We are now getting used to (and quite enjoying) using metaphors during a challenging conversation. Many locals seem to go for this approach so it is easy just to join in, with expressions like:
‘These resources should not be sleeping. They do not like being quiet, they love talking, I want to hear them talking.’
I had a little chat with a year 1 teacher during a school visit this week. I know this teacher a bit, we had team-taught for a little while (she took care of crowd control); I did some training at her school and last year her class were taught phonics quite well. She asked me to write words for the children to read on the chalkboard. It didn’t take long to see that these children had back-slid a bit in their reading and didn’t recognise some of the sounds. This was a little discouraging. The bomb-shell was soon to follow. She said that ‘some’ teachers were complaining (reading between the lines it soon became apparent that the ‘some’ was only her); and that they (she) wanted extra money to be teaching phonics. ‘What?’ I said to her, ‘isn’t phonics suppose to be taught in extra lesson time?’ (The period in the timetable where teachers get paid extra money by parents to teach because it is outside of the government timetable). She said ‘yes’. And I said, ‘and don’t you get paid to teach extra lessons?’ ‘yes’. I then shared my disappointment; how she could clearly see the benefits of teaching phonics and teaching reading well, how children benefited directly and their reading improved significantly; but she was not following through. I think she gathered that I wasn’t going to give her money motivation.
Historically (well, a few decades ago when charities and NGOs arrived to help); money was often given for motivation. Money for transport to go to meetings and money to attend meetings (called a sitting fee) soon became an ingrained part of life and culture, especially when dealing with charities and mzungus.
It is now difficult to break this expectation and this way of thinking. There are many head teachers and teachers here who bring a smile to my face and ‘buck’ this trend but this particular occasion and teacher was not one of them. She is a government-employed primary school teacher earning a salary. Some teachers are in it for the children; others are in it for the money; unfortuntately I think this teacher is not here for the children.
The past few days of ‘agriculture school’ has been like ‘Backyard Blitz’ getting ready for the lovely couple to arrive. Preparations finished late yesterday for their grand arrival in the evening – here they are 🙂
More pics to follow soon…
These are Dan’s first batch of home-made pork sausages in Gulu – they tasted amazing! Pretty excited to add these to our diet here and to enjoy with fantastic neighbours.
Yesterday during the church service the preacher (an elder) shared during one of his many tangents that he and most men love their wives 20 per cent; whilst women love their husbands around 70 per cent.
I could get very depressed about this statement about the current state of relationships and gender-based values; or I could try to put on my Lorax-head and think positively… 
It’s not about what it is, it’s about what it can become. Dr Seuss, The Lorax.
Later, in the church tithing basket, someone had donated two dried fish. Standard local practice is that they get auctioned off during the service and the money goes back in the offering. A youth did the auctioning, urging husbands to buy the fish to show their wives they love them. A gentleman at the back of the church bought them for 5000 shillings (about £1 or $2). He said he wanted the preacher to have them to take home to his wife.
Yesterday afternoon I almost ‘gave up’ on Africa. In the morning I had quite an encouraging meeting with the head of primary at the National Curriculum Development Centre, however that story is too positive for the theme of this post. After the meeting in the NCDC office in Kampala we headed on bodas for t
he shopping centre and then for the main bus park. Traffic in Kampala is, well let’s say it’s like imagining you have found yourself in the middle of an anthill and you are trying to get out. Peak time Oxford Street, London, with a combination of taxis, cars, motorbikes, people, chickens, oh – and no organisation whatsoever. And the boda rides, well: they are a combination of weaving in and out of cars, taxis, up and down pavements, dodging pot-holes and man-holes in a somewhat erratic fashion. After getting off the boda up from the bus park I said to Dan: ‘I am done with bodas today! I know of girls who after that experience would curl up in the corner over there and cry.’ Dan’s reply: ‘well you’re not one of them, so keep going!’ We then push our way through thick crowds to the bottom of the street to the bus park entrance. We are greeted with a somewhat ‘not serious’ security check where I take off my backpack (which has been jam-packed with clothes and learning aids) to find the front zipper open – my phone and glasses have gone! We then enter the bus park, greeted in a very ‘friendly’ manner by bus attendants trying to encourage us onto their particular bus. At 1.30pm we finally board a bus back to Gulu – by now I am more than ready to begin the 6-7 hour journey home! The bus isn’t very full. We ask the conductor when will it leave, not till about 3pm was his reply. ‘What?’ ‘Look, it’s not full yet,’ he said. So for two hours we sit and wait, interrupted by ‘hawkers’ shoving anything from phone chargers, tea leaves, handbags, water bottles and loaves of bread in our faces urging us to buy. No – I don’t want to buy a solar panel I just want to sit here and feel sorry for myself! At 3.30pm the bus finally roars up the engine to head off on the this time seven and a half hour journey back to Gulu. Not long in I was told by a ‘charming’ Catholic sister in front of me to move and swap seats with her because I had the window seat and she likes the ‘wind’. But I like the wind too I responded. I refused to move and stood my ground. ‘Well don’t you complain when you get too much wind because it is staying open!’ was her response. ‘You won’t hear me complaining!’ I said. Sure enough, when it grew dark the wind was sharp and cold. I put Dan’s hoody on and tied the hood close around my face but I never complained. You almost broke me today Africa! Almost… But in reflection, maybe I hold on to possessions too closely. What does it matter if my phone was stolen? Even if it is an iPhone.
