Progress

15/08/09

What a day! I must start by acknowledging the achievements of Shadrack. This young girl was the bane of my life at the start of teaching as her writing was all over the page and whilst she would try and copy of the other pupils, even that wouldn't make sense as she would only write in Bemba, despite my efforts to write "NO BEMBA" in BOLD LETTERS for them all to see.
Today we witnessed a miracle in her education, she started to write in English, compiling some form of sentences together. I felt a sense of pride in her achievements as I had been able to pass on something to someone so deprived of an education. Incidentally, the task had been to write a story, just to highlight the gap in her knowledge!

The understanding from all the class is questionable, as displayed in my science lesson on excretion, as none of the class could answer the questions correctly, a problem that is based on the fact that their whole curriculum is taught in English, and they have the ability of kids far younger than themselves, yet they are accessing materials designed for their own age. There are so many changes that need to be made! We complain in the UK about our education systems, yet you look at theirs and you realise the uphill struggle that they face.

The afternoon was incredible. We put on a Sports Day, hosting a "Potato and Spoon Race", a sprint, and an obstacle course, which definitely involved extreme creativity. It was a lot of fun and we were able to hand out prizes to the winners! All the kids enjoyed themselves immensely, as did the teachers :)