May 6, 2010
What a day! I love teaching but I have discovered that after school monitor is beyond exhausting, physically, mentally, and emotionally. Pam and I had a FANTASTIC day teaching. We had 3 PE classes in the morning, the grade 5’s and both grade 6 classes. Some of the boys tower over me, in Pam’s words I “look like a little kid next to them”. But they are gentle giants, really. After our PE classes we taught Health in the afternoon to both grade 3 classes and the combined grade 4 class. It was after school that everything went downhill.
For PE we had the kids help us lead the stretches. They loved being involved and helping out. They would pick a stretch and demonstrate it to the class. I was asking what muscles they were using and why certain stretches were important. I love being able to have more intelligent conversations with some of these students. At some point I heard one grade 6’s name “Janet”. It stuck because as you know one of my best friends is named Janet. It came in handy because at one point I needed to call on her for something and I used her name. Without responding she beamed to her classmate and said “She knows my name!!”. What a simple thing to remember a single students name. It brought her such joy and excitement. I wish I was able to remember all 200 students names, but that simply isn’t possible in a matter of two weeks. I am happy however that I could create that moment for her.
For health we focused on the topic of bullying. We had noticed in a few of your PE classes that this was an obvious issue. The bullying in Antigua is completely different than in Canada. Students in Canada use more mental and verbal bullying; in Antigua it is complete physical abuse. We read them the story One by Kathryn Otoshi (if you haven’t read it, you MUST). And then acted out some bullying scenarios together. The students LOVE it. After our world class debut, we asked them to identify what was wrong with what happened. They were fantastic at identifying what was wrong and why it was wrong. After, we had them make Anti-Bullying Pledges. They each created their own promise of the things they wouldn’t do to each other. They were so excited to use markers for that too. They decorated their pledges and it was a beautiful thing.
Bell rang and we collected our things. I was feeling great about our day. We had several successful teaching opportunities. We did PE and Health, overall a great day. I was completely blindsided with what occurred next. On previous days, Shelby had stayed at our school, so once school ended we all packed up and left. However, today Shelby was at another school so we were waiting for her to pick us up. I started playing pass with students in a nice circle and Pam had another group playing pass in another area. It didn’t take long for the fights to break out. We were the ONLY adults out there, so you can only imagine what the students thought they could get away with.
I had two older students shoving a smaller student of the same grade into the fence, boys whipping the girls with their belts, grade 1’s pushing each other with brute force. It was a war zone and no one was winning. I would settle one fight, have the children apologies, tell them they cannot hit, punch, kick, etc and continue playing the game. 5 minutes later another fight would break out. And on and on and on this vicious cycle would continue. I was so upset, angry at the kids for being so mean to each other and hurt because they just had not respect. Not to mention I felt completely defeated as a teacher because if felt as if not one of them had listened to our health class about bullying.
I couldn’t even make it to the van before bursting into tears. My heart breaks for these students because they don’t know a life any other way. Their culture is angry and full of hate and violence. I want so badly for them to know the power they have in their words and how that can be such a positive thing. I want them to know they can communicate with each other that does not involve one another “thomping” or hurting each other. I know that there is not much I can change for the long term. For that I need a family, a community, a country behind me and that just isn’t happening right now. I pray I can come up with an effective way to teach these children that violence does not solve the problems. I so badly just want them to be healthy and safe.
The one thing that made the afternoon better was that we had our first stop at Australia today. It’s the oh-so-popular ice cream shop in St. John’s. Won’t lie, it’s pretty amazing. I had raspberry and coconut. Pretty much heaven in a cone. So great! I am praying for a day with less violence tomorrow. The PE specialist is in so that will be helpful.
Side notes, I burnt my nose today. I keep wiping my face on my shirt sleeve because I am so hot and sweaty. Apparently as I wipe, I am also removing my sunscreen. On goes the Aloe now! I have also had the privilege of “tea time with Letecia” basically every night before our team meeting. Leticia and I have a cup of tea. It is truly lovely and a I thoroughly enjoy our time together!
