our experiences so far. A LOT of us have lost weight including myself. (I have lost 15 lbs! Crap! And I thought I was skinny to begin with. I got some ideas I want to try that will hopefully put those pounds back on.) Aside from the boring training sessions, we shared a lot of laughs. I have not had that much fun in a while.
Now I am in Mombasa on my “vacation.” I am going to visit a few places along the coast with some friends. It should be a great time. But I must admit, I am dreading the loooong trip back to my site.
Kwaheri for now!
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