School has started in the most confusing way, but confusing to no one but me. The first day I was ready to go. No one had a schedule or a lesson plan, but I was assured that on Monday all would fall into place and that my counterparts and I would have time to plan for Tuesday, the actual first day of classes.
At the end of previous week we had learned that there was a big change in the routine occasioned by the smaller enrollment over the last two weeks. As a result, a decision was made to cancel the afternoon session at the high school. All students and teachers would be in class only for 5 hours in the morning. There are 2 consequences (probably more, but two I see right away). One is that students from the 23 communities which feed students into the high school will have to leave very early, in many cases, to get to school by 7. These students used to enroll in the afternoon session. There is a kind of school bus, a small jitney, which serves one or two communities, but the other students need to find a way to get to school. Walking is an option for some, especially if they can start in the afternoon. Others can take a bus, but that starts to be expensive. For instance the fare from one large community one way is 3 pesos or fifteen cents. Round trip is 30 cents or $1.50 per week, $3.00 for a family with 2 high school students. A teacher’s monthly salary is about $200. So you can see the investment a family makes to get a child to high school. Consider the hit if the family makes less than a teacher which most do. My guess is that change in the schedule will result in some students just dropping out of school. (Since I wrote this I saw 2 other transportation possibilities. Bikes, of course but on the highway. See below for downside. Also I saw maybe 9 students stuffed into a cab. I’d guess someone has worked out a deal with a taxi driver because usually a cab would be way to expensive.)
The second effect is obvious: classroom space. Even if there are fewer students, you still need a certain number of math classes, for example. Answer: the first year students will remain at the elementary school along with one section of second year students. What about the elementary school students? They now go to school in the afternoon. Irony: The elementary school only draws from the town, not from surrounding communities. I don’t get it, but then I’m new to this system.
Back to the first day: I arrived at the school at the appointed hour. Teachers were busy sweeping the cement court which serves for all sports. The students had gathered l dressed for the first day in their blue and white uniforms, many with new shoes and little fancy touches like bows on their knee socks. The high schoolers hung out being cool outside the fence but the elementary kids (yes, everyone is together for the first day) with new book bags and pens and virgin erasers and slick notebooks were happy to be with their little friends—lots of hugging and hand holding. After an hour sweeping and decorating the court with slogans and balloons, the officials started to assemble: a lawyer, a priest and finally the delegado, the representative of the government, a kind of superintendent of schools. The sound system blared. Another half hour passed. There were many parents to observe this important day in their children’s lives. Finally the children, including high schoolers, lined up to sing the national anthem and listen to the invocation and the remarks of the delegado (not sure why the lawyer was there). He reminded the kids of the great opportunity given to them by the government. He reminded them of the sacrifices their parents made to give them this opportunity to learn. Later I asked the teachers about the sacrifice. They all agree it is great, that there is a big bite out of the family budget to buy uniforms and supplies and back packs—and—as mentioned above—bus fare. Everyone sacrifices here. One teacher lives about 20 miles away. He rides his bike for an hour to school every morning on the Panamerican Highway, a two lane thoroughfare. I guarantee he is not safe doing that with 18 wheelers blasting by him. School is serious stuff, for the parents at least. That night on the news the first day of school was the lead story.
Later that morning, we learned about the change in the structure of the day, but no one had a teaching schedule. They were still being worked on. I planned for a class with one of my teachers who has 4 sections of first year students. We knew that she would need a plan sooner or later and sure enough, the following day we were assigned to teach a section, three actually. She and I did a great job in both our opinions. The plan was sound and lively and interesting and we made a great start with the first years. The best part was that one of the other English teachers sat in to observe and after class said to me, “ I want a plan like that plan.” And so I planned a class with her in the afternoon, which we still have not given. No one knows when his/ her classes will be taught. With a third counterpart, I planned a class for third year students. We’ll teach it tomorrow, I just found out via text from my teacher who just received a text from the principal. Is this any way to run a school? Nope. But this is how it is and everyone is adjusting, even me, as I sit in on classes and help out where I can even without formal planning. Will we have a complete schedule by Monday, a week after the first day? The teachers think so. I’m betting no.
Your moment, if not of Zen, then of Reader’s Digest: I was sitting next to a student just as class ended. She turned to me and said” Quien es Shakespeare?” Who is Shakespeare? I told her that like Ruben Dario, Nicaragua’s most famous poet, he was a great playwright and poet. She was happy to know.
P.S On the Spanish front, I have progress to report. My counterpart teachers, the other day, were commenting on how much better my Spanish had gotten since I first met them last November. That made my heart sing. I think it’s true. When I teach, the students understand me. I don’t plan what to say. I just say it. I still am way behind the Spanish majors and the volunteers who lived for a semester in Spain or Latin America, but I now pick out “modernismos”, colloquial phrases, when the teachers talk and ask them what they mean. I am pleased that I hear them at all. It is a source of a lot of hilarity that I try to look up modernismos in my dictionary.
The First Week of Classes
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