Click on the pictures to see my comments to the pictures in Picasa nettalbum.
søndag 31. oktober 2010
tirsdag 26. oktober 2010
Trying to teach English and enjoying it
I think it is about time to write something about my volunteer work here in India. This is my eight week of teaching Maths and English in Bindraban governmental primary school. The school has classes from 1st to 5th grade and it is about 10 children in each class so the school is not very big. There are only three teachers at the school which makes it 0,6 teachers in each class. The first four weeks we were four volunteers in this school and right now there is only me. We teach English and Maths to 1st and 2nd grade in the morning. In the afternoon I teach English in bridge class for girls from 5 to 18 years. The school is quite nice, but if someone had picked it up and placed it somewhere in Norway it would of course not meet our standards; It is amazing what you can get used to. There are only three classrooms so we are two classes in one room and one other class always sit outside. The students have reading books for Hindi and copy books and they are supposed to have pencils and rubber, but I never understand where all the pencils and erasers disappears. So every day we bring a box with pencils, sharpeners, erasers, chalk and colours together with English books, Maths books and the worksheets,memory cards and flash cards we make all the time. The children have desks and plastic chairs, but there is no desk for the teacher in our class room. By the way, there is one thing I never can get used to; the concrete floor is so uneven that all the desks are (how to say...) tilting. It is really annoying me, but the children don't seem to worry about it.
I never planned to work with kids here in India. I wanted to work with women empowerment and that's why I chose India and this particulare camp. The information we got before we arrived recommended to prepear by learning some songs and games in English for the children, but of course I didn't do this because I was not supposed to work with kids. Well, now I have learnt at least five songs for kids in English and even more playground games, and the songs are haunting my brain 24/7:
"Say good morning, say good morning.
How are you? How are you?
Time to start the lesson, time to start the lesson.
Now, now, now. Now, now, now.
Namaste! (Shouting)"
In the beginning I didn't understand how I was going to survive working in the school. I did feel that it was getting a little bit better every day so I hoped that after a while I would feel more comfortable (as you can read in an earlier post of my blog). I was right, but it took me about four weeks before I felt comfortable. After three weeks I felt that it was OK to go to work, but that I couldn't teach the children anything and I still wanted to sink into the ground every monday morning. Many of the volunteers are working only for three weeks. I am very glad that I stay here for as many weeks as I am. I think that it makes a big differense. I guess that this is not that important if you are doing other things like construction work, environmental avareness campains or when working with animals, but at least I think that it is important when working with and being so close to young children.
So I never planned to work with kids and now I have been with them monday to friday for eight weeks and what has happened is that I look foreward to go to school everyday! I don't have to prepare so much now as in the beginning because I basically know what I am going to do the next day. I know the children and I know what to expect from them. This means that I know that they are going to drive me crazy when we play Memory cards by picking up the cards before we have started playing, I know that they will bite of the tip of their pencil, tilt their head to the side and ask; "please, ma'am, please, sharpener, please", I know that they will start to work in the back of their English book and match the picture of a cat with the word "butterfly", and I know that if I have their attention for five minutes it will be a miracle. But I also know that they will shout my name when I come into the classroom in the morning and give me high five, I know that I will have five kids hanging in my arms when it's playtime, I know that they will help me carrying the little blackboard when we go outside, and I know that they will proudly bring me their book and show me when they have finished an exercise.
I have eight students in my group in the morning class which last from 9:45 to 12:00. We have devided first and second class into three groups and one volunteer is responsible for each group. I am teaching the group with the slower children and this means that I teach basics like ABC, counting the numbers 1-10 and 2+2=4. Some of the children know most of the letters but don't understand spelling and some of the children have problems with following the dots to make an A. So the day is spent by practising writing letters and number, playing Memory game, recognise and match letters on the blackboard and counting stones. In the afternoon, 15:45-17:30, my two Norwegian room mates, Ida and Sirvej, and I teach English to girls from 5 years to 18 years. In this classes we focus on conversation in English and to actually use the language. We have one topic every week and the topics have been my self, family, hobbies, clothes; so really basic English. The girls know quite many words, but they don't speak much. We have a project executive who helps us to translate Hindi and English and in that way we can have conversations. The girls are quickly bored and prefer to play badminton, but we try to keep their attention at least the first hour. After that it's PLAYTIME:-)
I never planned to work with kids here in India. I wanted to work with women empowerment and that's why I chose India and this particulare camp. The information we got before we arrived recommended to prepear by learning some songs and games in English for the children, but of course I didn't do this because I was not supposed to work with kids. Well, now I have learnt at least five songs for kids in English and even more playground games, and the songs are haunting my brain 24/7:
"Say good morning, say good morning.
