-----Teaching in Namibia-----: Mon the 31st and Tue the 1st at AI Steenkamp and the Dolmans Children's Home

Monday was probably the most inventive day of teaching I have had yet. I arrived at school at the usual time to find that Mrs. Emma's children were sick and she was not there. I had been gone from school on Friday due to our trip to Zebra River so I had not seen her since Thursday and did not know what she had taught on Friday. I didn't even have a time table to see which kids I had when and for what subjects since she had taken home the one we had been using. This situation was the ultimate test for my crazy organized systematic personality. I had nothing planned, no idea what I was going to do or when surprisingly I was okay with it. (people who know me well know that this is a big breakthrough for me)

I did know that I was going to start my ticket incentive program with my students this day as I had discussed it with Mrs. Emma on Thursday before I left. I also knew that Mondays began with an all school assembly that takes up the first period, so that was one period down and seven to go. After the assembly, I made my way to the classroom to find my 7A homeroom class waiting for them. I greeted them with a smile and then asked my trusty prefects to tell me what they had done on Friday. They politely pointed to the board and told me what was listed there was what Mrs. Emma had begun to go over. For home ecology there were some new notes to be taken down and for maths there was information about prime numbers, composite numbers, and highest common factors.

I began each class period with an explanation of my ticket incentive program. Learners were able to earn tickets as a reward for showing positive behaviors. I used a learner who was listening to me attentively as an example of this by giving them a ticket. I then explained how they would put their first and last name along with their class name on the back of the ticket and place it in my orange cup as they left the class at the end of the period. I told the learners I had brought all sorts of prizes from USA that they would get to choose from if their name was one of the ones drawn on a given Thursday or Friday (depending on what the last day of the week was that I saw their class). I also said that those learners whose names were not drawn out in the weekly drawing would be placed in an end of the month drawing where larger prizes would be won. I was pleasantly surprised with how quickly this incentive program took off and the positive changes I saw in my learner's behavior as a result.

In home ecology, I had the learners play hang man with their vocabulary words in teams. In maths, I went over the corrections for the homework assignment with the learners and then quickly made up a game. The game covered the main concepts which were listed on the board and caused the learners to have to apply what was there. The day went pretty well overall. My favorite learner quote of the day comes from Sambalo from my 7A class when he didn't get a ticket because he hadn't been showing me appropriate behavior, he said, "Miss, I promise I will earn one of those tickets tomorrow."

After school we decided to go down town to go shopping and exploring since some of the girls needed some things. I found a cute plaid scarf like the ones I enjoy wearing back home that is a pretty blue that I bought since it was only N$70 (about $10 American). I enjoyed being downtown since it had been a while since we had ventured down there. When we returned to Casa Blanca, our professors told us they had run into some of our long lost friends, Paul and Shirley, we had met in Namibia and that they would be joining us for dinner that evening. This was very exciting news for us.

We went out to Sardinia's, a great little Italian place, for dinner. Jill and I shared a bomb salad and some really delicious chicken penne. It was great to see Paul and Shirley again and get to catch them up on all the adventures we'd been having since they saw us last.

Tuesday came around and Mrs. Emma was still gone from school. I talked to another teacher who told me her two year old daughter was now in the hospital and she may not be returning for several days. If I had not been there to cover the classes, it is likely that the students would have not been taught anything during the days of Mrs. Emma's absence as there is not really a system in place for short term teacher absenteeism. Most times when teachers are gone, the learners are either supervised by teachers who have a planning period on a given day or are left un-supervised. I knew then that anything I could teach them during this time would be a plus, so I did not stress out about it. I used the home ecology class times to better acquaint my learners with who I was and where I had come from while teaching them some things about USA. I told them we were having an intercultural conversation since we were of different cultures and we were discussing them together. The learners loved hearing what I had to say and asking many questions about USA. In maths I had noticed that the learners were quite weak in their knowledge of math facts, so I decided to take the class periods to do time test assessments to see where they were at.

Some random things that happened during Tuesday:

-A physical fight broke out between two girls in my 7E class upon arrival in the classroom. It was very difficult for me to get the two girls apart and calm the class down from the commotion. I didn't know how I should deal with it, so I had the prefects escort the girls to the principal's office.

-Jan and Paula stopped by to observe me at the last minute (they were scheduled to come on Wednesday) just because they had half an hour to kill before they could observe Janelle. I told them I had no real idea of how the period was going to go because Mrs. Emma was gone and I was basically flying by the seat of my pants. I think they were just curious to see, so they came in and sat down. Things went fairly well since I was working with my 7A class at the time (only 22 learners all of whose names I know). The only thing Jan and Paula really commented on for improvement was that I maybe should begin with an opening activity before I jump right in to time testing.

-Jan and Paula noted that in a minute's time, I had called on 6 girls and 1 boy (of 14 girls and 8 boys) and that 5 of the learners I called on were on my right side. I found this interesting as I had heard before of teachers being seen calling on more students on their dominate side, but I had never been told that I did it. This feedback caused me to be much more cautious about moving myself throughout the whole room.

-I had extra time with my 7A class, so I gave them Skipbo cards in groups to make math facts out of.

-I had a planning time during 7th period, and the teacher for English was absent, so Mr. Mica brought me 7E and told me just to watch over them and have them do homework for the period. The learners were pretty well behaved and they asked me to tell them a story. They said, "Miss, tell us a story about Miss' life." So, I told them the story of how I got to summer camp for the first time. They were so attentive and enjoyed the story very much; it was really fun.

-Geraldine, one of my 7A learners came to me with her school diary (basically a planner) and asked me how to use it. So, I got to teach her how she could effectively record her homework for a given day and use it as a checklist when she was at home completing her assignments.

After school on Tuesday, it was my turn to go to the children's home to help tutor the kids and hang out with them. I so love doing this even though by the time it comes around I am very tired from the day at school. This particular day, Emmanuel, who is in grade 1 was home sick from school. He was feeling very well by the time we got there, but had had a fever the night before. He was so much fun to play with and is a happy little boy. He raced me around the house and told me I needed to run faster. He hoped on my back like a monkey and pulled my braid saying I was a donkey and I needed to go. The kids love to play with our digital cameras and "catch" photos of everything. Gustaf had fun going around and having his own little photo shoot. I may have said this before, but I love that we get to help out at the children's home also. The lady at the home said the kids are doing better in school since we started and they love having us around. It's really fun to build outside of school relationship with these kids and be able to run around the yard with them and be goofy once they've finished with their studies.

Ann-Lee and I (Ann-Lee is in grade 6, but for some reason she has taken a real liking to me and comes to see me everyday at the beginning of the day, break time, and the end of the day :)