For the last few months of I have been the soccer, or as we will call it from here on out,the football coach of my school's team. Now all this really entails is taking the girls to football practice every day. Since our school does not have a field of its own we need to go to fields that are near by. The closest field is behind a lumber yard, about a 10-15 minute walk, depending on how lazy the students are being.
But because this field is used by others, the only days that we have found it not occupied are Monday, Wednesday, and Friday. On Tuesday and Thusday we just run. And in all honesty the running is good because many of the girls are very out of shape.
The few students that are very good play multiple sports, so they can't always come to football. Not to mention the fact that volleyball and basketball have regular games, so of course the girls need to practice for those more.
This means that most of the time I end up with a rag tag group of students. Well that is not exactly true. I normally end up with a bunch of the younger students who just want to get off the school grounds, so doing sports with me provides them with a way to get out.
The reason for this post now is because in the last week I had two funny football stories.
Story Number 1:
It had rained for about 3 days. Many hours each day(normally this does not happen). Then the sun came out. I took a group of students to go play football. We found the field already occupied. There was the other field that we could see, but that we had never been too. I suggested that we go. I told the captain to start leading the girls and I would follow up in the rear.
Bad Idea Number One that I had. To go from the field that we were at to the other field we had to cross a boggy marsh. The trail we were following started out well. But then we started encountering all of the trenches of muddy water that we needed to jump. Of course this was Bad Idea Number 2. In case you have never seen me jump, lets just say I was not gifted with that athleticism. For lets say the first 8 jumps I did very well. I was even helping the students across. Then--the final jump--now it didn't look that bad, but because I wanted to be careful I always give myself a running start.
I cleared the trench. But what happens when you get a running start and then jump, you continue for a few steps after the jump. Well, I had seen grass on the other side and it hadn't worried me. Bad Thought Number One. it was not grass. It was water grass. That means that when I cleared the muddy trench water I then 'landed' in water grass. The water went up to my knees. I am serious. All the students just stood there in shock and started saying sorry sorry teacher. I of course climbed out and said its okay,lets keep going. We then played football for two hours--me in soaking wet shoes and socks, not to mention wet and dirty legs. We shall say it was 'pleasant.'
On the way home I told the girls that we need to find another way back, and luckily the captain is a good girl, and she came through. It was a little longer of a trip, but totally worth it.
Story Number 2:
The next day I took the girls to play football again since we had a game on Sunday(it was friday now). For extra help two of my fellow teachers came with me. Which was really nice. We decided to just go directly back to the field we had used the previous day. Once again I had the captain lead the girls, and she was kind enough to take us on the slightly longer path, but the dry one. We had a decent practice.
At the end of practice I told the girls we had to go back to school and I asked the captain to lead the girls again(I always follow up in the rear to make sure I don't lose any students). Well my two fellow teachers come to me before we set off and say, why are we going to go that way, its faster to go the other way. All the students start laughing. I then inform them that the students were being kind to me so I don't wet again because I'm not a very good jumper. Both men laughed for about 5 minutes, and then they said too bad because we are going that way.HA. so then I had to do the jumping again. BUT-this time-I was succesful. aka I did not get wet.
Story Number 3:
We are going to skip ahead in time to Sunday. On Saturday we did have practice, from 7 am to 11.30 am. It was hard core. though nothing really special happened.
Sunday morning-7 am. We meet the students. There was both a basketball and football, so it was a good number of students coming to play. Not to mention about the 20 students we were taking as spectators. This being where it is, we didn't actually leave till around 8.30 after all is said and done. We traveled about 15 minutes away to a school that did have their own field/court. It was a coed school, and being a sunday there were many students around to watch. Basketball started playing first. About 20 minutes into their game, the other football coach started to get in a huff that we needed to start football. Now for purposes like this, I am not the coach, one of the guys is, just because it makes interactions easier.
These two men argued for about 10 minutes about how why can't we wait till the basketball is over because three of our players for football are on the basketball team. While the other man's point was that students can only be on one team.
Well conclusion of the arguement: we have to start football. I get the girls and tell them to head over to the field so can start warming up. Meanwhile I spoke with the basketball coach and he said after another 15 minutes he can give me the girls(our team was winning by a lot).
Here comes the Drama.
The people in charge of district sports come to check the girls out. We had to have a list of the students playing(roster), and identification to prove they were who we said they were(so we can't bring in ringers). For proof we have a team photo. This did not go over well. They wanted individual identity cards for each students. But our students did not have them. This then started a 90 minute arguement. And I am really not lieing. It was intense. Students were involved. I was involved. Everybody was saying something to somebody.
