"Don't let the curriculum bring you down" (9/12)

This morning was pretty horrific for me.  I had just woken up (so I was still laying in my bed) and was skyping with Nick when all of a sudden a cockroach ran over my computer screen.  So naturally, I screamed bloody murder and ran out of the bed to grab the Doom (cockroach spray).  I killed the cockroach and then tried to recuperate from my tragic experience (I am still trying to get over it two weeks later).  Before I left my neighbors encouraged me to think of my mosquito net over my bed as the set-up for a princess bed, which I did up until now, because I’m sure princesses do not share their beds with cockroaches. Sigh. 

After being on edge from the cockroach in my bed, I started teaching only to notice a lizard above my head in the classroom.  Oh boy, today was going to be a long one.  Anyways, the math lesson I taught today went well, and I was able to see the students starting to warm up to me.  Later in the day I taught English and was observed by Enoch.  The lesson itself went very well up until it came time for the students to work in their exercise books.  I have made the decision that when I check the students’ work in their exercise books, that I will meet with them one-on-one to do so.  This allows me to check-in with each student and see how they’re doing, as well as it allows me the opportunity to build relationships with every student in the class.  Well as I was going around checking my students’ work, student after student seemed to be totally lost.  I had asked the students to be rather creative, and come up with their own sentences telling me what they do during the different parts of the day.  The problem was that the students at Rwentutu are never given the opportunity to think on their own or to be creative, but rather they always follow a set-in-stone sentence structure or pattern given to them by the teacher. So the task that I gave them to complete was too difficult.  I was feeling quite defeated after seeing my students struggle through the activity. 

I expressed these concerns with Enoch as well as some others I had at this point.  He not only made me feel better about these things, but he also thought my lesson went really well.  He gave me several compliments, but the most important one to me was that he said he could tell I care about my students.  He said this was evident as I knew all of the students’ names already and because I spent time working with each child.  As is how teaching works, I will take the things that Enoch told me and my own personal reflections from my lesson to help me plan my lessons for tomorrow.   

The problem I experienced today, with the students unable to write simple sentences was my first encounter with what Dr. Gillian warned us about, letting the curriculum bring you down.  The reason that students aren’t provided with opportunities to be creative in their writing or in anything they do, is because creativity is not something that is tested on the national exams.  This was one of the concerns I expressed to Enoch.  I wanted to know if I should be going back and teaching the basics such simple sentence structure, letter sounds, number recognition, and so on, or if I am just supposed to stick to the curriculum and ignore the fundamentals to reading, writing and math.  Enoch encouraged me to do what I thought the kids needed; however, he still stressed that the curriculum needs to be taught.  So I am going to try my best to incorporate the basics and fundamentals into the curriculum that I am required to teach.

First day of teaching!

Today was my first actual day of teaching, as we spent the first week observing and deciding on which classrooms we wanted to work in.  I will be teaching Math, English, and Reading in my P1 class.  But today I just taught English and reading.  After spending hours preparing last night, I felt confident going into my lessons today.  I knew my lessons well and knew what my goals were for the students and myself. 

I first taught English.  I started by having the kids loosen up a bit by playing a game of Simon Says.  It got the kids out of their seats and gave them a little break so they would be ready to learn.  The curriculum for the day instructed me to teach the words morning, afternoon, evening, and night.  And in English they must be able to read the word, spell the word, define the word, draw a picture of the word and use it in a sentence.  And all of this for some rather abstract words.  I had the kids do an activity where they moved around to try and put some pictures representing the words into chronological order.  This went fine.  The most difficult teaching point for me was teaching the spelling of the words.  What Katie and I have realized is that the kids have never learned the sounds that letters or strings of letters make.  This means that students are not able to sound out a word when they are trying to spell it, or when they are trying to read it.  This presents me with a challenge, how do you spell without knowing what sounds each letter makes?  Their answer to this is repetition and memorization.  Unfortunately, repetition and memorization do not always equal learning.  Hmmmm….Right now I am still trying to figure out how I am going to teach English in a way that allows the students to actually learn and comprehend the vocabulary. 

For reading today I started by introducing fluency to the students.  I want the students to learn to read fluently so they can gain confidence as readers as well as to aid in comprehension.  I made an anchor chart for the students that listed the three main components of fluency that I want them to focus on including reading accurately, loudly, and with personality.  After going over this with them, I sang a song about the days of the week that we would be using as our fluency piece this week (since the students would be learning the days of the week for vocabulary later in the week).  I then had the students sing with me.  We will continue to sing the song each day, and by the end of the week if students feel ready, they will have an opportunity to sing by themselves and demonstrate their fluency.

