Little Moments

Throughout my days here there are little moments that I really cherish with my students. Now that my students are comfortable with a new foreign teacher in the classroom we have been able to let loose with each other yet have a set routine that makes the class run smoothly. Here are some of those occasions:

1. Greeting me everyday when I arrive at school lining up by the car reciting, "Good morning Teacher, How are you?" They then insist on helping me carrying any teaching supplies for me to the classroom often trying to get a peek into what we are doing in class today or if there are any surprises. This also connects for when I am about to go home for the day. They approach me usually in pairs to say, " Goodbye teachaar, see you again on Friday."

2. Hellllooo teecha. When I'm done with my classes for the day and I'm sitting in my classroom grading notebooks, lesson planning, or decorating the classroom every few minutes a student will walk by the room peeking in their head to say "helllloo" or "Tam arai, Teacher?" (what are you doing?) This sometimes happens when I am on skype with my parents and they hear the foreign voice and immediately ask "Teacher, may I come in?" They LOVE seeing my parents and then get to practice their go-to phrases of "My name is ___. I am ____years old. I am from ____. Today's weather is____."

3. Goodbye Hugs and handshakes. With my 3rd and 4th graders at Wang Yang our Goodbye routine now consists of a mandatory hug and handshake. After putting away their notebooks for the day they line up to get their handshake and hug from me. As the girls are leaving they usually say , "I love teacher Bai Tuey!" and I of course respond with "I looove you!" They have even now started blowing kisses hahaha

4. Dance Parties while cleaning. As mentioned before in "Day in the life of a Thai Student" post the students are responsible for the school being in tip-top shape. At the end of the day they sweep the school again, mop/scrub the floors, water the plants, put away dishes, and any other chore that needs to be done. During this time if I am in my classroom with my computer I usually play my students favorite song "Waka Waka" by Shakkiera while they cleaning and we can dance around and try and make the chores a little more fun . My co-teacher usually walk by at this point and think I am absolutely ridiculous! oh well

5. Afternoon gardening. After I finish lesson planning and cleaning up my room for the day one of my favorite activities is to sit in the Pla Pak Noi garden while my student diligently tend to their grade level's plot of vegetables. I walk around and my student quiz me on the Thai name for the vegetables. Their garden has chili plants (all thai food MUST have a few crushed chili peppers in it to add some kick), onion, garlic (you'll find whole cloves of garlic in Isan food), cilantro, and some veggies I can't remember right now.

6. Stickers. One thing the other volunteers and I have learned is Thai students LOVE stickers. It doesn't matter the age, students even in 12th grade will do about anything for a sticker. During games students will get so excited about the possibility of winning a stickers that they will be jumping over one another or desks to answer the questions or clinging onto one another in anticipation. Of course as the teacher I find this hilarious!

All of these things really make teaching in Thai unique and special. They make up for all the times I sometimes struggle to convey one simple direction of "come here" or "Say this...phut Today..Today" and they just stare at me with blank faces. It has only been 4 months here and I still have a lot of time left to make more special routines and moments with my students!

News from the classroom

The past few weeks have been busy with teaching since I'm back to a more regular schedule with no days off for Sports and holidays. Although it's been busy and sometimes completely exhausting I feel like I have gotten into a nice routine with my students and we have been making progress in the classroom (at least I think). My days have been seemingly flying by. At PlaPak Noi I have been given my own english classroom so my 6th and 5th grade girls have been helping me move posters around, set up a special reading corner (made from a mosquito net), and rearrange desks and tables to fit a better classroom layout. At Wang Yang school, I have been working on continuing projects and trying to keep up with some feisty 3rd and 4th graders. Recently I completed a unit on Nature where my students final project was to create a diarama of a Nature scene from old cereal boxes I had been saving, label with the corresponding vocabulary learned and present it to the class. It was great to see my students working together and their excitment. This was also a great project for them because Thais are extremely talented in folding leaves into orlabrite masterpieces used for string tying ceremonies or any event. To make the project a little more interesting I made it into a competition with the winner recieving a new pencil and sticker! Here are the end results from my 6th graders (wang yang school).