Now I understand the issue they have, but I could not understand why we couldn't just play the game under protest, so at least that way the girls get to play. But NO NO NO, the other team's coach was having none of them. At one point I had to drag away the two men from my school because they were getting so angry I knew that nothing good could come of it.
In the end we didn't get to play. We went back and watched the boys basketball game that came after the girl's. Although it was a good day, I know all the students were really dissapointed about it. Because I was feeling bad for them, and because we had been gone from school soo long, and they missed lunch, I bought enough gum to give each girl a piece. It was amazing how happy that made them. Essentially they were all just tuckered out. We didn't get back to school till 4 pm. Now we had asked the kitchen to save them food, but they didnt save enough, so the oldest girls/captains didn't eat at all, whilst the rest of the girls were just sharing food.
Since I felt bad for them I invited the 5 students back to my house and made them pasta and green beans. It was nice. I think they enjoyed it. At least it was something different for them(the girls eat the same food everyday)(well then again so do I, but I do it because I like to, they do it because they don't have another choice).
Well thats the end of my three football stories in one week. As you can tell, it sure was a long week.
Wednesday, June 3, 2009
Dos de Mayos
Now many of you may be thinking, is this girl crazy? doesn't she know her dates? yes yes yes, you can assure yourself that I am not crazy. We just celebrated dos de mayos, and here's why: it was one of my friend's birthday's. She and her husband are from Houston, and had originally met working in a Mexican restaurant, hence the themed party.(not to mention any reason to drink is a good reason)
Almost everyone from my program showed up. It was essentially an open house starting at noon and going till whenever at night. It was essentually BYOB, and then everyone chipped in on bringing different snacks. For instance I had been asked to bring 2 pineapples.
Let me tell you it was a great party. Just very relaxing. It gave us all a chance to chat and talk about how our second term had started, and also let us be free since we were inside a house and not everyone was looking at us because of our skin color.
We had samosas with gaucamole and salsa that my friend made, and then in the evening we had 'quesadillas' on chapati. Not to mention all the fruit and little snacks. We also 'roasted' peanuts..haha..
It was also great because we used the even as a giant book exchange because we were all in the same place at the same time for once..
I took a book that I had heard about for ages,but never had a chance to read--The Alchemist. For those of you who have not read it, I highly recommend it. It is not a long book, and it truely is a great read for so many reasons.
Since it was my friend's b-day, I wanted to get her something, but then the question becomes, what does one need here? We don't lead very exciting lives. really. So I decided to do what I could, give money to buy food, because that is really all we spend money on. I gave her a 1000 rwf, and told her to not spend it all in one place.haha..this is funny because 1000 rwf is less than 2 usd.
So for all of you who celebrated cinque de mayo, I hope you had fun, but I don't think you could have had as much fun as I did. :)
Almost everyone from my program showed up. It was essentially an open house starting at noon and going till whenever at night. It was essentually BYOB, and then everyone chipped in on bringing different snacks. For instance I had been asked to bring 2 pineapples.
Let me tell you it was a great party. Just very relaxing. It gave us all a chance to chat and talk about how our second term had started, and also let us be free since we were inside a house and not everyone was looking at us because of our skin color.
We had samosas with gaucamole and salsa that my friend made, and then in the evening we had 'quesadillas' on chapati. Not to mention all the fruit and little snacks. We also 'roasted' peanuts..haha..
It was also great because we used the even as a giant book exchange because we were all in the same place at the same time for once..
I took a book that I had heard about for ages,but never had a chance to read--The Alchemist. For those of you who have not read it, I highly recommend it. It is not a long book, and it truely is a great read for so many reasons.
Since it was my friend's b-day, I wanted to get her something, but then the question becomes, what does one need here? We don't lead very exciting lives. really. So I decided to do what I could, give money to buy food, because that is really all we spend money on. I gave her a 1000 rwf, and told her to not spend it all in one place.haha..this is funny because 1000 rwf is less than 2 usd.
So for all of you who celebrated cinque de mayo, I hope you had fun, but I don't think you could have had as much fun as I did. :)
Tuesday, April 21, 2009
The Jurassi Park Back-Up Island
Many of you might be familiar with Jurassic Park. If you remember correctly, you will remember that at the end of the movie we are reminded that there is another island that has the dinasours.. well I have found that island. It is called Bat Island, and it is in the middle of Lake Kivu.
