Sunday, May 6, 2012

ABCs of Teaching English in Ethiopia


Fifteen students make up the class at Mercy Ministry Happy
Children's Home in Asko, Ethiopia. The children are mostly
age 5, but I'm learning that a few are a bit older. They
arrive at school and change from their street clothes into
these, their "school uniform."

On my first full day in Ethiopia, I was able to observe Robin and Beza (BEE-za) in the classroom. There are 15 children, mostly aged 5 but a couple appeared to be a bit older. 
Robin began class with recitation: ABCs in particular. Keep in mind that English is a second language for these kids so pronunciation of some of the letters reflected volunteer instructors from around the world: for example, “Z” is “zed,” as in Canada. Somehow “L” is pronounced “EL-a”; “M” “EM-a” and “N” comes out as “EN-a.” Theory: I think this may be a result of singing the alphabet (do it in your head … when you come to L-M-N-O-P, it does sort of mumbles together into “elemenopee” and if you’re 5, that could easily become EL-a, EM-a, EN-a. Hmmmmm … can I fix that? Does it matter?).
Robin then held up flash cards, one after another through a tall stack, with short words (“cat,” “hat,” “bat”); she’d clearly organized them into rhyming sets. Beza, the full-time teacher for the school, sat on the sidelines and participated in Ahmaric only when the kids gave a blank stare to Robin; otherwise she seemed focused on her fingernails or cell phone. “CAT!” the children would yell to Robin. “HAT!” “BALL!” Their joy seemed to come from the musical chorus they created with each word.
It was clear within ten minutes of observation that poor Robin was winging it.  I quickly became intent on getting a sense of how much English the kids understood and where they were in their development of words, phonetics, numbers, etc.
The recitation went on for almost an hour. At 10:30 a.m., Beza looked at Robin and tapped her watch, indicating that it was time for “recess.” Fifteen little bodies dressed alike in dirty, holey blue T shirts and shoes that resemble Crocs dutifully lined up at the door and in single file, anxiously headed out to the courtyard.
This isn’t what I’d envisioned: I expected to be more of a teacher’s aid to support whatever curriculum was already in motion (my American perspective). Robin looked to me with eager eyes: “Are you a teacher?” she asked with a tone of desperation.
I’m sure my eyes widened. “No!” I replied. Her shoulders slumped a bit in disappointment. “Have you been doing this for a month?” I inquired. “Coming in here every day and winging it? No help from the teacher? No direction?”
“Yes,” she replied, forlorn. She was tired and no wonder … anyone who has worked with kids knows how exhausting it is, both physically and mentally. Couple that with a sincere desire to teach and add value to their lives with few tools and no direction … I wondered how she’s done it! How has she managed to keep her motivation?!
“We can fix this,” I said as encouragingly as I could. “I may not have an education background, but I’m organized. And they’re 5 years old. We can do this.” Her relief was evident.
Robin and I meandered outside to sounds of laughter, coughing, screeches of glee. Abete (ah-BEAT-ee), a round-headed boy with eager eyes, stood out to me as he initiated handholding in a circle and led the others in a song in Ahmaric (not Ring Around the Rosie, but seemingly similar). A few children sat in the dirt along the concrete-block wall that barricaded us from the dirt alleyway outside. Others ducked one at a time into a wooden shed that I learned to be their bathroom. Beza sat on an overturned bucket and watched.
“Any toys? Any organized games?” I asked. Robin clearly had been reminded of something, ran inside, and returned quickly with a long stretch of elastic that had been tied into a loop.
“I got this in town!” she exclaimed. The children ran toward her, arms outstretched to retrieve the elastic, which they promptly fashioned around their legs to play some form of Chinese jump rope.

