In the Classroom

The funny thing about teaching is it is the same wherever you are.  I don’t just mean that classrooms, students, resources (regardless of what form they take) are common denominators.  More fundamentally it is the actual process of teaching that is the same.  In the classroom, I am looking for that essential communication between myself and individual students (however many there are in the class) that they have got whatever it is that I am trying to teach.  I guess this may be obvious to you, the reader, but it is new to me!

So how is it different, teaching in Ethiopia?  Well not a lot different to England or Georgia if we are talking about the essence of teaching, but a lot different if we are talking about the overall experience.

The English Alive Academy has been open since 2004 and is run by an English woman and her Ethiopian husband.  When Stephanie and Dawit first met, she was teaching at an International school in Addis Ababa and he was well-established in one of the Embassies.  They opened their first school in 2002 and their students were from the wealthier families in the city, but they felt strongly that this opportunity was not available to those without money and so took the step of closing the school and opening up again in Nazret which at the time was a small town, a 2 or 3 hour drive from Addis Ababa.  The English Alive Academy is open to all children and the fees are subsidised so that local children can afford to attend.  For those who are suffering hardship they can come to the school for free but they have to apply to the local authorities who confirm their situation.

The ethos of the school is to provide a quality education that is only available to children from wealthy families for the poorest children.  It’s an attempt to redress the balance and equip children from the poorest people to become a voice for their community, to give them the same opportunities as wealthier children and all the benefits that a good education provides.

When you first look at the school it doesn’t seem like it is enormously different to what you’d expect.  But that is because I am looking at it with my experience of English schools.   The walls are covered with the children’s art work and there is a store room full of resources for the children, such as games, books and art materials.  There is a nursery for pre-schoolers and two kindergarten classes. (Ages from around 3 to 7)

Similarly in the Grade school, a separate compound, there are grades 1 to 4, (aged around 7 to 11).  However, age is a loose term as birthdays and age is not important and many people do not know how old they are or when their birthday is.  Also some children start school later than others and are therefore put into younger classes if they are late-starters. There is also a small library and a computer room.  Four old-ish computers had been donated and two of these were recently moved to the KG school.  Dawit is also in the process of applying for a grant of 20 new computers from the government which will be amazing for the students and the teachers!

In the class the children are well behaved and attentive.  They are in the habit of copying off the board and working from that and not interacting.  This is the traditional way of teaching in Ethiopia (like many countries) and Stephanie has given the teachers a lot of training to introduce them to modern teaching methods; so the children at the school are more used to interactive lessons and it is easy to see the difference between the students who attend the school and those who don’t.  The ones who don’t are VERY QUIET.

The children are also very innocent and playful. Even for the 13 year olds, they are happy to do as we ask them.  In particular they enjoy the many craft activities that we have arranged as they don’t do art in Government schools and so the older children love the opportunities we have given them to do this and play games.  They will happily join in in playground games such as ‘Oranges and Lemons’, ‘The Hokey Cokey’ and ‘The Big Ship sails on the Alley Alley O’ as well as Chinese jump rope.