This past weekend I was in Kibuye, one of the towns around the lake. On Saturday afternoon my group boarded a boat to take us out onto the lake.
When we left it was sunny with clouds on the distant horizon. Perfect boating weather. The boat ride took a little bit over an hour+. But we did have a bunch of the boys jump off the boat and go swimming. Once we got to bat island, we all got off the boat and watched as the boatmen tried to secure the boat...remember this I will touch on this later.
We are now on the island. We start following the boatman along a semi-marked path. Along the path we have our first encounter that makes us think Jurassic Park--big piles of poop. After we had walked only about 5 minutes the guide started to clap which caused many of the bats to come out of the trees and fly around. CRAZY. I had never seen so many bats. It was CRAZY. Sooo neat. I took lots of pictures. Granted in many of the pictures they just look like black things in the sky, but I know what they are..haha..
Now lets get to the Jurassic Park Back-Up Island part. As we all know, where bats live, obviously dinasours live too. Also, what other animal could leave such odd droppings. HAHA.
My one friend and I proceeded to create our own Jurassic Park Back-Up Island video. Not gonna lie, its pretty good. Essentially it gave everyone a good laugh.
After we had seen the bats, which really how long can you watch them fly around, 10, 15 minutes?? ..we headed back to the boat. We, as in those of my group, would like to thank a tree that our boat got caught in, if not it would have floated off..haha.. But luckily that tree was present and we were able to get back on our boat and head back. Most of the ride back was in the dark, yet it was still oddly beautiful even though one couldn't really see anything.
Note: The poop that we saw belonged to cows that live on the island, or so they say.. How do cows get to the island?? Just saying.. it could be dinasours..haha :)
Note 2: On the other side of Lake Kivu is the DRC, so I got pictures of mountains that are in the DRC, but the lake is HUGE, so the mountains are truely, and utterly in the distance.
This past weekend I was in Kibuye, one of the towns around the lake. On Saturday afternoon my group boarded a boat to take us out onto the lake.
When we left it was sunny with clouds on the distant horizon. Perfect boating weather. The boat ride took a little bit over an hour+. But we did have a bunch of the boys jump off the boat and go swimming. Once we got to bat island, we all got off the boat and watched as the boatmen tried to secure the boat...remember this I will touch on this later.
We are now on the island. We start following the boatman along a semi-marked path. Along the path we have our first encounter that makes us think Jurassic Park--big piles of poop. After we had walked only about 5 minutes the guide started to clap which caused many of the bats to come out of the trees and fly around. CRAZY. I had never seen so many bats. It was CRAZY. Sooo neat. I took lots of pictures. Granted in many of the pictures they just look like black things in the sky, but I know what they are..haha..
Now lets get to the Jurassic Park Back-Up Island part. As we all know, where bats live, obviously dinasours live too. Also, what other animal could leave such odd droppings. HAHA.
My one friend and I proceeded to create our own Jurassic Park Back-Up Island video. Not gonna lie, its pretty good. Essentially it gave everyone a good laugh.
After we had seen the bats, which really how long can you watch them fly around, 10, 15 minutes?? ..we headed back to the boat. We, as in those of my group, would like to thank a tree that our boat got caught in, if not it would have floated off..haha.. But luckily that tree was present and we were able to get back on our boat and head back. Most of the ride back was in the dark, yet it was still oddly beautiful even though one couldn't really see anything.
Note: The poop that we saw belonged to cows that live on the island, or so they say.. How do cows get to the island?? Just saying.. it could be dinasours..haha :)
Note 2: On the other side of Lake Kivu is the DRC, so I got pictures of mountains that are in the DRC, but the lake is HUGE, so the mountains are truely, and utterly in the distance.
Bus Ride to Musanze
Over Easter weekend my friend and I went to Musanze, formerly known as Ruhengari. Previous to the program that we are both on, my friend had lived in Musanze off and on for 2 years, so she knows the city real well. She told me before we got on the bus in Kigali that I have to stay awake because the view will be amazing. Well she was right.
The ride there took a little over 2 hours. I was lucky enough to get a window seat for the ride, and did I ever enjoy it. To get from Kigali to Musanze you have to travel Northwest up into 'mountain' country. Essentially you weave your way amongst hills the entire time. It was amazing to see the country side. Most of these hills were either fully tiered or just planted directly on the slope. We saw many people both out and about, aka walking on the road, and then we saw many people working in the fields. As we passed through small towns and villages we saw people doing anything and everything that they could possibly do. I felt like it was the Rwanda that I was missing because I live in Kigali. Now don't get me wrong, I love Kigali, but something can be said for the countryside.
