Part two of the double-post: Here's an idea of what my day is like.
Monday:
7:45 am: Bike to school while trying to avoid pedestrians, cows, potholes, and taxis. All concern about whether I’m flashing people has disappeared; I’m more concerned about whether I’m going to make it to school in one piece.
8:00 am: Arrive at BHS very sweaty, silently thank God that I’ve made it, and find the teacher’s lounge in the IT lab, because the administrative building is still being painted. Find out that I’m teaching forms 1,2, and 4 integrated science. Then spend 15 minutes trying to figure out my schedule on the insane (handwritten) timetable after all of the other teachers have left for the opening assembly.
8:30 am: prepare to sit in the teacher’s lounge for the next three hours or so because my first class isn’t until after lunch ends at 11:15. Mentally prepare myself for my first class as a teacher. Try to sit in the cross breeze so that the sweat can dry a little.
9:00am: talk to the Head of the science department (HOD) and find out that they want us to teach 3rd form physics and maybe even maths classes. Either that or join another department and teach social studies or English. Nothing is decided, but I begin to get nervous that I’ll be teaching a 4th form maths class.
10:20 am: lunchtime. I end up waiting until 10:40 to go to the canteen because of the huge mass of students all trying to buy lunch from two lunch ladies. It’s still crazy when I decided to brave the crowd, but one of the benefits of being the teacher is getting served first, so I don’t have to wait too long.
11:15 am: begin my first class of second formers with introductions, class rules, and then begin teaching the scientific method (it was the only thing I could come up with without the textbook or the curriculum guide to go off of). Lesson goes ok, but I’m stretching things as much as possible because the kids are shy and a little reluctant to participate.
12:25: second break. Take a deep breath and relax for the next hour.
13:20 (1:20 pm; the 24 hour system of time keeping is used here): begin my second class with the first form students. They’re more enthusiastic and a little easier to manage, especially because it’s their first day at a new school as well.
14:30: school day ends. After meeting up with Corin and gathering our stuff, be prepare to brave the road home once more.
14:45: Leave school. The road is slightly less chaotic than before, but still scary. I bump into a parked taxi while trying to avoid a moving taxi, and then struggle to peddle away while the taxi driver is shouting at me.
15:00: Make it home and thank God I survived the day. Immediately shower because at this point I’m drenched in sweat. Sit and relax for a while.
16:30: wash clothes by hand.
18:00 dinnertime.
18:45 head over to the internet café to look up ideas for leading class tomorrow, because I still don’t have any books or any hints as to what the students are supposed to be learning this term.
19:15: leave unsuccessful. This happened to be the busiest day at the internet café, so the internet was too slow to get anything done.
19:30 sit at the dining room table with my housemates for the next couple of hours trying to think of ideas. Finally decide to have the class “follow the scientific method” with a little experiment and also plan on teaching them averages. Also come up with a short lesson on the units of measurement and unit conversions just in case.
21:00 bed time.
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Tuesday was pretty much the same as before. We woke up to the sound of torrential rain outside, and it didn’t let up at all by the time we were ready to go to school. We ended up taking a taxi and shared the car with about five primary school kids and one student from our high school. Since the time table was still in flux, I decided to double check my classes for the day. Lo and behold, I found out that I’m also a 3rd form physics class…which worries me, because I just took my first real physics class last year. The only consolation is that I only have the kids once a week, and they’re not depending on me for their big standardized tests, the CXCs.
I told my HOD that I don’t really know what to prepare for this new class because I never got any books, so she promised to get me some materials to work with. I’m really thankful that I had prepared the extra lesson on units of measurement, because that’s what the students ended up learning that day. My HOD did bring me the books in the end, but it wasn’t until I was in the middle of my first physics class. Yes, during class. We quickly found out that it’s common for teachers or students to interrupt class if they need to find a student or give the teacher something. Despite the semi-regular interruptions by teachers and students, and the confusion of the schedule, things went ok all things considered.
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The rest of the week was pretty normal (for Guyana). The timetable for the school is still changing a lot, even into the second week of school. As a result, I still don’t really know all of the classes I’ll be teaching this year. In addition, it takes a long time to get the materials I need to teach: nearly halfway through the second week, I still don’t have the book for my first form classes. A big part of being here is being flexible and working with what we have, even in the confusion and miscommunications.
Tuesday, September 14, 2010
New Amsterdam
This time I'll post twice to get everyone up to speed about living in New Amsterdam and my first week of school.
Our long awaited departure from CPCE arrived Saturday, August 28th. My housemates (Corin and Colleen) and I Ioaded up in a minibus for the drive over to New Amsterdam. After a long delay (the minibus was 45 minutes late, and then we waited for more passengers in Stabroek market for another hour or so), we were off. It’s a pretty easy drive out here from Georgetown, but certainly not boring. On the way we discovered yet another use for a machete (as a whip to herd cows across the road), passed a random parade/ protest against domestic violence, and crossed over the new floating (read: scary) bridge over the Berbice river. We were tired and a little shell shocked when we finally arrived at our house on the Multilateral Compound, but thankfully Sir Buster (a teacher at Multi who came to collect us) bought us dinner and water, so we settled in the best we could.
New Amsterdam consists of three parallel roads, Strand, Main, and Republic, connected by several cross streets. Berbice High School is on the other side of town, so Corin and I will have to master the fine art of biking with skirts to get to school every day. Across the street from us is an internet café/ “snackette” (kind of like a mini convenience store with tables to sit and eat there), and we’ve made friends with Miss Lolita and her family who run it.