In other news, life in PlaPak has been becoming more like home. My house covered in cobwebs, spiders, and geckos has an oddly comforting feel to it now. Spending a weekend afternoon washing and hanging up my clothes by hand is normal. Doing dishes in wash tubs in the dark because our outside light never works. Waiting 30 min for my water to boil so I can a luxury hot water bucket bath all seem like a routine and I don't dwell but enjoy the process of it. Entering my 5th month here I have obtained a level of familiarity with the village and more important a pleasant relaxed relationship with my students. Last minute schedule changes, unannounced events, or miscommunications with my co-teachers all fit inside the box of a normal day now.

Being the only foreign teacher at my school has been a great experience because it forces you to make connections with the teachers and be the minority(which can be painstakingly hard at times when you just want to know what is going on). However being around a foreign language and culture can take its toll and it's always nice when the other volunteers and I can get together to swap stories from our teaching or what crazy thing a thai person made you do. This past weekend we celebrated Volunteer Ben's Birthday with a boat trip down the mekong river, a dinner at the "onion", and some drinks out at The Duck Pub. On top of that we treated ourselves with a night at the SP hotel complete with hot water showers, comfy beds, and english tv (that we didn't get a chance to watch). Little outings like this are much need especially when you are Thai-ed out for the week and want to let loose of a day. As we entered february, I'm looking at another full month of teaching, mid-service conference in the beginning of March, and then a glorious 1 1/2 months off to travel throughout Thailand...Here are some Pictures from the weekend boat ride

Day in the Life of a Thai Student

Update, finally! I haven't had internet at my house for the past 2 weeks or so now and I haven't been very willing to sit outside in the cold at the high school to pick up their wireless for very long!

This is an account of what a day in the life of

one of my Thai students might look like. However, everyday I am amazed at the different cultures and routines each of my elementary schools has so this account is one specific to my smaller more rural elementary school PlaPak Noi. This school has already become very dear to me and acts more like an extended family for the students and teachers. The teachers are more like parents in charge of disciplining and teaching students life skills.

Every morning starts with a morning assembly. The time mainly depends on when the teachers arrive at school this can be 8:15-9am. Students line up in their grade levels in perfectly straight lines equally spaced apart. The flag is raised, national athem sang, buddhist prayer said, and a marched exit accompanied by drums.

School Maintaience responsibilities fall mainly upon the students. They are incharge of sweeping, mopping, picking up any trash, watering all the plants, and picking up leaves (by hand), and even helping with construction. Right now my students have been helping with the construction of a new building of classrooms(funded by donations) to replace the open-air wooden room that houses sometimes up to 3 grade levels. I will see my tiny 2nd grade boys hauling huge cinder blocks or digging out the side of the hill to insert steps. I find this involvement in the school and its upkeep very beneficial to the students who then respect and appreciate their school. I do sometimes worry about their safety with the construction though.

In the next block of morning classes grade levels will rotate through my english class. I found that the morning schedule really revolves around my class since the bell is manually rung only by my students exiting the class. I dont think the bell is used at all when I'm not at the school. Time at the school runs on daily events rather than a schedule. When the students aren't in english class they are maybe working from workbooks, cleaning something, or the older students helping prepare lunch. Everyday it seems like my students receive a small cooking lesson (which sometimes I wish I could join!).

Lunch is then served with the menu usually being sticky rice, steamed veggies, fish soup, somtam salad, fried egg, and pork. However frog and chicken feet occasionally pop up too! After the teachers are done eating my 5th and 6th grade students are in charge of washing all the teachers dishes and cooking bowls.In the picture you can see the wash tubs that are usually surrounded by dogs looking for leftover scraps. The afternoon I teach Kindergarden-2nd grade and the older students play sports, scrub floors, or work on their prized vegtable garden they started a few weeks ago. Here is a video of my students one afternoon working in the garden.

Drying rack of students family style lunch plates

The end of the school runs similarly to the morning assembly but without the drums and flag. Students line up say a prayer, thank the teacher, and are then excused to go home. The time for this also varies greatly on the teachers after school plans.

I find myself usually conflicted with the my student's school routine. On one side I think it is great that the students are involved in the upkeep of the school, how respectful they are to the teachers, and the flexibilty in the school schedule. If something important comes up or could be benefical to the students the schedule should be able to change unlike the strict American school system dictating teachers every lesson plan. However there is a severe downside to the Thai way. I feel like the teachers sometime take too much advantage of their "power". One afternoon my students were washing a teachers car or how they scrub the floors every week instead of being taught. My students are learning valuable skills such as growing vegetables but as far as more academic learning seems to be missing or involved classroom teaching. This is part of the culture of Thai Teaching that we as volunteers are hopefully modeling for the rest of school on how to make classroom learning fun, meaningful and relevant to the student's lives. Recently I was notified that the school board was coming to observe me teach at PlaPak Noi and videotape my english lessons to use as example for other thai teachers. Even though I hate to be videotaped or observed teaching for that matter, I'm happy that the school board is taking note to how we teach without a the use of a workbook and are willing to incorporate new teaching strategies.