As we got farther North the weather did get colder, which is GREAT. I was sitting next to the window so I got the amazing breeze in my face, I had not felt so wonderful for about 15 weeks. But then what do you know happens, the Rwandese get cold so they asked me to close the window so I did.. yet for that short time with the window open it made the bus ride even better.
I would also like to note that I happened to see two waterfalls on the bus ride. Also once you get to Musanze it is really neat because whenever you look up at the skyline you see the volcanos looming in the distance.
The bus ride back was almost as good, the only down side was that it rained so the views weren't as good as the ride up. That just means I will have to go back to see what I missed.
The ride there took a little over 2 hours. I was lucky enough to get a window seat for the ride, and did I ever enjoy it. To get from Kigali to Musanze you have to travel Northwest up into 'mountain' country. Essentially you weave your way amongst hills the entire time. It was amazing to see the country side. Most of these hills were either fully tiered or just planted directly on the slope. We saw many people both out and about, aka walking on the road, and then we saw many people working in the fields. As we passed through small towns and villages we saw people doing anything and everything that they could possibly do. I felt like it was the Rwanda that I was missing because I live in Kigali. Now don't get me wrong, I love Kigali, but something can be said for the countryside.
As we got farther North the weather did get colder, which is GREAT. I was sitting next to the window so I got the amazing breeze in my face, I had not felt so wonderful for about 15 weeks. But then what do you know happens, the Rwandese get cold so they asked me to close the window so I did.. yet for that short time with the window open it made the bus ride even better.
I would also like to note that I happened to see two waterfalls on the bus ride. Also once you get to Musanze it is really neat because whenever you look up at the skyline you see the volcanos looming in the distance.
The bus ride back was almost as good, the only down side was that it rained so the views weren't as good as the ride up. That just means I will have to go back to see what I missed.
Wednesday, April 1, 2009
Let Them Entertain Me
The ending of the first term brings the girls a lot of free time. Normally during the day they just sit around or watch movies, or even debate. Then the entertainment chief organized two special entertainment events.
On Saturday afternoon/night was the first event. It started at 4.30, then we had a break for dinner at 6, and then it started back up at 7.30ish. So what was the event you ask, well it was a combination of a lot of things. They had a few groups do some dancing and then they had another top model competition. Once again it was fierce. In this competition there were girls of all ages involved. Then inbetween rounds, when the girls were changing, they played jeapardy. I have used this game in my class as a fun review activity. I alter the rules a bit so it can work with 30+ people. Before they played they had me come up and introduce the game. I should mention that the entertainment chief is one of the students that I teach. I think that jeapardy went okay. Since they only had 4 girls playing and then about 500 watching I believe it got a little boring for the crowd, but it made me happy that they tried it. They even did double jeapardy and final jeapardy..haha.. love it.
The second big entertainment event was Wednesday night. It started at 8 and went to 11. This was the closing event of the term. Different clubs and organizations at the school performed. They sang songs, did traditional dancing, hip-hop, and skits. The event ended with a boom--for those of you who don't know, evidentally boom is the english word for a dance..ah. wonder how I missed that one when I learned english..
Honestly it was really fun, and I am SO happy that I was invited and that I went. I would like to note that I was the only teacher invited. Just to give you an idea of how it was for me I will tell you about two of the skits that were performed. One was done by the club Fight Against Aids. Actually I am going to talk about the demostration that they did first. They had about 10 girls from the club stand in a straight line with hands behind their backs. The president of the club gave one girl a stone and the girls passed it amongst themselves. After a certain amount of time they called girls out of the audience to guess which girl had the stone. This was done about 4 times, obviously each time the girl could not guess correctly. Well you might ask what was the point of this, it was to remind the girls that one cannot always see who has HIV/AIDS..(at least this is my guess, it was all in kinyarwanda). The club then did a skit about a group of friends and how a girl borrrowed a sweater from another girl and then a third girl freaks out at her friend for wearing a sweater that someone with HIV was wearing since of course one can get HIV that way.. After the skit the president of the club then outlined the ways it IS transmitted, and ways that it is NOT transmitted (I was told this happened, of course I did not understand what they said). The other skit was about women equality and how cultural/society treats or views women here. Overall they were nice breaks amongst the dancing and singing.