I then did a read aloud with the class.  I had the students come and sit on the floor with me, which they were very excited about, as this was clearly something they had never done before.  The students seem to really enjoy read-alouds, and it provides another opportunity for me to gauge reading comprehension from my students.  I hope to do daily read-alouds. 

Next the students read by themselves.  I sat one-on-one and read with one student.  She was really struggling throughout the book.  This told me first that the book she was reading was too difficult for her and that I need to go to the school library and pick out some more appropriate books for my students.  But she also demonstrated to me how hard it is for the students to read without learning letter sounds.  She wasn’t able to sound out any words at all.  The only words she knew were those that she had memorized.  But this meant that even small words such as an or in were often times mixed up, because her reading of these words was based solely on memorization. 

So looking at the strengths and weaknesses of my lessons from today, I spent the night planning new lessons for tomorrow.  I tried to incorporate more of my own teaching style, while still using the schools’ somewhat limiting curriculum.  

9/10

Today is our final day observing in the classrooms that we chose and then tomorrow we will start teaching.  As I mentioned, I will be teaching in a P1 classroom.  While at school today I received the books that I will teach from.  I have 8 English units to teach and 10 math units to teach while I am here.  The first English unit I will teach will be Times of the Day, so students will be learning the vocabulary morning, evening, afternoon, and night, as well as the days of the week.  In math, I will start by teaching about bar graphs.  So while observing today I was brainstorming some lesson plan ideas. 

After school we went to the Market to get some food for the week and then we picked up the skirts that we had made out of the beautiful fabric we bought.  The skirts turned out perfectly and so did the headbands.  I don’t have a picture of me in my skirt yet, but I will take one and post it at some point.  Then as soon as we got home we spent the remainder of the night planning for our lessons.  Enoch has asked us to write out full lesson plans for each lesson we teach.  This turns out being a lot of work, but as I have found out it is also very helpful once it comes time to teach the lessons.  We also have to make anything we want to use in a lesson.  So I was busy making posters and anchor charts for my lessons.  I also made name-tags for my students so I can start calling my students by name right away.  

Kilembe Copper Mines (9/9)

This morning we woke up very early to go to the Catholic Church in town.  It was a good half hour walk, but it was nice walking through town so early as it was much calmer and peaceful at this time.  The Mass was a little difficult to follow as it switched back and forth between Lukunzo and English (even though it was an English service), but it was still nice to be in a somewhat familiar place.  And I once again was able to feel comfort and a connection to home when the priest said “God is good all the time” and “All the time God is good.” 

Katie, Doreen, and I on top of the hill overlooking Kasese

After the service Doreen found some of the neighbor boys and asked them to take us on a shortcut home.  And sure enough, we were home in half the time!  One of the boys that walked us was Mark.  Mark is a 13-year-old boy in P7 at the school right up the road from our house.  He has befriended the past three Wisconsin groups that have been here and has taken them to the mines in Kilembe, so he extended the same offer to us for the next Sunday.  We jumped at the opportunity.

Enoch then came over after church to meet with us, as he is our supervisor for teaching.  A better way to describe him though would be as a Grandfather, because that is how he treats us, as his own daughters.  Whenever we talk with Enoch he not only listens to our concerns, but he really hears them.  And even though missing the safari yesterday had nothing to do with Enoch, he felt terrible and wanted to make it up to us.  So he asked us if we could find Mark and go to the mines today. 

So we loaded up the car, Morris, Enoch, Doreen, Mark, Katie, and I, and headed to Kilembe, the town where the copper mines are located.  It was only about a 20-minute drive as it is still in the Kasese district.  But of course, before we actually arrived in Kilembe, Enoch stopped along the way at the top of a hill that overlooked all of Kasese.  It was an incredible view, and probably one of my favorite stops atop a hill so far, as we were looking down at the place where we live.  It was really breathtaking as the town was to our left and then the beautiful mountains were to our right.  In fact, the hilltop that we were standing on is where the King’s home will be built in some years to come, as it is the best view in Kasese. 

Kasese

Rwenzori Mountains

The plaque declaring this as land for the King's palace to be built on, and our tour guides Enoch and Mark

Our next unexpected stop was to some hot springs.  I had been to some hot springs this summer in Colorado and really enjoyed them, so when the men (completely submerged in the water) invited us in, I took off my shoes and rolled up my pants ready to get in.  The water was piping hot. There was actually a spot in the hot spring where the water was boiling.  Katie and I stood in for just enough time to snap a picture and get out.  Our feet were burning, while the men were just relaxing and laughing at us.  They explained to us that the hot springs are actually used medicinally as the locals believe they have healing powers.

