Bob Marley and Failed Lesson Plans

Right now (Wednesday, May 27th at 2:00pm) I am sitting in the World Relief office in Mzimba listening to Bob Marley singing “It’s going to be a bright, bright sun shiny day.” The WR office here has about 6 rooms, two are offices, one is the main entrance which is used to store the motorbikes, and the other two are storage rooms, with a room with benches around the walls used as a common room. That is where I am right now, thinking of ways to keep my self busy and ideas of how to teach 2 to 5 year olds at the same time how to understand letters and numbers. The kids that I met this morning can recite the alphabet and numbers (1-20) almost perfectly (it gets a bit hazy in the MNOP’s and 14,15,16,17’s), but they do not recognize the letter or number symbols when they see them, so that is what I am thinking of – fun activities to teach them letters and numbers with limited amounts of papers and no writing utensils (is that the right word?) for the kids. Today, after one day of observing the classrooms, which are held in church buildings, I presented a lesson plan in front of a class of about 50 kids and their two caregivers. Yeah, didn’t go so well... 2 year olds are at a way different place than 5 year olds. When the caregivers go through training in July, they will be told to divide the children into age groups, which I think will be really helpful... Not only do the kids not recognize the symbols for 1,2,3... they can’t really count yet, meaning when they see three objects they haven’t really gained the knowledge to be able to count them. We did an activity where you count the raindrops in a cloud, and it took long enough to get the point across about what we were doing much less how long it took them to figure out how to count...lol. I think they spent too much time staring at the “muzungu” to be able to think about the numbers, as is often the case when a white person talks : ) Yesterday I made two kids cry because they had never seen a white person before, they wouldn’t come in the building where I was, so far I think I have done more to inhibit learning than enhance it haha. I was forewarned about the crying thing, so it was ok. :)

When it came to the letter part of the lesson plan, I discovered quickly how difficult it was to teach the alphabet from one language to the next because words that begin with A in English do not start with A in Tumbuka, so it is hard for me to find examples or ways to connect the alphabet with something concrete. I am thinking of leaving the alphabet to the caregivers and asking to do shapes and colors, I have oodles of activities for those topics. So many lessons learned today...I think Owen, the child development staff member in Mzimba realized today I am learning as I go, I think he figured that out pretty quick by the disaster that was this morning. A positive thing about this morning would be that we got a couple games in and the caregivers were thankful for that, they only had a couple so they said they could really use the ones that we did today. Also, I found it easier to give ideas to the caregivers so that they could then implement the different strategies in their classroom, as they know the kids better. As Owen pointed out, one of the struggles the child centers face is that there will be, in this case, 63 kids and 2 caregivers. In a center I heard them talk about yesterday there were 200 kids (aged 2-5 remember) and 4 caregivers. In the US there are, what, 20 children per caregiver, if that? 20 versus 50 children is a lot when you are talking about a bunch of children who cry, don’t pay attention, and like to run around. Yeah.... . Tomorrow, after we go to the other center and speak to the caregivers and ask how much their students know the alphabet and numbers, I will be able to hone my lesson plan and plan better for when I present on Friday. Today, I need to rewrite my blurb for the caregivers about interactive learning.

Last night, instead of going over my lesson plan for the zillionth time, I went to sleep right after dinner. This means about 7:30pm, I don’t think I’ve gone to bed that early since...I have no idea. Maybe because I am not sleeping through the whole night yet, I swear there was a large animal outside last night making the weirdest noise (it ended up being a crane, there are LOTS here and VERY LOUD). I woke up to this weird clunk on the roof and listened to noises for the next hour...no, I didn’t get up to check, too tired and too worried about bugs to dare venture out from my net-covered bed.

There is another group here, one with children, who I haven’t met yet. The other group I think as kind of adopted me as an extended member of their group, which I don’t mind, they’re pretty nice and have helped me get adjusted pretty well. After my failed lesson plans they share their stories and let me know that it’s not just me...there are always challenges when you are teaching in a foreign country...like the fact that they want to stare at you (the “muzungu”) more than the lesson plan you are teaching : )