How are you? How are you?
Time to start the lesson, time to start the lesson.
Now, now, now. Now, now, now.
Namaste! (Shouting)"
In the beginning I didn't understand how I was going to survive working in the school. I did feel that it was getting a little bit better every day so I hoped that after a while I would feel more comfortable (as you can read in an earlier post of my blog). I was right, but it took me about four weeks before I felt comfortable. After three weeks I felt that it was OK to go to work, but that I couldn't teach the children anything and I still wanted to sink into the ground every monday morning. Many of the volunteers are working only for three weeks. I am very glad that I stay here for as many weeks as I am. I think that it makes a big differense. I guess that this is not that important if you are doing other things like construction work, environmental avareness campains or when working with animals, but at least I think that it is important when working with and being so close to young children.
So I never planned to work with kids and now I have been with them monday to friday for eight weeks and what has happened is that I look foreward to go to school everyday! I don't have to prepare so much now as in the beginning because I basically know what I am going to do the next day. I know the children and I know what to expect from them. This means that I know that they are going to drive me crazy when we play Memory cards by picking up the cards before we have started playing, I know that they will bite of the tip of their pencil, tilt their head to the side and ask; "please, ma'am, please, sharpener, please", I know that they will start to work in the back of their English book and match the picture of a cat with the word "butterfly", and I know that if I have their attention for five minutes it will be a miracle. But I also know that they will shout my name when I come into the classroom in the morning and give me high five, I know that I will have five kids hanging in my arms when it's playtime, I know that they will help me carrying the little blackboard when we go outside, and I know that they will proudly bring me their book and show me when they have finished an exercise.
I have eight students in my group in the morning class which last from 9:45 to 12:00. We have devided first and second class into three groups and one volunteer is responsible for each group. I am teaching the group with the slower children and this means that I teach basics like ABC, counting the numbers 1-10 and 2+2=4. Some of the children know most of the letters but don't understand spelling and some of the children have problems with following the dots to make an A. So the day is spent by practising writing letters and number, playing Memory game, recognise and match letters on the blackboard and counting stones. In the afternoon, 15:45-17:30, my two Norwegian room mates, Ida and Sirvej, and I teach English to girls from 5 years to 18 years. In this classes we focus on conversation in English and to actually use the language. We have one topic every week and the topics have been my self, family, hobbies, clothes; so really basic English. The girls know quite many words, but they don't speak much. We have a project executive who helps us to translate Hindi and English and in that way we can have conversations. The girls are quickly bored and prefer to play badminton, but we try to keep their attention at least the first hour. After that it's PLAYTIME:-)
torsdag 21. oktober 2010
Trekking in the Himalayas II
5th of October:
Where to begin? I have catched a cold and my voice is just half of what I need for a school day in Bindraban gov. school. Yesterday we came back from a five days trek in the Himalayas and now it's morning and I am going to work in 1 1/2 hour. It was lovely to sleep in "my own" bed again after five nights where I have been woried that I would wake up with bluemarks on my hips because of the hard bed. But where does the story begin? It begins with the hike we went on two weeks ago arranged by IDEX. The whole volunteer group went for a hike from MacLeod Ganj and slept one night in the mountains at a camp site called Triund. The last post on this blog is the pictures from that trip. (If you click on the pictures in the slidshow and follow the link to Picasa you can read my comments to the pictures.) As you see we had a great hike in a impressive landscape. Before we went there I had already decided for my self to go back for a longer hike and I had checked out some of the companies that arranged trekking from MacLeod Ganj. This was something I already thought about back home in Norway. At the hike with IDEX we had a very nice guide and the food was great and everything was good! We (Ida, Sirvej, Vegar, Mathias and I) decided to go for a five days trekking from 29th of September to 3rd of October with the same company and the guide Mool Raj. This was all inclusive wich means that the trekking company provided us with tents, sleeping bags, food and what else we would need and we also had people carrying all this things for us. We only carried light backpacks with our own clothings and other personal pickpack. The service was without limmits, they even washed our dishes for us. Since I acctually have a Master degree in analycing this kind of trekking I was prepeared for this, but it was anyway difficult to know how to act when you are in the mountains and you are supposed to sit down and relax while someone is setting up your tent and put on pillow cases on your pillow for you. We slept for two nights in tents in the mountains and two nights we spent on home stays in villages on the other side of the mountain range wich we passed.
