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Published: September 23rd 2009
The New Language Lab
The computers were provided by GCSF. Molding the Minds of Tomorrow - Take 2
Now, thus far our story of Dong Ha includes many restaurants and many Huda beers. Those experiences certainly demonstrate how much fun can be had in Dong Ha City, but we were in the city in the first place for a very important reason - to volunteer.
Dong Ha is a city within Quang Tri Province, just south of the former DMZ. It was one of the hardest hit provinces during the war, finding itself at a crossroads of anger and arms. The area is still suffering the effects of the war, from problems with unexploded ordinance to birth defects from Agent Orange and other chemicals used in the area. In a country with so many wonderful tourist destinations, Quang Tri is struggling to catch up, to become more prosperous, and to take a slice of the tourism pie. Because so few westerners, and in particular, native English speakers, come through Dong Ha, it is hard for students there to practice English. One student told me that I was the first native English speaker she ever met. In April, we spent one week teaching English at Le Quy Don
Gifted High School. We fell in love with the school, the teachers, and the students, and promised them that we would return. We also knew that one week was not enough. This time, we stayed for two weeks.
Many of the students at Le Quy Don, particularly the English majors, are very smart and very dedicated to their English studies. Many of them hope for placement at a Vietnamese University, and some of them dream of studying abroad in the UK, Australia, and of course the US. They use the same text books that are used in schools throughout the country, but they have a hard time competing for opportunities with students from Hanoi and Ho Chi Minh City, particularly for scholarships to study abroad. In addition to teaching some of the students about American culture, we decided to take things up a notch during this trip because we were going to be there for two weeks. We wanted to focus on building confidence, and getting students to speak loud enough to hear in a group.
We were immediately at a disadvantage with our planned activities when we arrived. The school was closed on the national holiday, on
Me and Vy
Enjoying sugar cane juice at the cafe across from the school. Saturday there were no classes because of the opening school year ceremony, and there were no classes on Friday to prepare for the Saturday celebration. Selfishly, it worked out well because it gave us some time off, but we were not able to do some of the things we wanted. We created several presentations for the students that we did not have time to give. We did have time, however, to show some of the students a presentation on teenagers in the US, particularly discussing high school and university abroad. We discussed the difference between college and university (in Vietnam students go to college only when they are not accepted at University, it is not as prestigious), public and private schools, and the different ways to pay for school. Even with all of their questions about where they could study, how to get scholarships (if anyone works with an organization providing scholarships to Vietnamese students, please send me a message), and what their careers should be in the future, I was surprised at what they found impressive in our presentation. What caught their eye in the presentation was not the photo of prom or a sorority house, but the picture
Gift from the Principal
Eric was used to getting in trouble with the principal when he was in school, not being rewarded with gifts. of a typical high school library, wall to wall with books. The library at Le Quy Don has no diversity of books, almost no English language books (I am working on that, and will probably hit some of you up for donations in the future), and very little reason for the students to even enter the library at all.
The students, particularly the English majors, and some exceptional students in grade 12 Chemistry and grade 12 Math, know their vocabulary words. They know grammar rules and understand what we are saying pretty well. What they lack is confidence and the ability to think on their feet - responding to questions that they are not prepared for. We hoped to help with one of these. During our second week, we had every student from grades 11 English and 12 English speak for five minutes in front of the class, on any topic they wanted. They were all nervous and some seemed downright frightened (I am also sure that some people skipped class that day). Regardless, it was a good experience for them, with prizes awarded not only for clarity but also for how comfortable the person felt in front of
Gift from the Students
Phuong gave us a beautiful wind chime of conical hats. the group. I hope they learned something from the experience and realized we were not making them do it just to be cruel, strict teachers.
VIP Treatment
One of our first days at the school we were reminded just how much of a VIP we were. Of course, there they say V.I.P. or “veep.” We were interviewed by the local Quang Tri TV station. We were asked to teach in the new language learning computer lab, compliments of Global Community Service Foundation (“GCSF”), while the cameras rolled. Then we were interviewed by one of the teacher’s daughter’s, Ms. Anh. We did not get to see it on the news, but some of the students said they saw us. We felt pretty famous.
On Saturday, all of the schools in Vietnam celebrated their new school year ceremony. We were not only invited to attend, but were sat in the front row with the other VIPs (veeps). We sat one seat away from the “most powerful man in Dong Ha,” the Chair of the People’s Committee. There were speeches, and Mr. Hai was the M.C. Several students performed singing and dancing routines. Also, several VIPS, including the
Mr. Hai as MC
Mr. Hai looking very handsome in his suit as the MC of the opening ceremony for the new school year. Headmaster and Vice Principal sat for a signing ceremony, to sign their names to a document committing to a successful school year. They were stunned we do not have something similar in the US.
The Quang Tri TV station was there that day as well, and we hoped that because we were at the VIP table that we would be seen on the TV. That night, we managed to catch the news and watched the coverage of opening ceremonies across the country. We saw Le Quy Don, but only the most important man in Dong Ha was shown on the news. We realized then that we were almost veeps; not VIP enough when sitting with the local Chair of the People’s Committee. We did see some of the students we recognized, including Phuong from grade 11 English. She was more veep than us.
