It’s so easy for me to talk about the big things that happen out here, but I forget to update you all on the everyday life out here!
Teaching has been going really well recently with the preschool now able to read short story books! It’s great to see their enthusiasm of their new found talent as they run up to me at break times with a colourful book in their hand. They can now correctly say English words using the alphabet I taught them, without saying words like ‘cabbage’ with a click at the start represented by a ‘c’!!! The two pre-schoolers with the lower ability are really coming on with their handwriting and can now spell their name! Dum-Dum’s words are less rarely spelt upside down (I still don’t know how she does it!). It’s amazing to hear them helping each other translate what they are trying to say to me in English.
Loli’s English is still poor, but we are getting there slowly. With his basic English and my basic isiXhosa, we make a great team trying to communicate…the smiles that spread across each of our faces when we both finally understand what each other mean is really satisfying, even if it’s taken 5 minutes, and a high-five to add to that smile reassure him I know what he’s trying to say! Amazing J
Teaching has been going really well recently with the preschool now able to read short story books! It’s great to see their enthusiasm of their new found talent as they run up to me at break times with a colourful book in their hand. They can now correctly say English words using the alphabet I taught them, without saying words like ‘cabbage’ with a click at the start represented by a ‘c’!!! The two pre-schoolers with the lower ability are really coming on with their handwriting and can now spell their name! Dum-Dum’s words are less rarely spelt upside down (I still don’t know how she does it!). It’s amazing to hear them helping each other translate what they are trying to say to me in English.
Loli’s English is still poor, but we are getting there slowly. With his basic English and my basic isiXhosa, we make a great team trying to communicate…the smiles that spread across each of our faces when we both finally understand what each other mean is really satisfying, even if it’s taken 5 minutes, and a high-five to add to that smile reassure him I know what he’s trying to say! Amazing J
Group 1…the group who couldn’t add simple numbers at the beginning of my year out here, are now learning more complex maths and I have been teaching them how to add fractions! It’s crazy to think that calling a circle drawn on the board with lines segmenting it a ‘pizza’ makes so much more sense to the children than just the visual drawing itself! I have also been teaching them all about recycling, although I don’t think their knowledge on ‘re-using’ can be stretched any further…their use of old bread bags to make balls to throw around in the field or tie together to make skipping ropes never ceases to amaze me!
Group 2 are learning all about Biomes in Natural Sciences and are applying their new knowledge of reading bar graphs to determine the temperature and amount of rainfall in each main biome of the world! In Economic and Management Sciences (EMS) they are learning about how the economic environment is connected to natural, social, political and technological environments. They are currently looking into a case study about how the economic decisions of a company called Richards Bay Minerals is affecting the natural environment of Lake St Lucia!
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