Now the boom. Ha. First of all the girls all wanted to make sure that I was staying to dance, and I did. But for the first 15 minutes the girls would barely dance 'with' me, rather if I started dancing they would all stop dancing and make a circle around me so they could all watch. Lets be real, I'm not THAT good of a dancer for that..haha.. Luckily the entertainment cheif solved the problem and turned the lights off in the dining hall. This helped a bit.. eventually the girls just separated to dance with themselves, which was fine with me. I stayed with a group of about 15 girls and danced. It was fun, essentialy I made a fool of myself, but hey that is what dancing is all about, right?
Some of the girls tried to teach me to dance like the do, but since half of them could be amateur belly dancers, I, of course could not follow along. I tried to explain to them that I don't know how to make my stomach/hips move like that and all they could say was why not? haha.. how cute.
I had wanted to hook my ipod up to their radio so they could listen to some other music than the 3 CDs they have, but I failed to hook it up, over break I am going to try an buy the cassette that you plug your ipod in to then play it in a radio, because I know come term two the girls would love to listen to my music..haha..
And to finish this off I would like to say I think I have a 'new' favorite song. Many of you might know about my obsession with Toto Africa, or rather my brother singing the song and being the musical instruments, well the girls have a remix version of the song with African drum beats in the background. It is amazing, I love it. I must find a way to bring it home. :)
oh wait one more thing, I introduced the running man and the cabbage patch to the girls; they could not stop laughing.
On Saturday afternoon/night was the first event. It started at 4.30, then we had a break for dinner at 6, and then it started back up at 7.30ish. So what was the event you ask, well it was a combination of a lot of things. They had a few groups do some dancing and then they had another top model competition. Once again it was fierce. In this competition there were girls of all ages involved. Then inbetween rounds, when the girls were changing, they played jeapardy. I have used this game in my class as a fun review activity. I alter the rules a bit so it can work with 30+ people. Before they played they had me come up and introduce the game. I should mention that the entertainment chief is one of the students that I teach. I think that jeapardy went okay. Since they only had 4 girls playing and then about 500 watching I believe it got a little boring for the crowd, but it made me happy that they tried it. They even did double jeapardy and final jeapardy..haha.. love it.
The second big entertainment event was Wednesday night. It started at 8 and went to 11. This was the closing event of the term. Different clubs and organizations at the school performed. They sang songs, did traditional dancing, hip-hop, and skits. The event ended with a boom--for those of you who don't know, evidentally boom is the english word for a dance..ah. wonder how I missed that one when I learned english..
Honestly it was really fun, and I am SO happy that I was invited and that I went. I would like to note that I was the only teacher invited. Just to give you an idea of how it was for me I will tell you about two of the skits that were performed. One was done by the club Fight Against Aids. Actually I am going to talk about the demostration that they did first. They had about 10 girls from the club stand in a straight line with hands behind their backs. The president of the club gave one girl a stone and the girls passed it amongst themselves. After a certain amount of time they called girls out of the audience to guess which girl had the stone. This was done about 4 times, obviously each time the girl could not guess correctly. Well you might ask what was the point of this, it was to remind the girls that one cannot always see who has HIV/AIDS..(at least this is my guess, it was all in kinyarwanda). The club then did a skit about a group of friends and how a girl borrrowed a sweater from another girl and then a third girl freaks out at her friend for wearing a sweater that someone with HIV was wearing since of course one can get HIV that way.. After the skit the president of the club then outlined the ways it IS transmitted, and ways that it is NOT transmitted (I was told this happened, of course I did not understand what they said). The other skit was about women equality and how cultural/society treats or views women here. Overall they were nice breaks amongst the dancing and singing.
Now the boom. Ha. First of all the girls all wanted to make sure that I was staying to dance, and I did. But for the first 15 minutes the girls would barely dance 'with' me, rather if I started dancing they would all stop dancing and make a circle around me so they could all watch. Lets be real, I'm not THAT good of a dancer for that..haha.. Luckily the entertainment cheif solved the problem and turned the lights off in the dining hall. This helped a bit.. eventually the girls just separated to dance with themselves, which was fine with me. I stayed with a group of about 15 girls and danced. It was fun, essentialy I made a fool of myself, but hey that is what dancing is all about, right?
Some of the girls tried to teach me to dance like the do, but since half of them could be amateur belly dancers, I, of course could not follow along. I tried to explain to them that I don't know how to make my stomach/hips move like that and all they could say was why not? haha.. how cute.
