Still a bit busy, so updates are still short...
And, here's a summary of the classes i've taught: http://docs.google.com/Doc?docid=0ARvHBS01ogRpZGNqamsyemNfMTIxY2g5ZzYyano&hl=en
Thursday, July 23rd
Woke up in the morning, went to a Math class, and watched one of the teachers give a test to grade ten students. Prior to the test, she went over the types of questions that were going to be on there. I thought she did a good job of demonstrating the basic concepts, and though the majority of the students indicated that the test was difficult, I though that it was a good test of their comprehension of the subject material. After that class, Jeanette asked Karly, Sara and me to fill in for the life sciences teacher, who was not going to be in. We had the students work together on one of the exercises, which I felt worked out rather well. The students drew diagrams describing the passage nerve impulses took from receptor organs to effector organs. I've been compiling a teaching report, which summarizes the classes that I work in. It's posted on google docs, and will be linked to later. After that, we had several meetings trying to plan the teacher workshops. I cooked chili for dinner, which unfortunately got a bit burned by the electric stove and thin cookware. I went to bed with a runny nose, and woke up with a pretty nasty head cold. We are all feeling a bit worn out, because of the travel time, the acclimation to the altitude, and the start of school, and as a result are very much looking forward to our off-time this weekend.
Friday, July 24th
Woke up feeling pretty awful, so today was a bit of a blur. Did a bunch of planning for the workshops we will be giving, went to a couple of meetings, and felt generally lousy. Dinner was butternut squash lasagna.
Saturday, July 25th
First day of Saturday school. The majority of the LEAP3 faculty were at Alexandra college, testing potential students for next year's incoming class, so we had to fill in for the Maths classes. We had each class work in small groups to complete their assignments, and went around answering the questions that the students had. The grade 11 class was a bit better behaved, partially because they had an assignment to complete in a textbook the had, while we had to make photocopies of the activities for the groups of the grade 10 students. After that, we had a “Psychology” class for the grade 11 students, which was more about the nervous system and the transmission of messages. The students completed a group activity that Beth and Karly had worked on, which seemed to be a lot of fun for them. Even the group of the 'too cool for school' boys completed the activity, staying outside and working on it after everyone else had gone in. Following the activity, we talked a bit more about the brain, and the effects of injury and alcohol. After that, the students splintered off for their social responsibility meetings. We then decided to head to Melville for some dinner. We ate at a Portugese restaurant, which was showing the rugby match between New Zeland and South Africa. We then walked around the town, which was quite trendy, and went to a bar called “Cool Runnings,” which was Jamaican themed. Following that, we tried to find a club called Tokyo Room, which had apparently moved to a different city. We asked a few people, and finally got directions from a guy who owned one of the restaurants. He drew us a map that had no street names, and suggested a few restaurants in the area. We followed his directions with little difficulty, and ended up eating sushi at a run-of-th-mill restaurant. We finally found the club, which was “a black door behind the restaurant called Red.” Inside, the place was actually very trendy, and had a pretty crappy DJ. The thing I don't like about South African restaurants and bars is that people smoke in them, and there is terrible ventilation. The other weird thing about this place was that the only non-white people in the club were the doorman and two ladies picking up empty glasses. That started to change about midnight, but the area did seem very rich and white. Our drive home was chaotic, as we had no idea where we were, or how to get home. Add a crappy map to the situation, and it took us about an hour to make what would have been a 30 minute drive. Karly fell asleep in the back seat, and Sara helped navigate a bunch of (completely) foreign roads. We finally ended up on one of the major highways, and tried to turn at what we thought would be an entrance to Linbro Park, where the school is. But, it turned out to be Linbro Business Park, so we turned around and tried to get back on the high way to take the long way. I got on going the wrong direction, but luckily, the next exit ended up being ours, and we got home just fine.
Sunday, July 26th
Slept waaaay late, and woke up to a delicious breakfast that Karly had cooked for us: scones, eggs, bacon and potates. Sat out in the sun and ate. Finally got ready, and headed to the Rosepark mall. Took full advantage of our day off, and wandered home around 8. Back to school tomorrow morning, which had me dreading my alarm clock already.
Monday, July 27th
Woke up early for school. Spent the early part of the morning preparing a workshop on acid rain. Spent most of the time researching the chemical equations. Taught two maths classes with Karly in the middle of the day. The first class was the “advanced class,” which seemed a little artificially divided. The slower class is entirely girls, but it is too soon to tell if that is merely sexism, or if there is actually an ability divide. After the classes, we met for awhile with some people from South Africa Partners. It was weird to interact with Americans again, and there was a bit of a culture shock. They were a group of Americans from some boarding schools on the East Coast, and they were touring a number of schools in South Africa. We have decided to stay a week longer in Jo'Burg, and got confirmation from Amy that we could try to arrange that. The three of us are very excited, because we feel we are beginning to make a difference here, and an extra week will allow us to help out even more.
Tuesday, July 28th
Spent the morning finishing the preparation for the acid rain workshops. Led two Maths classes, with help from Dr. Piet from LEAP 2. I think he thought I was an actual math teacher, which I never thought to explain. Sat in on Sara's Geography class, which had 7 students, and was a ton of fun. Following lunch, we had our Acid Rain workshop, which went fairly well. The students were generally well behaved, though the grade 10 boys were a little reluctant to talk, and some of the grade 11 girls were a little chatty. Later, when we were sitting in our kitchen decompressing from along day, the receptionist Rebecca comes to us and suggests that a couple of the grade 11 students give us a tour of the nearby township of Alexandra. The two students, a girl named Yvette, and a boy whose name I've forgotten, lived in the township, and were very excited to give us a tour. So, we drove them through the area as they gave us an hour long tour. They showed us the local braai place, where apparently all of the local celebrities go to on Sundays. We also saw several of the local high schools and what could best be called the “suburbs” which were small, walled and gated houses with miniscule yards. They were actually quite nice. The rest of Alex was much more like the other townships we had visited, with lots of shacks and cramped quarters. We also got walking tours of the local university, a community center and Nelson Mandela's house. The traffic, both foot and car was extremely chaotic, and I had to spend most of my time paying attention to the road. Driving here in SA is difficult, and the crazy township drivers make things worse. We survived, and went to buy groceries.