The Real Start of School

It’s finally time to formally start school, 2 weeks after the students started coming, but that still doesn’t mean I am teaching classes. 

My classroom is conveniently blocked in by Kindergarten on each side and those kids just love to peer at me through the crack in my door and the windows like I’m some animal on display at a zoo.  It is harmless at first and then it becomes very annoying as I chase them away time after time until it becomes a game for them.  Needless to say, what discipline I learned in America doesn’t apply here and I am picking up some really bad habits that I won’t speak of. 

When it finally comes time to begin teaching, I quickly learn that I am not going to be provided with a schedule so I had to chase the other teachers around and basically come up with my own.  That took about another day off my teaching schedule. 

 I assign a first project and have the kids illustrate their names and sign names as a way to gauge their levels and help learn their names.  When the projects were completed, many exceeded far above my expectations and I was really happy about their work.  However, it seems many of the kids don’t know their real names, only their assigned sign names, and the roster is impossible to line up with the list I created from the cards.  Grading is going to be fun…

Next, I taught a mobile lesson where the kids got to work in groups.  They collected whatever they

could find outside and some groups came up with really nice finds.  After 3 classes completed the mobiles, my class now looks like a jungle and everybody loves looking at their new art!

My pool with the hills in the back

The kids are currently working on snake coil pots.  Clay is clearly a medium they enjoy and their creativity blows me away.  They use stones and sticks to add embellishments to their pieces without me even thinking about it.

Somewhere between my last post and this one, I explored around my site some more and found a huge dam that is now my personal swimming pool.  I risk contracting Schisto and other nasty bugs by just having my feet in the water but I consider a nice refreshing swim to be well worth the risk.  Except for that part where I have felt like crap since I first went out over a week ago…

End of day 1

I got bored and decided to start a small project on campus, working on building a football net from water sachets, which are small plastic bags that all the water comes in here.  They are discarded everywhere since there is really no public trashcan, and the kids go out and collect them so we can continue to work. The first net is almost complete and the football team couldn’t be happier!

I also went on a short trip to Navrongo and saw the world’s largest basilica made entirely from mud bricks.  The interior decoration is very traditional and was inspired by the Nankani-Kassena motifs that are used to decorate their houses.  It also includes reliefs of local animals and religious stories.

The wet season is coming to an end and with it, some amazing storms have been blowing through.  We get a lightning storm just about every night and I was able to get some pretty exciting shots.

Developments with Biggie:  He is a really horrible cat and we have come to a point in our relationship where I thought he would benefit be more as a meal.  But after being far to aggressive toward him, I decided to start feeding him outside and he no longer wakes me up at night!  So now, he is welcome back on probation, as long as he can behave himself.