Katie and I dipping our feet in the hot springs

Locals

When we arrived in Kilembe, we first just drove around the town.  The town is much different now than it used to be, because mining no longer takes place in the town.  Mining stopped around 1970.  But we were still able to see the homes that the miners lived in, which people still live in today.  Enoch explained that the town was booming while the mining was still taking place, but now everything is much more run down and so many places have closed.  You could almost picture the mining town the way Enoch described it, even as we drove through the now ghost-town.

Old houses that the miners lived in

As we started heading towards the mines we found a man in a blue jumpsuit heading back from the mines, so of course Enoch struck up a conversation with him and in a matter of minutes we had our own personal tour guide.  The man was very informational, as were Enoch, and Mark.  They walked us through the step-by-step process of the mining for copper that took place within the mines and we were able to see the old equipment.  We even were able to enter the caves as we came prepared with our headlamps and saw some of the copper.  We only walked in about .5 km, but the mine goes back about 5.5 km. 

Kilembe Copper Mines

Where some of the mining was done

Farming is how the people of the town make a living today

On our walk to the mines a hug herd of cows were walking by

The mine we went in

Katie, our tour guide Mark, and I inside the mine

Copper in the mine

Old equipment

Secondary School

We then visited a secondary school in Kilembe.  Enoch is on the board at this school, and it is also the school that Doreen attended.  After our brief visit to the school, as we were heading back to our car, I spotted a man wearing a Wharton shirt (this is the business school at Upenn where Nick went to school).  I was so excited, but the man was sitting down and I was unable to get a picture of the shirt, so I went to ask him if I could take his picture.  Well when I asked him he didn’t even look up at me, and Enoch explained that the man was on drugs (as he was eating them out of a little plastic bag), and that he wasn’t thinking right.  So unfortunately I was unable to get a picture! 

Guy in a Wharton shirt!

Stream running through Kilembe

Our next stop was to the Margherita Hotel.  It is a beautiful hotel in Kasese that has a nice garden area that you can sit in and enjoy a drink.  So that is just what we did.  We wanted to thank all of our tour guides, so we bought everyone a soda, which was much needed after yet another jam-packed day. 

Of course we still had one more stop in us, and that was to see the District of Kasese’s Prime Minister, Loyce Bwambale.  She has not only served as the Prime Minister, but she as also held several other important government roles within the country and even the continent.  It was nice to sit and talk with her as she gave us some insight into the Ugandan culture, which she seemed to be quite the expert on.  And before departing, we made arrangements through her to meet with the King of Kasese.  Enoch sure has his connections.  

9/8

Despite all of our planning, our car broke down on the way to pick us up for the safari, so we didn’t end up going today.  I guess it was a good thing that it broke down before we were among lions though.  It was definitely a let down as it was something we were looking forward to, but we rescheduled for next Saturday. 

Katie and I all ready for our safari :(

We spent most of the day just relaxing and reading all day.  We had a visit from the neighbor boys, which can always brighten up our day.  And then Katie and I walked to town for the first time by ourselves to just explore a bit.  Most days we go to town and just stop at the same places, the market, the supermarket, the flour shop, and so on.  We ended up buying some chart paper that we will use to make posters for our classroom.  And Katie even haggled a bit and got the price down 2,000 extra UGS. 

And just to test us a little more after our safari let down, we had 3 HUGE cockroaches visit us.  And then we lost power. And then I received bad news from home.  All of that mixed together was the perfect recipe for homesickness.  But the day provided us with the perfect opportunity for a cure, lots of skype time with family.   

"God is good, All the time" (9/6)

Baby Alian, sooo cute!

We woke up this morning with no power.  That meant getting ready for school in the dark.  It wasn’t too bad as the sun was almost up after we were done skyping and it was time to start getting ready.  It just adds a little excitement to your morning.  Something I have learned by now is that every day there HAS to be some form of “excitement.”  Be it a cockroach, no power, rats, fires, or lizards among so many other things (I will talk about the last three things in later posts), a day does not go by without something happening.

At school I observed in the P4 classroom.  There were 29 students present.  One thing that I appreciated was when the teacher had the students get out of their desks and go outside to draw circles in the dirt with their feet.  Not only was it great to see the children out of their seats and using what resources they have (nature) to learn, but I also learned how to make a perfect circle using only my feet!  Another thing that worked well in the class was when the teacher had the students work in small groups of about three.  It was good to see some small group work, as everything else I have seen has either been individual or large group. 

