Teaching Galore

A short, yet long week … the last week of teaching experience. Due to poor planning on the university's part, they scheduled teaching experience during national testing, so there was little actual teaching occurring after testing. The result being that I had to schedule 10 observations, debriefs, and meetings with teachers to four days (not ideal). I observed an all-boys primary school in Yeoville, an impoverished neighborhood near campus (and the Brixton Tower). I won't get into specifics, but it was a "tough" school and the teaching quality needs a boost, to say the least. I feel awful for the university students that we send on teaching experience - they're thrown into schools for three weeks at a time. That is not nearly enough time to build a report with the learners, the teacher, or the administration. Teacher training obviously must involve observations and student teaching, but it can be done in a much more meaningful way.

On Saturday morning I went with the research committee I've been working with on mobile literacy (using mobile devices to create text) to train the teachers we selected to be part of the research. The research, funded by a private company for three years, looks at literacy growth for fifth graders in two successful schools that serve underprivileged populations. The hope is that by using the device (iPod Touch) the learners will increase their overall literacy, especially difficult because English is many of the learners' second language. In any event, we selected two schools in Soweto ("Southwest Township") and met at Orange Farm Primary School to train the teachers on the iPod. I enjoyed helping them with the technology and most importantly, helping them feel more comfortable with using this device in their classroom.

After the training, I went back to campus and presented with one of my fellow Pretoria Fulbrighters, Rob, at the "Rural Teacher's Conference" on campus. My other host professor organized a conference for rural teachers (who are part of the rural teaching association) from Mpumalanga, Limpopo, Gauteng, and the Eastern Cape. Rob and I led an hour-long workshop on "centers", a teaching strategy to divide the class into groups to purposefully complete tasks (and in turn, allow the teacher to work with a small group). I enjoyed presenting - it's a lot of fun to prepare for the presentation, think through every step, and then perform. Importantly, we chose a topic that we thought was very applicable to our audience; I appreciated using centers in my own class in Chicago.

…and that was the week! My apologies for a relatively uneventful blog post; readers (whoever you may be) have been accustom to long-winded explanations of travels and new experiences these past weeks. Unfortunately, this was just a normal ole' week. I promise more excitement in the future.

Orange Farm Primary