Week 2 of Teaching

My school is on a 7-day cycle not a 5-day cycle. This means that last week was days 1-5 and Monday, Tuesday of this week are days 6 and 7. Learners may be absent several days, usually Fridays and/or Mondays for weddings, funerals, and other family events. With a 5-day cycle they would miss the same day 5 (Friday) classes (or day 1 Mondays) more often. With a 7-day cycle, the missed days are more evenly distributed. Our first cycle was on a provisional timetable and we start a new timetable tomorrow, day 1. It makes sense when it is explained but it is difficult keeping track of the teaching day and class schedules.

Besides trying to learn over 200 learners’ names, I am not exaggerating since there are 35-40 learners in each class and I have four 8^th grade classes (A, B, C, D), one 9^th grade, and one 11^th grade, I am trying to get ahead on lesson plans and fine tune classroom management. I am mostly satisfied with my progress, but it is a steep learning curve. As far as learner names, I have a little advantage because I teach Physical Science to the 8C and 8D classes, then I have the same learners again for Art (only once a week) and then I have some from 8C and 8D for the Computer Studies class. There are 2 days in the cycle when I see those 8^th graders three times in one day. I hope I can keep their interest.

The learners seem to understand me better than I understand them. Unovina says I can call her Uno and Katjikonde says I can call her KK. One young man was trying to tell me a method of recording data. Some had already said “tally sheet”, “filling in a pre-made chart”, “taking photos or video”. All I could understand him saying was something like “raw nose”. After trying over and over, I asked him to write it for me – rough notes. Ah ha! I felt like such an idiot, but they were happy I finally understood.

Today is my last born’s birthday. I cannot believe it has been 37 years since I first saw his smiling face. Happy birthday, Sal!

Here are a couple photos from the Sotte Sokkie, roughly translates as the Fool’s Sock Hop. The video wouldn’t download so this is all I have.

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