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Published: July 29th 2009
Monday 27th July
At last I'm finally teaching full-time in the school I wanted to be in! The school re-opened yesterday (Sunday) after a long break and the placement guy here thought there would not be much point in my going in on the first day. I sat in on and observed 6 lessons today - in the first few I just watched then I started to get involved a bit. I am working mainly with the English teacher (i.e. the teacher of English - the staff are all Nepail). The school is called Shree Krishna Lower Secondary School - Shree just means "first" and Krishna is the 7th incarnation of the Hindu God Shiva. Lower Secondary means it teaches up to grade 8 (A higher secondary school would teach up to grade 10, the equivalent of our GCSE year) so the eldest kids in the school I'm in are aged 13-14. The school starts at grade 1 (age 6+).
There is only one class in each grade so there is just the headmaster and about 8 teachers. The school is a government one (as opposed to fee-paying private ones) so it only caters for the very poorest kids.
School Motto No. 1
there's lots of other stuff I can't read as well!Despite this, kids have to come in uniform. There is just one classroom for each grade - there are nominally over 40 kids in each grade but they never all come on any particular day (school attendance is not yet compulsory). The kids stay in the same classroom all day, teachers move around. The timetable is the same every day, just about. There are 7 lessons per day (Sunday to Thursday) and 4 on Friday then Saturdays there is no school - this makes 39 lessons per week. They have to do 6 Maths, 6 English, 6 Nepali and 6 Science, then some Social Studies, Population & Environment, Health & PE and finally Moral Education. Lessons are nominally 45 minutes long but in practice they are often only 30-35 minutes as the teachers are in no hurry to get to lesons!
The classrooms basically have about 12 bench-type desks which could each probably seat 4 kids at a pinch, then maybe a teacher's lectern and a blackboard - and that's it! Some classrooms didn't even have a light bulb so don't even start thinking about a computer! The courtyard is a right mess - rubbish, stones, puddles, the occasional
cow. School starts at 10:00am with the first lesson at 10:15 - between 10 and 10:15 there will be an outside assembly (unless it's raining). Between 10:15 and 1:15 there are 4 x 45 minute lessons. From 1:15 till 1:45 is "Tiffin Time" - the staff retreat to the headmaster's study/school office/staffroom (it's all the one room!) where the school caretaker makes everyone a glass of sweet gren tea. Then from 1:45 till 4:00pm there's 3 more x 45 minute lessons. Staff arrive a few minutes before 10:00am (if you're lucky!) and depart within a few minutes of 4:00pm and then the caretaker starts locking up.
The school uses goverment-issue textbooks - one for each grade for each subject. They are not very interesting, black and white and pretty well used. Kids have to come with an exercise book and pen/pencil - if they forget either, they basically can't do any work. The teachers seem follow the text books rigorously, each lesson is the next one or two pages in the book. This makes it quite difficult for me to contribute many of my own ideas, though it's early days yet. Since I am teaching grades 3 upwards, most
A classroom
bench seats, lectern, blackboard - and that's it! of the teaching aids I brought with me are not very appropriate unfortunately, but I can leave them at the hotel where other volunters will be able to use them with younger ones.
As far as I can work out, none of the staf have been out of Nepal, and certainly not to England - this includes the English teacher which means that he has not really been exposed to English native speakers very much and his accent is quite difficult to follow. Combine this with the uninspiring text books, which also sometimes have wrong english grammar in them, and I can't se the kids getting ideal teaching - despite that, however, some of them do manage to speak it well enough. In other respects they are smilar to schoolkids everywhere - some really keen and interested, some lazy and noisy! Towards the end of the last lesson of the day, things deteriorate as younger siblings arrive to join their elder ones, some kids have to leave early etc.
Tuesday 28th July
Today I followed pretty much the same timetable as yesterday but this time I either led the lesson (with the normal teacher there as well)
Getting ready for assembly
10:00am in the school courtyard or we taught it as a team. Often the kids' English is not good enough to understand me so the teacher has to translate - but it is only my second day!
Wednesday 29th July
I read the local English-language paper at breakfast this morning and there was an article about a national 3-day teachers' strike over pay, starting today. I got to the school and asked the English teacher about it - he wasn't sure what was happening. Eventually we started the first lesson but back in the office after lesson one, I noticed all the kids starting to leave - I was confused as to why as some building work had also started on the school this morning and at first I thought they had abandoned school because of the interuption, but then I was told that the strike was on and school was closing. Whether it lasts 3 days or not will depend on whether the government agree to talks witht the teachers' union - I will simply have to go in tomorow and se if it's open!
Wednesday 29th July
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Sue
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And not a SmartBoard in sight ! Pleased you are at last getting down to teaching the children. Have enjoyed reading the journal of your stay there. Very interesting. Maybe if some of the kids over here visited a school like that they would appreciate what they've got ! Take care Sue x