A little over three weeks ago I posted that the agricultural training was about to begin, so… it has begun!
In my opinion, we have recruited a really good teacher who seems to know his stuff! We have had a really good response from the students and, importantly, a really good response from the seeds, which are progressing well in the nursery bed. One third of the students are sisters from local convents and there’s one catechist from the local Anglican – so it’s quite a spiritual group and they all work very hard and are really proud of the growing rate so far (I am as well 🙂 )
We haven’t quite finished the pig pen, which you will see from the pictures, but it is well on the way… we are still running a bit short on cash for the last construction phase, we will just have to go until the money runs out.
Additionally, we have just commissioned an excavator to come in (photos to follow in the future), to hopefully dig a reservoir that we will be able to use for very simple irrigation for our crops. We also hope to use it for a place of recreation… still dreaming ideas. I have been told that the excavator operator has organised for someone to sit on the side of the road to wait for a ‘low-bed’ (a trailer to carry the excavator) to drive past. This is his second day of waiting, however we hear there’s quite a few on their way back from South Sudan, so he shouldn’t be waiting for too much longer.
Dan
I recently posted about a weekend of training nursery teachers. I wanted to share a few things from the weekend…
Here’s a few paraphrased comments fro
m the CCT (co-ordinating centre tutor, like a teacher trainer in charge of schools in that area).
‘I had to humble myself to come to this training. I hold a masters degree but I have come as a participant and I have learnt a lot. Catherine was my former student at Gulu Core Primary Teacher’s College, but today she is my teacher and she and Teacher Jody have taught me many things.
‘Let me tell you a story about a professor. There was once a professor who was travelling a long way to a conference to speak about swimming. He knew everything there was about swimming, he was an expert on swimming. He travelled to the conference in the back of a pick-up and sat in the back with 150 volumes of textbooks about swimming. He read every single one of them on the journey as part of his revision and preparation. For the last part of his journey he had to cross the ocean. He hired a fisherman with a boat and took with him his 150 volumes of swimming textbooks for that part of the journey too. As the fisherman was rowing, he was reading. The fisherman, who knew the waters very well, could see that a storm was brewing. He said to the professor ‘can you swim?’ The professor replied: ‘of course I can swim, I am an expert on swimming.’ The fisherman continued but the sky and the water both grew darker; ‘professor, are you sure you can swim?’ The professor again confidently replied that he could swim and knew everything there was to know about swimming. Finally the waves became very rough and as the fisherman was asking the professor could he swim one last time, the boat overturned. The fisherman swam to the shore, but the professor drowned with all his books on swimming.
‘What did you learn from this story?’
The participants and the CCT then shared how they had learnt a lot over the weekend about teaching reading. They encouraged each other not to keep the knowledge inside of them like the professor and drown with his books on swimming, but to use what they have learnt in their classrooms, in their lessons, and change how they teach reading.
It was a really encouraging weekend, teachers were extremely enthusiastic and it was lovely to see them working together. I look forward to following them up next term and to see if they are indeed drowning with the books on swimming or otherwise.
Teacher Catherine (on left) teaching at the phonics workshop.
‘I thought reading was something that came down from heaven and over time we just got. I didn’t realise you could teach reading. Thank you, you have made this thing now very simple.’
Comment from a head teacher after first day of training in their school.
I am training some nursery teachers this weekend, but this training has been organised a little differently. Here, I have found that nursery schools are very competitive and don’t really work together. After doing a couple of afternoons at one nursery school I soon realised that it is going to take me a long time to visit them all (along with primary schools). So I asked one local nursery school director about the possibility of working together with nursery schools and doing some combined training. He was more than happy to help me out and visited 10 nursery schools inviting them for a meeting. At that meeting last week they decided they would like two days of training (not just one which I had suggested); and a long discussion took place on how many kilograms of rice, beans, meat etc would be needed for the teachers. The head teachers made up their own food budget and are splitting the costs themselves; they are also contributing a small amount of money for the ‘facilitation’ of the training which will go towards handouts, certificates and photocopying a manual for each school. There are two things that I am pretty excited about with this training: 1. It is not the NGO or white person buying the meat and soda for the training, these local nursery schools see the value and are investing in it themselves; and 2. these nursery schools are working together to make it happen. We are hoping for 10 nursery schools and about 50 teachers, but not exactly sure how many will come on the day. Also hoping the CCT (local co-ordinator centre tutor, sort of like a college tutor in charge of schools) will attend and support the training.
Please pray that the weekend is a success, that many of the teachers come, all the organisation finally comes together in the end, that teachers are receptive to what I have to say and we can improve local education 🙂
Dan and Jodes... in Gulu, Uganda 