teaching in south africa

I admit i disappeared on you for a while…you won’t believe how busy it is to work as a volunteer!
Let me give you an update on what’s happened in the past few days…

We are setteling quite well in the schools. The first 2 days were hectic. 220 kids and 1 teacher for all of them were waiting for us…or actually not really because they didn’t have a clue we were coming. anyways, chaotic is just the beginning. schedules were wrong, kids missing, names spelled wrong and computers in the lab not working…on top i had 3 volunteers with no classroom experience to take care of. That’s what i call challenge!

But the surprise hit me on monday when all 4 teachers were there, the children behaved and our lessons worked out! What a good feeling that was. The 2 boys in my group are a bit special and need a lot of help and support, i guess it’s just so new for them. Steffi, the girl is not so experienced either but she is studying to become a teacher, so lots of knowledge and interest.

I am based in a farm school called Bulugha and I am responsible for all the preparation work and in-class work. On Tuesday I went to Cintsa East school. There are not so many kids there, mainly beacuse they just can’t be bothered to show up in school. it’s bad… but it makes it easier to teach, groups are small and the kids more focused. That’s the reason Mike made me be in Bulugha most of the time because it’s just soooo disorganized.
Mike actually asked me to stay longer, he would like to have me here until the end of the year. I must say I am not unhappy about that…But i guess I will have to ask for a higher wage :). We will see…I could imagine myself staying longer (I always tend to do that…) but I have not decided anything yet.

Yesterday we had a massive storm, the whole beach was flooded and the wind was icy…what reminded me that it’s winter. But today the weather is perfect and the air is fresh and crisp…lovely!

My plan for today is very lazy…walk over to Buccs, have a coffee, borrow some movies and then have a lazy couch potatoe evening.
The vollies live in 2 houses, the white and the brown house, The brown house is situated just up the road from my house and has a huge terrace overlooking the lagoon, it’s stunning! Friday we have braais (BBQs) up there. Would be nice if it was warmer, we could have great parties…;).

So I hope everybody is enjoying summer and having a good holiday…I am always so happy to receive your emails although I am not the quickest in responding…will get there eventually. have a great weekend!

Tags: Travel

This entry was posted on Saturday, July 28th, 2007 at 2:57 pm and is filed under Travel. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.