Back to School!

Welp, it’s official- the new school year is off and running, and boy did it get off to an interesting start. We’d hoped to find out what we’d be teaching before our travels so we’d have plenty of time to prep, but they told us that that sort of thing is not decided until about a week before the school year starts. It seemed silly, but at least we’d have a week to prepare…
…Or would we?! We did have a meeting at St. B. for all staff last Friday (the weekend before school was scheduled to start). This meeting was in all Swahili, so I got to play the game where I desperately listen for key words I know and see if I can get the gist of what’s going on. I’d say I was fairly successful. I’m pretty sure everyone was told to make sure to do their job. I know for certain that the meeting ended without one teacher knowing what s/he was teaching. I also know that, at the end of the meeting, the floor was opened to anyone who had questions for the headmaster. The security guard was last to ask a question, and, based mostly on his motioning toward it, I’m pretty sure he asked if the headmaster had any intention of fixing the deteriorating ceiling in the faculty room we were in (there were missing pieces right above the headmaster’s table). The response from the headmaster elicited some light laughter, and I assume it was some politician-esque joke that didn’t really answer the question. The meeting was adjourned, the headmaster left, and “chai” time began. About five minutes later… a huge chunk of the ceiling fell down on the chai table! Yep, that happened! Real life. Right there. After a pause to make sure the teacher who was lightly scraped by the falling ceiling was okay, the room erupted. Everyone was cracking up, and there was a lady from the kitchen staff who was doing that thing where you think something is so funny that you jump up and down while bending forward at the hip, slowly rotating with each jump until you’ve eventually turned at least 360 degrees. I wish I could be with you (the reader) right now to demonstrate, because it was pretty great….Maybe you had to be there…
Anyway, if you were keeping a calendar when I was explaining the timeline on finding out what we’d teach, the answer is no- you are not mistaken. We really did go into the weekend before the first day of class not knowing if/what we were teaching. So, we showed up at St. B on Monday morning, and I got some interesting news… I’M TEACHING PHYSICS?!
That is correct- I found out 2 hours before my first class that I will be the Form 2 Physics teacher for the boys’ class and the girls’ class! Good. For a second I was getting worried that I wasn’t going to be as deep into my ZPD (see first blog) as last term! To be fair, physics was where they had a need, and I offered. I think it will be a fun challenge, and I hope I can do a good job with some hard work.
This leads me to my first “classroom update” blog of the term. This week we began talking about static electricity (did I mention the librarian is not around so I can’t get the physics book or that the physics book doesn’t actually include the required “static electricity” section anyway?- don’t worry, I picked up some American physics books at the seminary). I had a couple of cool demonstrations I wanted to show the class, but I wanted to make sure I set a little bit of foundation by making sure they know the importance of making detailed observations since they are, after all, scientists at least while I’m in the classroom. I asked the girls class to start by making observations about me (dangerous, right?). Well, they didn’t really say much. They boys, on the other hand, managed to find the “right answer”… After a pause, Xavier stood up and said, “I notice that… you look handsome.” “Correct! Class dismissed!”
Okay, I didn’t say that, but I did agree with him. This answer was followed by a compliment on my hair (ironically I had spent the day messing it up by rubbing balloons on it, but maybe that’s what did the trick) and someone noting that my shirt had “expression”. I’m not positive what that means, but I took it. Then someone said my trousers were nice. I drew the line there, as my khakis were turning downright reddish-brown from kneeling on various dirty surfaces (church kneelers and classroom floors to be at student-desk-level). They seemed to kind of understand my jokes about my looks and my pants, but some good jokes about the smell of my armpits for those in the front row were definitely lost on them. Can’t win them all I guess.
My first demo involved charging a balloon (rubbing it on hair) and getting small pieces of paper to jump to it. While it didn’t work the night before, it worked splendidly in class and they were hooked! Then we were going to have a bunch of demos involving Scotch “Magic” (it’s really called that) Tape, which worked perfectly the night before and flopped each time in class! Hizzah! Welcome to physics teaching! It’s going to be a funky adventure through my ZPD, that’s for sure!
As for the seminary, I found out (on the first day of class, of course) that I’ll be teaching Form 1 Mathematics again. I had been promised Form 2 English (I really was pumped about teaching English here, especially to my old math class), but that changed. Oh well- I’ll probably need the prep time for physics anyway.
The Form 1 class is again right around 70 strong, and they are an energetic bunch! It’s great! I have over double-digit numbers of people raising their hands to answer questions! Magical!
I’ve decided that I have two broad objectives for this class. 1) Teach them the necessary math. 2) Fight the “math fear” that plagues this country. In order to do this, I have drawn on good old Breakthrough Saint Paul. I’ve seen a lot of really cool classes done in other departments that had some sort of crime-solving theme. This leaves the specifics really open (who knows when sports will be involved in clues, or music, or whatever). Thus, this year’s Form 1 math crew will be attempting to catch the “Ndizi Mwizi” (Swahili for “Banana Thief”).
The seminary students have the same thing for lunch and dinner for 4 years straight- “Ugali na Maharagi” (Ugali is this flavorless, thick, mashed potato-y substance made from corn, and maharagi is beans). There’s a huge banana field on the seminary property, but the students never get any. I have blamed this issue on the poor Ndizi Mwizi. He (or she) is writing the class letters, taunting them with mathematical clues that he (or she) does not think the class can solve (because they can’t unless they learn these new concepts). We’ll see how it works. So far they seem intrigued, and a fair amount of them even seemed to understand the premise. Also, they are learning the Breakthrough Spirit Check as an energizer. So far the monk in his thirties in the class seems a bit hesitant to pound on his desk, but we’re working on it!
Finally, I am writing this on Saturday evening, and the Archbishop of Songea was here today celebrating his silver jubilee/blessing the new monastic residence hall. It was a typical celebration (3 hour Mass, speeches, great food, singing and dancing, etc). We took a break from it to see a student/tailor in the village. Then the rain picked up…We sprinted back to the monastery and got absolutely soaked (and got cheered on by villagers who didn’t know what to think as they huddled under any kind of overhangs they could find). The Archbishop seemed to find the sight of soaking wet white people pretty hilarious, but we changed when we realized the celebration still had quite a bit of time left…
It turns out all of my underwear were on the line “drying” outside when the rain came. Also, my only towel was also on the line. Luckily I found some compression shorts I forgot about at the bottom of my bag, and I also learned that bedsheets are really just thin, large towels in disguise. With most of my clothing “drying” outside, I opted for the only logical option- ZUBAZ! It was not even looked twice at for the end of the celebration.
I always wear dress pants to meals, but tonight I thought I could make an exception. After all, it’s pretty much just us young volunteers at the guesthouse refectory right now. Naturally, tonight was the first night we were invited to join the monks in their cloistered refectory! Yep, I can now add “shook the hand of an African Archbishop” to the list of things I’ve done while wearing Zubaz! I’m not going to say it didn’t turn some heads, but, hey, it’s not my fault everyone wants a pair!