What a day! I love teaching but I have discovered that after school monitor is beyond exhausting, physically, mentally, and emotionally. Pam and I had a FANTASTIC day teaching. We had 3 PE classes in the morning, the grade 5’s and both grade 6 classes. Some of the boys tower over me, in Pam’s words I “look like a little kid next to them”. But they are gentle giants, really. After our PE classes we taught Health in the afternoon to both grade 3 classes and the combined grade 4 class. It was after school that everything went downhill.
For PE we had the kids help us lead the stretches. They loved being involved and helping out. They would pick a stretch and demonstrate it to the class. I was asking what muscles they were using and why certain stretches were important. I love being able to have more intelligent conversations with some of these students. At some point I heard one grade 6’s name “Janet”. It stuck because as you know one of my best friends is named Janet. It came in handy because at one point I needed to call on her for something and I used her name. Without responding she beamed to her classmate and said “She knows my name!!”. What a simple thing to remember a single students name. It brought her such joy and excitement. I wish I was able to remember all 200 students names, but that simply isn’t possible in a matter of two weeks. I am happy however that I could create that moment for her.
For health we focused on the topic of bullying. We had noticed in a few of your PE classes that this was an obvious issue. The bullying in Antigua is completely different than in Canada. Students in Canada use more mental and verbal bullying; in Antigua it is complete physical abuse. We read them the story One by Kathryn Otoshi (if you haven’t read it, you MUST). And then acted out some bullying scenarios together. The students LOVE it. After our world class debut, we asked them to identify what was wrong with what happened. They were fantastic at identifying what was wrong and why it was wrong. After, we had them make Anti-Bullying Pledges. They each created their own promise of the things they wouldn’t do to each other. They were so excited to use markers for that too. They decorated their pledges and it was a beautiful thing.
Bell rang and we collected our things. I was feeling great about our day. We had several successful teaching opportunities. We did PE and Health, overall a great day. I was completely blindsided with what occurred next. On previous days, Shelby had stayed at our school, so once school ended we all packed up and left. However, today Shelby was at another school so we were waiting for her to pick us up. I started playing pass with students in a nice circle and Pam had another group playing pass in another area. It didn’t take long for the fights to break out. We were the ONLY adults out there, so you can only imagine what the students thought they could get away with.
I had two older students shoving a smaller student of the same grade into the fence, boys whipping the girls with their belts, grade 1’s pushing each other with brute force. It was a war zone and no one was winning. I would settle one fight, have the children apologies, tell them they cannot hit, punch, kick, etc and continue playing the game. 5 minutes later another fight would break out. And on and on and on this vicious cycle would continue. I was so upset, angry at the kids for being so mean to each other and hurt because they just had not respect. Not to mention I felt completely defeated as a teacher because if felt as if not one of them had listened to our health class about bullying.
I couldn’t even make it to the van before bursting into tears. My heart breaks for these students because they don’t know a life any other way. Their culture is angry and full of hate and violence. I want so badly for them to know the power they have in their words and how that can be such a positive thing. I want them to know they can communicate with each other that does not involve one another “thomping” or hurting each other. I know that there is not much I can change for the long term. For that I need a family, a community, a country behind me and that just isn’t happening right now. I pray I can come up with an effective way to teach these children that violence does not solve the problems. I so badly just want them to be healthy and safe.
The one thing that made the afternoon better was that we had our first stop at Australia today. It’s the oh-so-popular ice cream shop in St. John’s. Won’t lie, it’s pretty amazing. I had raspberry and coconut. Pretty much heaven in a cone. So great! I am praying for a day with less violence tomorrow. The PE specialist is in so that will be helpful.
Side notes, I burnt my nose today. I keep wiping my face on my shirt sleeve because I am so hot and sweaty. Apparently as I wipe, I am also removing my sunscreen. On goes the Aloe now! I have also had the privilege of “tea time with Letecia” basically every night before our team meeting. Leticia and I have a cup of tea. It is truly lovely and a I thoroughly enjoy our time together!