The American Past Time
We also spent another day teaching baseball. During our trip back to the US we bought some baseball gloves at K-mart. We shipped them to North Carolina, where a friend from the organization we volunteered with took them and carried them on his flight back to Hanoi. We
Student Performances
At the new school year ceremony, singing and dancing in front of a large bust of Uncle Ho. then packed them in our backpacks to deliver them to Le Quy Don. The students were ecstatic. We spent Saturday morning with the new grade 10 English students just learning to throw and catch and trying to hit the ball. One of the young male students was a natural, and hit the ball clear across campus during his first swing. Some of the girls in class were hiding in the back, not wanting to play, and some were so scared I thought they would cry. They hid in the back row trying not to take a turn to swing the bat. I would not let them hide. I played the teacher card, “I am your teacher and I say you need to take a turn.” Part of my goal at Le Quy Don was to work on female empowerment. This was one of my little steps towards that goal. These girls were so terrified. I helped them stand right and hold the bat correctly, and Eric tossed them an easy ball. They all hit it at least once and some hit the ball a decent distance. I know how it feels to connect the bat with the ball and it
Eric Gets His Turn
Eric asked Mr. Dieu if he could bang the drum to start class. He was so excited. feels powerful. I was hoping that the girls would feel that power and overcome their fear of doing something different, or doing something that traditionally only a boy would do.
In the afternoon we played baseball, with grade 11 English playing against grade 12 English. After a break, 11 English was tired and decided to sit the rest of the time out. Grade 12 continued, splitting their class in two to play each other. Eric played pitcher and I played catcher. I felt much more comfortable this round because at least we had gloves. It April, I was so nervous about broken bones. It took some getting used to, but they were getting the hang of it. We were asked to find an official baseball rules book in English to send to the school (if anyone has one to volunteer, let me know!). One of the grade 12 Chemistry students, who was asking more questions than the others about the rules, (we were not sticklers on all of the rules for the purposes of this game) promised he would read it and teach his classmates.
Cultural Diversity
When we weren’t presenting on American culture, making
Baseball Gloves
The students were so excited about the new gloves. the students speak, or teaching baseball, we were teaching lessons from the text book. Many of the lessons involved testing listening skills, reading comprehension, and pronouncing words with similar sounds (e.g. words that have an “s” in them where sometimes they make an “s” sound and sometimes they make a “z” sound, like bats and bags and kits and kids). The topics were fairly simple because it was the beginning of the school year: family rules, household chores, best friends, or embarrassing moments. One of the cultural diversity lessons, though, really caught my eye. I taught this lesson a few times. The passage contained the results of a survey of American and Asian students and their opinions on love and marriage. I needed to read the passage out loud, asking the students to repeat after me to practice their pronunciation. Then, I asked a series of questions to test their comprehension of the conclusions of the passage and the meaning of specific words. Every time I read it there were certain parts that made me want to cringe. This is the passage I had to teach:
Traditionally, Americans and Asians have very different ideas about love and The Natural
A natural hitter from grade 10 English. marriage. Americans believe in “romantic” marriage - a boy and a girl are attracted to each other, fall in love, and decide to marry each other. Asians, on the other hand, believe in “contractual” marriage - the parents of the bride and the groom decide on the marriage; and love - if it ever develops - is supposed to follow marriage, not precede it. To show the differences, a survey was conducted among American, Chinese, and Indian students to determine their attitudes toward love and marriage. Below is a summary of each group’s responses to the four key values.
Physical attractiveness: The Americans are much more concerned than the Indians and the Chinese with Physical attractiveness when choosing a wife or a husband. They also agree that a wife should maintain her beauty and appearance after marriage.
Confiding: Few Asian students agree with the American students’ view that wives and husbands share all thoughts. In fact, a majority of Indians and Chinese think it is better and wiser for a couple not to share certain thoughts. A large number of Indian men agree that it is unwise to confide in their wives.
Partnership of equals: The majority of
Grade 10 English
Saying goodbye . . . Asian students reject the American view that marriage is a partnership of equals. Many Indian students agree that a woman has to sacrifice more in a marriage than a man.
Trust built on love: Significantly, more Asian students than American students agree that a husband is obliged to tell his wife where he has been if he comes home late. The Asian wife can demand a record of her husband’s activities. The American wife, however, trusts her husband to do the right thing because he loves her not because he has to.
The comparison of the four key values suggests that young Asians are not as romantic as their American counterparts.
I had to bite my tongue during several parts to not preach about the subject matter. Instead, I focused on the definition of several of the words, for example, many students did not even know how to define a “survey.” That was a much safer topic than, “class, let’s talk about why Indian men do not think it is wise to confide in their wives.”
The lesson also asked the students what was most important to having a happy life. They had to pick
Baseball Time
Grade 12 English loved playing baseball and using the new gloves! between money, success, good health, family, etc. One student answered appropriately saying that good health and a family is most important because then success will follow. Another of the students in grade 12 Math answered that money was the most important thing because he could have lots of girlfriends. Some things are universal. Obviously all students laughed as I pretended to bang my head against the wall saying “no no no!” I then decided to have some fun with him. I asked him whether all of his girlfriends would love him? He replied that they would love him because he had money. Then, I asked what would happen if he spent all of his money (probably on the girlfriends)? If his money ran out, would they still “love” him and would he still be happy? He just sort of stared at me, speechless. One of the girls then responded for him. No, they would not love him because they only loved him for money. She continued that if he had a happy marriage filled with love, if his money ran out, his wife would still love him. I need to return to Dong Ha immediately, because I still have so much to teach . . .
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Thanh Bac
non-member comment
Going through the entry several times to find if my name existed there, all I could find is "One of the grade 12 Chemistry students" =.=! Anyway, hope to see the rules book soon!