Happy Birthday to the New Year

Sawadii Bii Mai (happy new year)!
The last week has been pretty crazy celebrating New Years and taking a trip to the city of Chang Khan with my Thai Family for their annual family reunion. On Thursday at Wang Yang we had a school wide gift exchange. Every student and teacher (88 total) brought a small gift which I later found out means bring a 30-40 baht= $1 kanom (candy)- single bottles of soda showed up also to exhange. After all the gifts were numbered each person had their turn to pick a number and receive the corresponding gift. This took about 3 hours...all to exchange little candies.

After school I had about an hour to gather my backpack before Pi Med came to pick me up to begin a 7 hour journey to Chang Khan. However in typical thai fashion we didn't leave the city (nakhon phanom) till around 7 pm meaning we didn't arrive at Pi Med's sisters house in Chang Khan till 2:30 am! The ride was long and the car was FREEZING. For some reason Thai people like their cars really really cold. Everybody was bundled up in jackets and the whole time I was just wondering why don't they turn down the AC. After shivering for a few hours I politely asked to turn down the AC or turn on the heater. This was pretty stupid since I was quickly informed Thai cars don't have heaters! Once we arrived at the house Pi Med's daughters, Sohm 25 yrs and Ying 21 yrs , and I all jumped into one bed for the night. Waking up only a few hours later to the sound of roosters I began my introductions to the extended family. We had a traditional Thai breakfast which usually consists of sticky rice, fish soup, Laab (meat salad), and Somdtam (papaya salad). The whole trip I didn't sit at a table once. Everything is eaten on the ground with bamboo matts. Also there was no stove or oven. All the food prepared at the house was done over a fire!

In the Pictures below I got to learn how to make a traditional rice noodles. In the pot is the sticky rice mixture with the finished noodles in the tray next to it. To make them you squeeze the noddle mixture into a hot pot of water then use a net to scoop them out.

Their house was situated on the Mekong River, boarding Laos. In the mornings I would walk in the Mekong River, since the water is really low right now, and watch the fog uncover the Lao Mountains. Beautiful!

On one of the mornings I saw an old lady turning over rocks looking for frogs in the river to become her lunch. I decided that this looked fun and joined in the frog hunting (reminds me of golf ball hunts :) ). Eating frogs here is a delicacy.

This is her carrying her bag of frogs.

I also got to be a part of trying to cook the meals. Here is a roasting pot of Buffalo Skin. This is the cricket that I ate...not too bad actually.

The "downtown" had a very old-fashioned feel to it with most of the buildings made of wood and is where a festival was held on New Years Eve. We spent the night walking the streets, watching the fireworks, and doing a countdown. New Years is a very family event and there was no alcohol or partying for me this NYE.

Of course spending a whole trip with only Thai People we had a share of miscommunicates. Here are some of the clarifications we had to make:

*Los Angelos is NOT a state, but a city in California.

*If someone is trying to give you something and you say , "It's Okay". That means NO not yes.

*Thai Cars don't have heaters.

* "I make picture for you" means Let me see your camera and I will take a picture for you.

*Sitting cross-leg on bamboo mats for hours takes practice

Overall it was a very very Thai New Years and a great experince of the family culture. I loved seeing the interactions between family members and especially the older grandmother and fathers. They are treated with such respect and kindness. I hope everyone had a wonderful New Years and I wish you the best in 2011!!

My Thai Family: Mother-Pi Med Father- Pornchia Daughter: Sohm and Ying

Side Note

**At my school yesterday I made gucamole for my teachers after spotting Avocado at Tesco. My teachers had never tried avocado and my students kept calling it an olive so I thought it might be a good cultural food to share. In summary they thought gucamole was discusting and said I needed to add lots of fish sauce, sugar, and chunks of chili peppers to it! Since I couldn't find any tortilla chips I opted for my next best option, sticky rice!