Can you believe it’s March?! I’ve been here for 6 weeks already and there are only 12 days until spring break! For our break I’m going on a 6 day trip up the Garden Route with the other 46 students in my AIFS program. It will be full of adventures including bungee jumping, a canopy zipline, surfing, sea kayaking, spelunking, and a stop at Monkeyland! When that trip ends, 22 of us are continuing up the coast for another 4 days to visit the Addo Elephant Park. We’ll get to go on two guided tours through the park in an open air vehicle that will allow us to observe the Big Five, and spend a couple nights sleeping right by the Indian Ocean. But that’s still two weeks away.
Today was another crazy day at Lynedoch but, again, I think it went well. We played soccer in the morning, boys versus girls because that’s what they always insist on. I was especially happy to see that our student with a prosthetic leg was enjoying the game, as she usually sits out of our physical activity. My friend Jeff’s girlfriend is visiting this week and she was a great addition to our class. She jumped right into the game and a few of the girls stuck by her side the whole time. She told a couple students that she studied in Ghana last semester, but they had never heard of Ghana. She kindly explained that it’s another African country up north, but it reminded me of how little these kids know about the world beyond Lynedoch.
Back in the classroom we had to teach a lesson on first-aid. In order to make it interactive we drew a pretend cut or scrape on each learner’s arm and taught them the proper way to treat injuries like this. We had them wash it with soap and water, rub on some Neosporin, and then put a band-aid on the fake cut, while making sure not to touch anyone else’s blood. Since 25% of the South African population has HIV/AIDS the learner’s were taught at a young age to be careful around blood. We also went over how to treat a burn and a big gash on your own. Lastly we had the kids compile a list of reasons why you should call for help (i.e. someone stopped breathing, broken bones, glass under your skin, etc). What really surprised me during our lesson was that very few people knew the emergency numbers. If you asked a class of 6th graders in the United States what the emergency number is, they would all respond immediately. Even the teacher wasn’t sure which number to use in an emergency. Eventually they were able to come up with the police number and the ambulance number, but it definitely wasn’t automatic.
For our afternoon lesson we listed several of the rights from the South African Bill of Rights on the board and briefly explained each one. It was extremely beneficial to have Mrs. Adams, the 6th grade teacher, in the classroom because some of the rights are complex and it’s helpful to have her translate into Afrikaans. But it’s really great that she only does this for some things that we say, as she’s quite good at gauging how well her learner’s understand our English. I think she strikes a nice balance between explaining for comprehension and allowing them to figure things out in English. After this lesson we had the learners form groups and design their own skits modeling one of the rights discussed. They loved acting last week so we thought this was and effective teaching tool. We told them their scripts could be in Afrikaans if they wanted, but we were pleased to have a couple groups perform in English. For the second week in a row I was so impressed with Siziwe and her confidence when standing in front of the class. Her English is phenomenal and her group’s skit was definitely the most structured and well-rehearsed. I was saddened to see that four out the five skits were somewhat violent, but I suppose that comes with the territory.
I’m really happy with the relationships that Jeff, Andie, and I are forming with the learners and with Mrs. Adams. I think the learners pick up on how respectful we are towards them and, in turn, they show us respect. As Grant told us in the beginning, these kids have an innate ability to recognize when people are genuine, and I think they understand that we fall into that category. Grant informed us today that Mrs. Adams likes our lessons very much and has been incorporating them into her classroom lessons. I was especially happy to hear this because the last time Stellenbosch University had students volunteer at Lynedoch the teachers were not pleased with the way things went. The South African undergrads came into the classrooms and did things the way they wanted without showing the teachers respect. I think it made the teachers weary of us at first because we appear to be the same on the outside, a group of white college students invading the classrooms of a primary school. But Grant has been receiving nothing but positive feedback from the teachers thus far and they're very appreciative of our work.
On the train ride home I let one of the 4th grade girls borrow my camera so here are some of the pictures she took…
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