Let's Give it a Second Try

After the “first” day of school was a disappointment, I was ready to see if the reassurance of student attendance would be fulfilled during our second week of school. This time around we get about half of the students to show up, which still makes for a pretty large class. I felt ready to teach and got started with my “introductions” lesson plan. It included simple stuff like: who am I, who are you, name cards and classroom rules. The main activity of the lesson was to write down your name, your village, your grade, your favorite subject and a dream for the future. I, being naïve to the Guinean thought process, figured all of this would be pretty straight forward.  Sadly, the last question about their futures turned into the hardest question of the week. The most common answer being something about studying. I did my best to encourage them to consider things for a career or at the very least after school. They couldn’t do it. It’s the biggest problem I face every day in school. The language barrier does slow us down but the fact that they can’t answer a simple open question or form an opinion of their own accord is the most frustrating. It’s sad really because these students have been beaten (sometimes literally) into the rote system of learning and at this age have trouble changing that thought process. I’ve been doing my best each class to give critical thinking questions but easing into them. If anyone has any good critical thinking games, I would love to hear about them.



The yard at my school.



My second week of school was also highlighted by the appearance of my principal. I’ve neglected mentioning that since August when I was assigned to the College in Wonkifong the principal had been suspended. This is a new principal and he’s bringing lots of changes, which is great to see someone working to better the situation. He’s even trying to get them to show up a half hour before school, we’ll see how long that lasts.

Two weeks of school have now passed and I still haven’t really taught anything. They have a schedule like a college in America so they only have chemistry once a week. Overall the schedule is pretty weird because they only have two or three classes a day between 8AM and 2PM but the school week is Monday to Saturday. I’m no logistician but I’m seeing some flaws here.

 Hope everyone is doing good at home. I hear that I’m missing lots of sports excitement at home so email me updates! Oh, and I guess I want to hear about your day too.

Dante