Me with baby Evan at Chapel

Starting to gather for Chapel

After the morning break, it was chapel time at school.  Chapel began with all the kids huddling under a big tree with benches, chairs, stools, rugs, or just the grass to sit on.  The first half hour was simply singing, dancing, and drumming.  All the students were standing up, clapping, dancing, and singing different hymns.  The students sing loud and proud.  It is really cool seeing all of the kids come together, from the baby class up to P7, all uniting and singing passionately.  One of the schoolteachers gave the service and he switched back and forth from Lukunzo to English throughout.  But one thing that I picked up on right away was when he said, “God is good,” and the students responded “All the time.”  And then he said “All the time,” and the students responded, “God is good.”  This is something that Father Manahan, a priest from Marquette that Nick is very close with, does.  I know this because Nick and I attended one of his services that he had in Oconomowoc just a few weeks before I left for Uganda.  I should also note that Father Manahan spent 2 (or was it three?) years in Uganda teaching, so Nick and I met with him before I left and he gave me a lot of advice.  Anyways, it was neat hearing the same thing all the way in Uganda, and it gave me that connection to home that I don’t always have here. 

Here is a video from the beginning of Chapel. I will try and get a better one someday, because as the weeks go on it seems the students get more and more into it. 

The kids chasing the soccer ball

The last thing we did today was pump up one of the soccer balls we brought with us and give it to the kids.  After giving the balls to the school, they just sat deflated in a cabinet, so Katie and I took it upon ourselves to fill one up.  The kids were so excited.  We threw the ball out to them and they just chased it around the school for an hour, without stopping, about fifty of them.  And even though there is a field at the school, the kids were just too excited to make the walk to it!

After school we went for a run with the neighborhood boys, and boy can they run fast!  We started running with three neighborhood boys, but as we ran through the neighborhood, we kept gaining kids here and there.  By the end, we had a pack of about 15 kids running with us.  While on our run we also stopped at the boys' house, because they wanted us to meet their mother.  Their mother actually found two of the boys and took them in as her own.  The boys are so nice and I am so happy they have found such a wonderful woman to look after them.

Later, Katie, Doreen, and I made dinner.  We had been giving Doreen a hard time because she has a shirt that says Jennifer Lopez on the front, so we have been calling her J-Lo.  Anyway, we brought our computers out to play some of J-Lo's music while we cooked.  Well this turned into an all out dance party! We had a blast and could not stop laughing.  Here is a video of Doreen shakin it!

Bridging the gap 9/5

Just eating some lunch. 

Today I observed in a P1 classroom.  Only seven of the twenty students were in class today.  Something I observed today was the emphasis put on drawing in the classroom.  Students are expected to know how to draw everything they learn, especially in English.  They must know how to draw it well, and the exact way they are originally shown.  While I’m not sure how I feel about this as it hampers on their creativity, what I have come to realize is that a lot of the students are excellent artists!  One thing that the classroom teacher did today that I did not expect to see was an energizer.  She noticed the students beginning to lose focus, so she stopped the lesson and had the kids do a Simon Says type game.  She even let a couple students come up and lead.  It was nice to see this practice.  Another positive thing I saw was the teacher’s relationship with the students.  She seemed to have a decent relationship built with her students as she was laughing with them and having some fun.  This was also unexpected, as when we met with Gillian she said this was something missing in their schools.  Another good thing I saw, was while doing a spelling exercise, the students were each given individual “slates” to practice writing the words.  This was nice since it made all the students accountable.  Finally, during math, the teacher let the students get out of their seats and lay on the floor to do their work.  I really value letting students make themselves comfortable as long as they can still be productive, so this is definitely something I will continue when I teach here.

Hanging out during morning break

After a very positive morning, Katie and I were both a little thrown off when none of the teachers returned to their classrooms after lunch.  Unsure of what was going on, I started to play a couple name games and get to know your students-type games.  After observing some really great things this morning in the classroom, I was leaning towards teaching in this class and figured it would be a good opportunity to start learning some names and the students as individuals.  I started by teaching the kids a clapping and singing name game, which they loved, and then we did some math games, and other little circle games.  I ended up really enjoying the time (it ended up being a full hour), but was a little confused what all the other classrooms were doing that didn’t have teachers in them at all.  Katie and I came to the conclusion later that the teachers were in a meeting….

Hopscotch!

Down by the banks game

In the afternoon, we were just kind of sitting around during games time with a group of girls around us, and I picked up a stone and started drawing hopscotch in the dirt.  Then I demonstrated how to do it, all without words, and right away the girls tried it out.  They laughed and had a blast with it.  So Katie and I kept adding boxes on and making it bigger and bigger.  It was good to see the kids having some fun and starting to warm up to us.  After about a half hour of hopscotch, we taught a small group of girls the circle-singing-game Down by the Banks.  The kids LOVED it and by the end of the games period we had a group of about 30 students playing the game.  These games were such a small and simple way to start bridging the gap between the students at Rwentutu and us.