Summary of my work at World Relief

Okay, it has been a while since I said anything about what I have been doing at World Relief in Mzimba (Embangwane to be more exact), and a lot has happened since then. Since last Wednesday (it is now a week from then) my perception about teaching and going about my work has changed and Owen and I, I think, have worked out most of the kinks so our time teaching flows better. Owen translates my accented English into Tumbuka, so I think he is ending up with a lot of the work and I am very thankful that he is sooo patient and very kind. So basically, every day Owen and I will travel on a motorbike (Yamaha something-or-other) to various rural, very rural, places around Mzimba. One day this week we covered 85 kilometers, you can translate that into miles, I haven’t done that yet : ) At first we will go to talk to the caregivers at the learning centers to introduce them to the idea of more participatory and engaging ways of teaching young children and then sometimes, if we don’t do it the same day, we will come back and do a presentation to the class, or an example lesson, with a few games so far.

This is the part of my perception that has changed: at first, I was thinking that I would be teaching the kids, meaning they would be learning, and not that they aren’t when I am doing the lesson, but it is a little for me to expect kids to take away something from a lesson when 1) they might never have seen a white person before (me=distraction) 2) some of them have never seen written letters before 3) they’re 2-5 year olds 4) we speak a different language....the list goes on. So, by thinking of it as a presentation, there is a little less pressure for me and it tends to run a little smoothly. Also, we are doing the same lesson plan over and over again, which I didn’t expect, so that has also helped things to go a little smoother, since I think Owen has gotten the hang of explaining it from English and Tumbuka and I am more at ease with it and can engage the students more. The games we have done? Simon says (I’m not very good at leading this one), duck, duck, goose (usually this goes very well), relays...those have worked pretty well. We tried what time is it, mr.fox (aka mr.mosquito), and a form of team relays, and I want to introduce “tag” but some of the kids are so young, age two and three) that the time it takes to explain and do examples takes away a lot of our play time. But, generally it has been going well. I would tell you all the names of the places we visit (sometimes 2 or more per day and very spread out), but I haven’t been quite able to master remembering them all or much less how to spell them. I am figuring out quickly how much of a visual learner I am, I need to ask someone to write all the names and some Tumbuka words out for me so I can actually see what I am trying to say. Even learning the greetings has been kind of slow for me...

But yeah, we ride on a motor bike to very remote areas at times, traveling on dirt roads, crossing streams, up mountains....haha, ok maybe just very large hills, but serious cross country. I really enjoy it and it’s a great way to see Mzimba, it gets to be a little much after the 85th kilometer and I know Owen gets very tired from driving so much every day (hours and hours), more than I do with him, but it’s mostly a good experience for me. I am hoping Owen will teach me : ) although it does take some talent with all of the dust and potholes here, and they can’t afford to lose a bike, maybe they will take a chance : ) and if you are wondering, no big animals yet. Apparently, Zambia, whose border is very, very close, likes the herd most of the animals over onto their land into the reserves to attract the tourists... so I think I will be mostly out of luck in that department, sorry to disappoint. However, if you want to hear about very large cattle and marriage arrangements, large, plentiful, and loud crows at 5pm and 5am, obnoxiously loud cranes at 4am, or numerous chickens, goats, bugs, let me know.

On Monday we met with the village elders, or village heads, and CBCC (community-based childcare center) committee and caregivers for one village. Here, education is taken very seriously, teachers and pastors are some of the most respected and highest paid individuals in the communities. It impressed me that for each childcare center there was a full committee, made up of the village leaders and respected individuals from each area. In order to receive training and resources from World Relief and training and recognition by the Malawian government as a full childcare center, each center must make certain requirements. They must have their own building, many of them operate out of churches, which are sometimes just brick or mud walls with a thatched roof, sometimes not even that. The center we visited on Tuesday, June 2nd, was just made up of branches tied together with a thatched roof, it was so windy that we just bypassed the lesson plan and played games, and even then the field that we were playing in was so rocky, that it was a little worrisome to be playing running games. This is when duck, duck, goose comes into play, not a lot of surface area needed. For schooling, it’s hard to teach letter and number recognition when there is not a chalkboard or hard surface to work with! Just a roof and a dirt floor with some chairs to sit in. Though there are centers that do really well without training or many resources, the caregivers teach the kids songs to sing the ABC’s and 123’s and have the kids come up and point out the numbers and letters (if they have a chalkboard or other surface).

Back to the requirements: own building and area for playing, toilets for the kids (pit latrines at least), only some centers have these, and a kitchen or a way to give the children one meal (porridge). It is also recommended that the childcare center have its own garden to provide food for the kids. Because Malawi is largely an agricultural country, starting a garden is not a problem; it’s just harvesting and tending to it. Today we visited another village that is receiving some pigs from World Relief to start its own business. The pigs are arriving on Saturday, they were told a while back, and when we visited today, the pen that they were going to keep them in was virtually nonexistent, no foundation and just a stacking of bricks. So some villages are going full-force with the notion of childcare centers and training, etc., but others need some more encouragement. African time... : )

So daily schedule: get up 5:30-6am, have breakfast, work at 8am, devotions at WR, motorbiking to a CBCC, motorbiking back or to another CBCC, then lunch, out again, or hanging around the office...till 4:30 or 5pm when I go back to the guesthouse and chat with people, till dinner at 6pm, then bed pretty much right after that, 7:30-8pm. Tonight is late (9pm). Some friends of the other group brought their kids and we were entertaining them for the evening, running around and wearing ourselves out more than them of course : )