I had wanted to hook my ipod up to their radio so they could listen to some other music than the 3 CDs they have, but I failed to hook it up, over break I am going to try an buy the cassette that you plug your ipod in to then play it in a radio, because I know come term two the girls would love to listen to my music..haha..
And to finish this off I would like to say I think I have a 'new' favorite song. Many of you might know about my obsession with Toto Africa, or rather my brother singing the song and being the musical instruments, well the girls have a remix version of the song with African drum beats in the background. It is amazing, I love it. I must find a way to bring it home. :)
oh wait one more thing, I introduced the running man and the cabbage patch to the girls; they could not stop laughing.
Open House at KHI
On Thursday afternoon I was told that I would be taking 2 students on Friday to an open house at KHI for what would essentially be a career fair. KHI is the Kigali Health Institute.
Friday morning I left school with 2 senior 6 students and we headed out. Once we arrived we got a small tour of some of the classrooms and library before we got to the career fair part. In one of the school's courtyards they had a bunch of tents set up for the different departments. The school has a total of 10 departments, all somehow linked to health, whether it be nursing, or environmental health, or medical imaging. Slowly we worked our way from booth to booth and gathered information. What was great is that each department had a little pamphlet so I was able to get one for the school and all the other girls who could not attend. I will admit there were a few times when the people at the booths were explaining something to me as though I was 10 years old, but I did not want to be like excuse me I have a degree in Engineering you do not have to explain to me why clean water is good for one's health.
But, it was a really cool event to go to. It was also nice because we ran into some former girls who graduated from my school.
Now the event went from 9-4.30 in the afternoon. We had arrived around 10 am. To be honest I had gone to every booth by noon. But my students had not since they ran into other highschools in attendance and of course started chatting it up. Which I have no problem with, I understand it, but still, it was boring. Really boring. Luckily the girls finally got hungry and we left around 2 to go and get some food in town.
On the way back home I asked the two girls if they would consider going to KHI for university, and they both said no, it did not have what they wanted to study. Which in one hand I think its great that the girls want to study very hard things but at the same time I don't know the plausibility of every girl at my school going to study medicine, because that is what they all want to study.. I guess only time will tell.
And just one thing as a final note, the event had a DJ, and at one point the song 'Boom,Boom, Boom, I want you in my room...' came on, and I burst out laughing. :)
Friday morning I left school with 2 senior 6 students and we headed out. Once we arrived we got a small tour of some of the classrooms and library before we got to the career fair part. In one of the school's courtyards they had a bunch of tents set up for the different departments. The school has a total of 10 departments, all somehow linked to health, whether it be nursing, or environmental health, or medical imaging. Slowly we worked our way from booth to booth and gathered information. What was great is that each department had a little pamphlet so I was able to get one for the school and all the other girls who could not attend. I will admit there were a few times when the people at the booths were explaining something to me as though I was 10 years old, but I did not want to be like excuse me I have a degree in Engineering you do not have to explain to me why clean water is good for one's health.
But, it was a really cool event to go to. It was also nice because we ran into some former girls who graduated from my school.
Now the event went from 9-4.30 in the afternoon. We had arrived around 10 am. To be honest I had gone to every booth by noon. But my students had not since they ran into other highschools in attendance and of course started chatting it up. Which I have no problem with, I understand it, but still, it was boring. Really boring. Luckily the girls finally got hungry and we left around 2 to go and get some food in town.
On the way back home I asked the two girls if they would consider going to KHI for university, and they both said no, it did not have what they wanted to study. Which in one hand I think its great that the girls want to study very hard things but at the same time I don't know the plausibility of every girl at my school going to study medicine, because that is what they all want to study.. I guess only time will tell.
And just one thing as a final note, the event had a DJ, and at one point the song 'Boom,Boom, Boom, I want you in my room...' came on, and I burst out laughing. :)
Term 1 Exams
Exam Week
This past week of school were term one exams. Since I have 4 classes, I had to write 4 3 hr exams. Which in case you don't know is a lot, and in reality all I could do was hope that it was doable in 3 hours and/or that it wasn't too easy.
During exam week, which for some classes only consisted of 3 days, we as teachers had to supervise exams. But, we are not supervising our own exams, so in case students have questions or there are typos, sorry, noone to help them. Which as I will explain later, can present a problem.
Now this was my first time ever proctoring an exam, and let me tell you, it is boring. Essentially for 3 hours I was singing songs in my head to try and keep myself awake.