When the children arrive in the morning, they go into
this small room off the courtyard to change from their
street clothes into their school uniform. They also take a
nap in this room every afternoon after lunch at 1:00.
I meandered into the children’s changing/nap room to rummage around for any play equipment and found a filthy cloth ball on top of a cupboard; I brought it outside. Again, the kids ran toward me as if I delivered Santa himself. I worked at organizing the group into a large circle, realizing quickly that English wasn’t going to go far here; further, everyone wanted to be the one holding my hand: I noted their dirty clothes; how flies landed on their head, yet they didn’t seem to notice; how goop ran from some noses; and many eyes watered. They seemed untroubled, laughed, and clamored for my hands; I gripped whatever boney fingers landed in mine and resumed my effort to impose order. Beza lifted herself long enough to bark orders in Ahmaric and the kids promptly formed a rough circle. With difficulty, I shook my hands free and held the ball high in the air: “My name is DEBBIE!” I said, then tossed the ball to a child thinking that I would start a name game. Instead, three or four children rushed the ball as it rolled outside the circle. Fakodu (fah-KO-doo) victoriously delivered it back to the group. They’re 5, I reminded myself. They don’t speak English. The name game clearly wasn’t going to take off so I punted and we spent 10 minutes or so passing the ball “fast!” and “slooooowwwww,” “high!” and “loooowwww,” “behind” our backs and “under” our legs. They caught on and I insisted that the words be repeated over and over as the ball went round the assemblage.
At 11:00 on the dot, Beza called out and the students filed back into the room. They sat themselves in assigned seats at small tables crammed along one side of the room. I had a sense from their obedience that they’d been going through the same routine over and over for at least the month of April, but what before that? What had the other volunteers taught them? How much had they learned since their school year began in September? How would I know where to pick up the thread if I had no way of understanding where it began?
The second session focused on math. Robin had made some worksheets to practice subtraction. White plastic chairs swallowed their tiny inhabitants; one table was propped with shims to remedy the wobble. Two smaller desks had attached benches and were more suitable to their size. Each head bowed with gratitude as pencils were handed out. I jumped in to help a small group; we counted drawings of fish and crossed out the ones to “subtract.” How many remained? A couple kids got it. I used poker chips to help Bahalid (ba-HALL-id), who could count on request, remove the correct number of chips as instructed by the formula, but couldn’t seem to grasp “how many are left” and would simply count all the chips again. Kalid (KAL-id) colored over his numbers in. Yabsra “Small” (there are three Yabsra’s in the class, “Yabra Small,” “Yabra Girl” and “Yabsra Boy”) copied the numbers from the equation into the answer box. Another few kids added rather than subtracted.
Beza helped a different group and Robin the remainder. The three of us jostled five kids apiece, each child seemingly at a different level of understanding. A few finished: “Miss! Miss!” they would call, waving their paper in the air for approval. Some did this after every number they wrote on the page. Hewit (HUE-it) and Lemlem—probably older than 5—finished long before most and were instructed to color in the pictures of the objects others were still counting.
An hour. We hobbled through a single worksheet for an hour.
This wasn’t going to work, I thought.
At noon, the children lined up again to wash their hands for lunch, served in the classroom. Afterwards, they would nap until 2:00 p.m., then have “crafts” from 2:00 to 3:30 p.m. Between jet lag and mental fatigue, I was whipped and it must have showed: “Maybe you’ll want to take a rest?” Robin asked compassionately. I did. My head was spinning with all I’d taken in and ideas on how to get some control over the direction of their learning. I went to my room to lie down, feeling a little guilty for leaving Robin after her month of carrying the load on her own and reassuring myself that I’d just catch a quick nap and return to help.
By the time I woke up, the children had returned to their street clothes and were trickling out the blue steel gate to greet their mothers.
NO favorites but Abete ... oh my goodness. What a little charmer. Rediet is the cook's daughter ...
she's kinda a pain in the butt and needs boundaries but when she's at the house during the day
(we haven't figured out why she's there some days and not others), we try to include her in
lessons, although we often don't have a worksheet for her. Getting photocopies has been a
challenge; more to come on the topic of school supplies and lesson planning. Note the farm
animal stickers on the back of their hands. :-)

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