Oaxacan Classrooms: A Snap Shot

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Grade 3, Montessori School, Oaxaca, Oaxaca, Mexico

It’s 12:30pm and we’ve all been here since 8am, four and a half hours with one and a half left to go. Recorder music drifts through the open door, one of the students is practicing her mad recorder skills on the step outside. A few minutes ago she came up and asked me my name in English and in Spanish. She already knew my name so I think it was more and excuse to talk to me and show me she has some English.

Four girls are in the corner next to me are playing with razzberry coloured faux flip cell phones and talking about boys (or at least that what I am able to catch). Two of their classmates are outside on the step enjoying recorder music and playing a rousing game of checkers. The recorders have doubled now, with the second being not as relaxing as the first. Seven students are still working through the final pieces of work due this day, heads bowed at their desks amid all the fluster. The girls next to me are now building a fort out of their uniform sweatshirts, the classroom fan, some brooms and the computer table. The others still work diligently at their masas.

Maps of Mexico and the world adorn the walls, accompanied by poster projects on Benito Juarez, cosmetics, natural resources, maps, compasses and petroleum. There is a constant din of voices and laughter. It is almost time for music class to begin so the chorus of recorders has risen high enough to end my camera’s focus.

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