Now lets talk cheating. It was amazing how many students would just start talking to their deskmate or would 'casually' look at the paper next to them. What is funny to me is that this is the easiest way to get caught, I wanted to be like, 'hello students, aren't you smart enough to cheat without getting caught.' Though I did not say this, instead I would remind them that this was the class' first warning and the next time I see it happen I would take the exam away and the student would get a zero.' Which honestly I don't even know if I had the power to do that, but whatever..haha.
Now lets talk paper usage. Wow. These students use a lot of paper. Even at the begining of the exam when I would explain to them how much paper they got, they would then raise their hand an hour later an say teacher I need the paper. Sometimes I caved and I would give them more, but sometimes I would say no. It is not because I am mean, but if the teacher who wrote the test says they only need so much paper, then thats all they are going to get, and here is why: students here write as much as they can for every problem, even if they have already answered the question, even if the question did not eask for examples. It is absurd,they just want to regurgitate their notes back, and thats pure memorization. Students here do not know how to be brief or how to summarize, or how to answer why questions, or how to explain something other than with a straight definition.
Now lets talk answers. While I was supervising exams I will admit that as students finished their test I would read their answers, because lets be real, what else do I have to do. As I was proctoring a geography exam, I saw by far the best answer ever, and it was on numerous people's paper. The question was explain the causes of population growth in Africa. Some of the students answered, 'African women are the most fertile women in the world.' First I want to say, that I honestly do not have any statistics to back this or not, but I am pretty sure that this in general is not true. Now the other reason I found it funny was because I was reading other exams I figured out what they meant to say, which is, 'African women are married young, so during their most fertile years they are having children constantly because most African families do not use family planning.' Note that these are two different reasons. I would even like to submit that there are American women who get married at 18, it just happens to be that a lot of Americans use family planning to decide when and if they have children.. But that is enough on that, I had just wanted to share what had given me a chuckle.
The Mixup
Every class is called by their year(grade) and their tract. For example, S5BCM, means senior 5 Biology Chemistry Mathmatics. Well the week before exams the exam board of Rwanda changed how classes were called. This made S4PCM into S4MPC, and S4MPC into S4PCM. Can you already envision what the mixup was. Long story short, my exam for S4PCM was given to the new PCM, aka a class that I do not teach. That then meant that my class did not have an exam, or rather I could not give them the same exam because they had already seen the exam the other class took. This meant that on wednesday afternoon I had to write a whole new exam, which was hard work, so I could then have the students take it on Thursday. gr. It should also be noted that I felt bad for the other teacher who had his students take my test and not his, and he had to keep it that way, he was not allowed to give them a new test, yet his class has chemistry 7 hours a week, and this one of mine only has it 2 hours a week, so the exams are obviously covering different information.
Grading, or as they say, Marking
I worked my ass off over the weekend because I had been told grades needed to be turned in on Monday. Grading 4 classes of approx. 40 students each is long, and hard. It is even harder when I have to constantly think about what english sentence they are trying to say. But in the end I got my 4 classes done. Well it ends up that one of the chemistry teachers is sick or left, or who knows, but I was asked to grade a chem exam for S1. I said of course because I understand it has to get done, and I'm TOO nice. It ends up it wasn't just one exam, but 3 classes' exam, which totalled roughly 150 extra exams for me to mark. I would also like to say I was not given the answers or the grading scheme, so I got to make that up all on my own. Great right. Wait, it gets better. Evidentally another teacher needed help, and I was given another exam to grade. So all of monday and tuesday I was marking exams that did't even belong to me. Now this just pissed my off because I ws tired of looking at exams, and I was tired of teachers asking me oh gina you aren't done marking yet, you need to hurry. Near the end of the day of tuesday I was 'barking' at them that these exams are not mine, I finished mine already. What also pissed me off was that other teachers were actually still marking their exams when I had finished marking 8 exams. WTF. Also I got very annoyed on Tuesday when the Senior 1 exams that I had marked, this teacher was in school and didn't say a word to me about the fact that I marked his exams. gr. But we will leave it that I am done marking, and nothing could convince me to mark anything or do anything for the rest of the week.
This past week of school were term one exams. Since I have 4 classes, I had to write 4 3 hr exams. Which in case you don't know is a lot, and in reality all I could do was hope that it was doable in 3 hours and/or that it wasn't too easy.
