Owen, Bernard and I went to teach at Gunge school. Bernard worked with the Level 5-7 students while Owen and I worked with Teacher Hassan and the Level 2-4 students. The school also has a 1/2 day kindergarten class and a 1/2 day level 1 class. We were greeted by the Headmaster and teachers when we arrived and headed to the office with our large bags of supplies. They were very greatful! It was decided that we would all visit each classroom to introduce ourselves and distribute the pens and pencils.
Kids were excited to receive their pencils and pens. Whenever you walk into a room, they stand up and greet you in unison. We introduced ourselves and told them we were from the United States, in Connecticut, near New York. In one room a student asked how long it took for us to get there. A map was brought into the classroom and Owen explained that we started in Boston, flew 6 hours to Amsterdam, had a 1 1/2 hour layover, then had an 8 hour flight from Amsterdam to Kilimanjaro airport. This lead to a discussion about the time change (+ 7 hours) and a math lesson. If we left Boston at 8:00 pm, what time was that in Tanzania? If we arrived 18 hours later, what time was it in Tanzania?
After pencils were distributed to all the classes (and a round of Head, Shoulders, Knees and Toes with the kindergarteners), we worked with the level 3 students on letter names and sounds. I would show them a letter, say the name and sound and they would repeat.
For example "P says (make the p sound)" and the kids would repeat. Then I would equate the sound with an English word. For P, I said Papa and explained that was what Owen calls his Bubu (grandfather). Teacher Hassan told us that in Swahili, Papa is the word for Pope. I laughed and said my dad would like that. Later when we came to the letter P we passed around a picture of Papa on my phone :)
From 12:00-2:00 there is a break and students go home for lunch. Some students live too far and remain at the school. We ate lunch with Teacher in the teachers' quarters. He asked Owen about popular sports and, of course, soccer. Then he mentioned that kids there like the WWE and asked if it was real or "dramatized"! Owen explained that it is not real and a lot of the matches are choreographed to a degree and a lot of the dialogue between wrestlers is for the cameras. Later, Hussain called Owen over to explain this to the other teachers :)
We hung the ABC borders in each of the classrooms during the break. Level 4 students that remained at the school during the break spontaneously sang the ABCs after I hung the border in their room.
After break a teacher used the border to teach the Swahili sounds to the younger students. He skipped Q and X because there are no sounds for those letters in Swahili.
We learned the Swahili word for dog "mbwa"
We spent time in the afternoon teaching colors to the level 3 class. It was a lot of fun. We would show a color card and the students would say the name of the color. Then, we asked them to point to something in the room that was that color and say "this is ____." They were very excited raising their hands in a flapping motion to be called on.
After classes ended students fetched water and had some free time to play before going home.
That first day at Gunge was AWESOME! I was thrilled to have the opportunity to work with the engaging Teacher Hussain and his students.
Due to constant complications with transportation and being detained on Wednesday by police and immigration asking for Visas, Owen, Justin and I returned to Moshi earlier than planned. I felt bad that we weren't returning to Gunge to finish out the week, but knew they would be in good hands with Garrett and Jessica.
On Friday, the textbooks that were purchased with our donations were delivered to the students!!
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