Over the last few days, we’ve been exploring the town and slowly getting the house set up. Our house has three bedrooms, a toilet and a shower room, a living/ dining room, and a small kitchen. The biggest task was fumigating the kitchen to get rid of the cockroach population that had taken residence in the cupboards. Once that was done and the shelves were lined, it started to feel a little more like home. I shared a room with Corin for the first few days here, because my room didn’t have any curtains. However, the house is pretty much set up for now, and I’ve moved into my room.
The major problems that we’ve been dealing with have been the lack of running water and the lack of a refrigerator. First, the water situation. The water supply to our house connects to the city line via a PVC pipe that runs through an overgrown trench. Due ot the large mass of weeds, the city line disconnected from the house line pretty much every day. Last year, the girls who lived here had to connect the main water line from the city to the water line to the house because it disconnected all the time. In addition, the city water is not on 24/7, so everyone has a reservoir tank that they fill while the city water is on to save water for the off periods. When we got here, the line to the city water was disconnected, and the water tank was empty…which made for an interesting 24 hours until we could get help to connect the lines and fill the tank.
Everyday when the water was supposed to be on, we first had to turn off the pump and check to see if the lines were still connected. Mostly, they weren’t, so thankfully the maintenance man helped us connect the pipes for the first week and a half. Then we had to fill the tank and pray that the line stayed connected until it filled. This system was kind of annoying, but for the most part it worked when we could get the water lines connected. After many calls to our field director and the Regional education officer (REDO) who is supposed to take care of these issues, it seems like we got the problem fixed.
The refrigerator, on the other hand, is still an issue. We’ve had a couple of people look at it, and someone was supposed to pick it up on Monday to repair it, but it’s still a glorified pantry sitting in our kitchen. This is annoying because we can’t store meat or fresh vegetables, and we have to eat what we cook immediately the fact that the water got fixed within three weeks gives me hope that this will be resolved soon as well.
Our long awaited departure from CPCE arrived Saturday, August 28th. My housemates (Corin and Colleen) and I Ioaded up in a minibus for the drive over to New Amsterdam. After a long delay (the minibus was 45 minutes late, and then we waited for more passengers in Stabroek market for another hour or so), we were off. It’s a pretty easy drive out here from Georgetown, but certainly not boring. On the way we discovered yet another use for a machete (as a whip to herd cows across the road), passed a random parade/ protest against domestic violence, and crossed over the new floating (read: scary) bridge over the Berbice river. We were tired and a little shell shocked when we finally arrived at our house on the Multilateral Compound, but thankfully Sir Buster (a teacher at Multi who came to collect us) bought us dinner and water, so we settled in the best we could.
New Amsterdam consists of three parallel roads, Strand, Main, and Republic, connected by several cross streets. Berbice High School is on the other side of town, so Corin and I will have to master the fine art of biking with skirts to get to school every day. Across the street from us is an internet café/ “snackette” (kind of like a mini convenience store with tables to sit and eat there), and we’ve made friends with Miss Lolita and her family who run it.
Over the last few days, we’ve been exploring the town and slowly getting the house set up. Our house has three bedrooms, a toilet and a shower room, a living/ dining room, and a small kitchen. The biggest task was fumigating the kitchen to get rid of the cockroach population that had taken residence in the cupboards. Once that was done and the shelves were lined, it started to feel a little more like home. I shared a room with Corin for the first few days here, because my room didn’t have any curtains. However, the house is pretty much set up for now, and I’ve moved into my room.
The major problems that we’ve been dealing with have been the lack of running water and the lack of a refrigerator. First, the water situation. The water supply to our house connects to the city line via a PVC pipe that runs through an overgrown trench. Due ot the large mass of weeds, the city line disconnected from the house line pretty much every day. Last year, the girls who lived here had to connect the main water line from the city to the water line to the house because it disconnected all the time. In addition, the city water is not on 24/7, so everyone has a reservoir tank that they fill while the city water is on to save water for the off periods. When we got here, the line to the city water was disconnected, and the water tank was empty…which made for an interesting 24 hours until we could get help to connect the lines and fill the tank.
Everyday when the water was supposed to be on, we first had to turn off the pump and check to see if the lines were still connected. Mostly, they weren’t, so thankfully the maintenance man helped us connect the pipes for the first week and a half. Then we had to fill the tank and pray that the line stayed connected until it filled. This system was kind of annoying, but for the most part it worked when we could get the water lines connected. After many calls to our field director and the Regional education officer (REDO) who is supposed to take care of these issues, it seems like we got the problem fixed.
The refrigerator, on the other hand, is still an issue. We’ve had a couple of people look at it, and someone was supposed to pick it up on Monday to repair it, but it’s still a glorified pantry sitting in our kitchen. This is annoying because we can’t store meat or fresh vegetables, and we have to eat what we cook immediately the fact that the water got fixed within three weeks gives me hope that this will be resolved soon as well.
Wednesday, September 1, 2010
A selection of pictures
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| My humble lodgings during orientation at CPCE |
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| Cummings Lodge Secondary, where we had the teaching practicum |
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| A caterpillar that our students brought to show us the day after our nature walk |
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| The students who attended the lessons during the practicum |
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| Me, Colleen (one of my housemates), Marek (another volunteer), and the 5th form students |
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