I’ve got a lot to report on from the last couple of weeks,
unfortunately not sharing too much of a theme, other than that I can alliterate
the topic headings. My first interesting
point comes from my intermediate class a couple of weeks ago. I’d given them a class on good citizenship
which had been alright but like all my attempts at discussion based classes in
site never quite took off. Students
would talk back and forth with me, but I could not get them discussing with each
other. A local friend had sat in on the
class, and while we were talking about it afterwards he suggested that I do a
similar class based on how to be a good student; maybe that would inspire
greater participation.
To start
the class I had the students work together to create a list of attributes of a
good student. They came up with 11, not
counting a couple that were essentially repeats. Most of them were what you’d expect from
American students, “participatory, respectful, studious, etc.” though there
were a couple of odd ones (humility?), so I decided to have them individually
list them in order of importance.
Meanwhile I did the same thing.
Then we discussed what order they’d come up with vs. what I had, and it
was extremely revealing. Unanimously
they picked “respectful to the teacher” as the number one attribute of a good
student and they were unanimously shocked when I revealed it had come up as my
6th. They were equally
shocked when their almost universally last placed “participate,” was my number
one. No wonder it seems like we’ve been
working at cross-purposes for so long, we have been!
After that
we discussed the attributes of a good teacher, and again found a shocking
difference. They feel (maybe “felt” now)
that a teacher’s job is to present information to the students, and were
surprised and intrigued when I told them that in my view I’ll have failed my
job if they don’t learn. Questions, I
had to emphasize, are not a sign of disrespect, implying that I haven’t
presented information well, but rather allow me to make sure I do my job well
and that they understand. We’ll see if
this actually ends up increasing participation, but it can’t hurt.
Lastly I
had them write down what they want to do with the class for the rest of the
school year, and I was shocked to see all but one of them requested that we do
more poetry. I thought they hadn’t liked
English poetry and that they thought it was too difficult, so I’d let the class
drift away from it; it turns out its their favorite thing we’ve done! Only a couple requested specific grammar
points (which I will address), so the class acted as a nice confirmation that
students really do appreciate this break from their normal schooling, even if
they do find it challenging.
Last week a
couple of friends from home visited me so I got to play tour guide in Marrakech
and Essaouira a little bit. It was a
great trip, and very relaxing, though as it turns out I wish they’d come a week
later because, in normal Morocco fashion, my schedule has been terribly
upended. I was supposed to have an
English Language Camp in my site over the students’ Spring Break, which starts
next week, but once I came back from Marrakech I discovered that the camp had
been cancelled. Although I could
justifiably stay and teach my normal classes I’ve noticed that over the breaks
students rarely come to the Youth Center (many travel), and so I thought I
would serve better working at another camp, which means I’ll have to travel
again, coincidentally to a city south of Marrakech. If I’d known I’d have to travel for camp I’d
have tied my friend’s visit to the trip down and avoided back tracking, but
such is the way of Peace Corps. In the
same period I also found out that I will be working at an AIDS awareness
program in Essaouira during the annual Gnouwa music festival (something I
really wanted to do), will be travelling to Rabat for a middle of service
check-up, and will possibly have to travel for a meeting with Ministry of Youth
and Sport officials in May, so suddenly I went from “not planning to leave site
much until July” to “crisscrossing the country,” though I think I’ve worked it
out such that in all this I will only miss two meetings of my C.L.I.M.B.
project, and I am more than confident in my counterparts ability to run those
two sessions without me.
Speaking of
C.L.I.M.B, we had our second hike this past weekend (clunky transition, but
what can you do). Frequent readers may
recall the ruins of Zaouia which I visited in December. This time we took the campers out there, but
then continued on to a small village further in the valley, and then returned
the long way by circling a mountain.
Somewhat amusingly two other student groups had decided to take hikes
out to Zaouia as well, so when we got there the ruins were overloaded with
Moroccan students playing drums and soccer.
They all seemed a little confused that we’d want to go further.
The hike
went very well, though unfortunately it was a little less strenuous then I’d
thought it would be so it didn’t allow for the same opportunities of group work
that the first had. My counterparts
assure me the next will challenge us more.
It was fun to see how much my students have gelled, and, since some
brought their hand drums, to see them dance and sing together during our rests.
So, I’ve
discussed differences and digressions, now on to the dilemma, and that is, as
always, the limits of shared language I have with students. There is a group of boys in town with weak
English and radical ideas, and I want to talk with them so that they may
channel their thoughts into useful ways.
The other night these boys talked with me about their interest and
respect for Marx and Mao, whose ideas they largely conflate one with the other. The conversation ranged and the boys
namedropped other famous names, but I don’t think their understanding of these
others really improved on their understanding of Marx and Mao. I understand where they’re coming from, these
same ideas enticed millions of disaffected young men in Europe and China over
the last century, but I don’t think they really understand the disastrous
consequences that followed Marxist and Maoist thinking. Here, of course, we come full circle to the
problem of the different conceptions of a teacher’s role. They’ve had information presented to them,
but haven’t received training in critical thinking to analyze the
information. Left in the ether for them
to pick up they, like millions before them, focus only on the pretty ideals of
Marxism and Maoism and not on what actually happened, and pretty much is guaranteed
to happen, in countries which adopt these ideals. I’d like to teach them about more positive
thinkers and world shakers, but I worry about how I could possibly bend our
seven-years olds’ understanding of each other’s language into such heady topics
in such a way that I’m not guilty of the same problem of leaving information
out in the ether without a context to really analyze it in. Suggestions are, as always, welcome.
I think I
must leave you all with a Joha joke after all that, if I keep ending on downers
like I have for the last few posts no one will want to read anymore!
One day
Joha was riding through the village backward on his donkey. One of the amused villagers came up to Joha,
“You know, Joha, you are facing the wrong way.”
“No, my
friend,” said Joha. “The donkey is going
the wrong way.”
No comments:
Post a Comment