During exam week, which for some classes only consisted of 3 days, we as teachers had to supervise exams. But, we are not supervising our own exams, so in case students have questions or there are typos, sorry, noone to help them. Which as I will explain later, can present a problem.
Now this was my first time ever proctoring an exam, and let me tell you, it is boring. Essentially for 3 hours I was singing songs in my head to try and keep myself awake.
Now lets talk cheating. It was amazing how many students would just start talking to their deskmate or would 'casually' look at the paper next to them. What is funny to me is that this is the easiest way to get caught, I wanted to be like, 'hello students, aren't you smart enough to cheat without getting caught.' Though I did not say this, instead I would remind them that this was the class' first warning and the next time I see it happen I would take the exam away and the student would get a zero.' Which honestly I don't even know if I had the power to do that, but whatever..haha.
Now lets talk paper usage. Wow. These students use a lot of paper. Even at the begining of the exam when I would explain to them how much paper they got, they would then raise their hand an hour later an say teacher I need the paper. Sometimes I caved and I would give them more, but sometimes I would say no. It is not because I am mean, but if the teacher who wrote the test says they only need so much paper, then thats all they are going to get, and here is why: students here write as much as they can for every problem, even if they have already answered the question, even if the question did not eask for examples. It is absurd,they just want to regurgitate their notes back, and thats pure memorization. Students here do not know how to be brief or how to summarize, or how to answer why questions, or how to explain something other than with a straight definition.
Now lets talk answers. While I was supervising exams I will admit that as students finished their test I would read their answers, because lets be real, what else do I have to do. As I was proctoring a geography exam, I saw by far the best answer ever, and it was on numerous people's paper. The question was explain the causes of population growth in Africa. Some of the students answered, 'African women are the most fertile women in the world.' First I want to say, that I honestly do not have any statistics to back this or not, but I am pretty sure that this in general is not true. Now the other reason I found it funny was because I was reading other exams I figured out what they meant to say, which is, 'African women are married young, so during their most fertile years they are having children constantly because most African families do not use family planning.' Note that these are two different reasons. I would even like to submit that there are American women who get married at 18, it just happens to be that a lot of Americans use family planning to decide when and if they have children.. But that is enough on that, I had just wanted to share what had given me a chuckle.
The Mixup
Every class is called by their year(grade) and their tract. For example, S5BCM, means senior 5 Biology Chemistry Mathmatics. Well the week before exams the exam board of Rwanda changed how classes were called. This made S4PCM into S4MPC, and S4MPC into S4PCM. Can you already envision what the mixup was. Long story short, my exam for S4PCM was given to the new PCM, aka a class that I do not teach. That then meant that my class did not have an exam, or rather I could not give them the same exam because they had already seen the exam the other class took. This meant that on wednesday afternoon I had to write a whole new exam, which was hard work, so I could then have the students take it on Thursday. gr. It should also be noted that I felt bad for the other teacher who had his students take my test and not his, and he had to keep it that way, he was not allowed to give them a new test, yet his class has chemistry 7 hours a week, and this one of mine only has it 2 hours a week, so the exams are obviously covering different information.
Grading, or as they say, Marking
I worked my ass off over the weekend because I had been told grades needed to be turned in on Monday. Grading 4 classes of approx. 40 students each is long, and hard. It is even harder when I have to constantly think about what english sentence they are trying to say. But in the end I got my 4 classes done. Well it ends up that one of the chemistry teachers is sick or left, or who knows, but I was asked to grade a chem exam for S1. I said of course because I understand it has to get done, and I'm TOO nice. It ends up it wasn't just one exam, but 3 classes' exam, which totalled roughly 150 extra exams for me to mark. I would also like to say I was not given the answers or the grading scheme, so I got to make that up all on my own. Great right. Wait, it gets better. Evidentally another teacher needed help, and I was given another exam to grade. So all of monday and tuesday I was marking exams that did't even belong to me. Now this just pissed my off because I ws tired of looking at exams, and I was tired of teachers asking me oh gina you aren't done marking yet, you need to hurry. Near the end of the day of tuesday I was 'barking' at them that these exams are not mine, I finished mine already. What also pissed me off was that other teachers were actually still marking their exams when I had finished marking 8 exams. WTF. Also I got very annoyed on Tuesday when the Senior 1 exams that I had marked, this teacher was in school and didn't say a word to me about the fact that I marked his exams. gr. But we will leave it that I am done marking, and nothing could convince me to mark anything or do anything for the rest of the week.
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