Very unfortunately Mathias got a flu and could not come with us. We missed you, Mathias!
We skipped four days of work and started on Wednesday from MacLeod Ganj; a small town where the exile government of Tibet holds place together with i big crowd of Indian tourists and foreign backpackers. It takes two hours by bus from our IDEX camp in Palampur and it costs 35 rupi (=5 NOK). This is a great place for shopping, but after 2 days the last time we were there I had enough of the place. We were only eager to get to the mountains and when you take a look at the pictures you can understand why. We had so many experiences during that short week!
Click at the slidshow to get to Picasa Nettalbum and read my comments about the hike!
torsdag 7. oktober 2010
A Sunday Hike to Baba's Temple
On Sunday the 26th of September we went for a hike in the hills north of our camp. Our plan was to go for a short walk to The Waterfalls wich we though was one hours walk from the camp. We followed the river upstream and after a while we started to wonder how far it could be. Then we met two Americans (the first white people we have seen in Palampur) who could tell us that it would take us three hours to get to the waterfalls. Well, so we would miss lunch this day, but get a nice walk instead.
The next person we met was Baba, a Hindu priest, and we should find out that without him we probably would never have found the waterfalls. He came down the hillside and lucky for us Sara who speaks hindi was there and then he decided to walk up the hills agan to show us the way. With Sara as translator we learnt that he was a Hindi priest and was responsible for the tempel by the waterfalls and that this tempel is very important in this area because it is in honor of the river that brings water to the valley. He has lived in the tempel alone in the hills for the last ten years, but he walks down to the town everyday. When we walked down together with him we saw that he was highly respected and appreciated by everyone we met. He was also very kind and hospitable to us.
This Sunday we met again some of the contrasts that India can offer. They are building a hydro power station in the valley and near the station by the river we passed the shelters for the construction workers and their families; shelters made by corrugated iron (?) and poorly dressed and dirty kids running around. Up in the hillside near the tempel we walked on the two years old construction road for the power station. The tunnels in the pictures is for the power station. Along the road we passed several shelters left by the workers; India offer a hard life for some of it's inhabitants.
It took us three hours to reach the tempel and the waterfalls, but it was worth every drop of sweat we sacrificed up the steap trail. I think the pictures speaks for itself. First we dank tea and ate boiled corn cobs and biscuits in Baba's house/tower before we had a swim in the ponds by the waterfalls. In the end of the day we had to hurry back to the camp before the staff started on our dinner so we could tell them that we would eat out on a restaurant. We still had time to take pictures of a goat in a tree posing for our cameras. We live an easy life here in India.
The next person we met was Baba, a Hindu priest, and we should find out that without him we probably would never have found the waterfalls. He came down the hillside and lucky for us Sara who speaks hindi was there and then he decided to walk up the hills agan to show us the way. With Sara as translator we learnt that he was a Hindi priest and was responsible for the tempel by the waterfalls and that this tempel is very important in this area because it is in honor of the river that brings water to the valley. He has lived in the tempel alone in the hills for the last ten years, but he walks down to the town everyday. When we walked down together with him we saw that he was highly respected and appreciated by everyone we met. He was also very kind and hospitable to us.
This Sunday we met again some of the contrasts that India can offer. They are building a hydro power station in the valley and near the station by the river we passed the shelters for the construction workers and their families; shelters made by corrugated iron (?) and poorly dressed and dirty kids running around. Up in the hillside near the tempel we walked on the two years old construction road for the power station. The tunnels in the pictures is for the power station. Along the road we passed several shelters left by the workers; India offer a hard life for some of it's inhabitants.
It took us three hours to reach the tempel and the waterfalls, but it was worth every drop of sweat we sacrificed up the steap trail. I think the pictures speaks for itself. First we dank tea and ate boiled corn cobs and biscuits in Baba's house/tower before we had a swim in the ponds by the waterfalls. In the end of the day we had to hurry back to the camp before the staff started on our dinner so we could tell them that we would eat out on a restaurant. We still had time to take pictures of a goat in a tree posing for our cameras. We live an easy life here in India.
Trekking in The Himalayas I
This is pictures from when the whole group of volunteers went to MacLeod Ganj and trekking in the Himalayas the 16th to the 19th of September.
Click on the pictures to go to Picasa netalbum to read my comments to the pictures. The pictures that I am on is taken by Josep Maria Ribas.
Click on the pictures to go to Picasa netalbum to read my comments to the pictures. The pictures that I am on is taken by Josep Maria Ribas.
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