Wherever you go, go with all your heart - Confucious
My teaching partners Nancy, Lisa, Jill and I all returned to our host school, Escuela Normal Superior Del Quindio, to give our presentations about our lives and cultures and to teach educational strategies to the pedagogical students that attend the school. Most of the students in attendance at the session were in their third and fourth years. At this point, it was fairly obvious to even the casual observer who was going to become a conscientious educator and who was not. Most had had about four years of English instruction, and listened intently as we presented. Some of the students, however, talked to friends or filed their nails. Nancy, my host teacher, had commented to me previously that she had some concerns that some students were in the program merely because they could not be accepted at a university, and I informed her later that I was pretty certain I could point out which ones they were!
Because most of these students would enter the profession as primary teachers, Nancy requested that I teach the students some simple English language game songs. Paige and Jill taught the students about video story telling, elbow partners, turn and talk, group discussions, and other fairly typical American teaching strategies. Colombian teacher training is quite different than the American system. Primary and elementary school teachers have less education than secondary, and technically, a preschool or primary school teacher can be as young as 19 years of age. Adults can also enter this program, so 17 years old are studying alongside 40 year-olds. This can be quite confusing. The students were surprised that I, as a music teacher, and Lisa, as a kindergarten teacher, had the same university training as a high school math teacher. A few of the Normal students were gifted musicians that played in a rock band. They performed for us, and stole the show. Afterwards, a guitar and mic were handed to me, and I had to get up on the stage and perform, much to my chagrin. When we finished, many of the young student teachers crowded around us, asking questions, wanting to know about life in America and merely just wanting some contact with Americans. I had printed business cards with my email, Twitter and Instagram handles on them, and I handed these out to eager students, along with pencils and bracelets. They were so eager and responsive! We made many new friends.
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She will likely take it off her back to give it to you - or in the very least, buy you one just like it! Our host teacher, Nancy, is justifiably proud of La Zona Cafetera, the area where she was born, grew up, and currently lives. Working coffee farms, or fincas, dot the area, and one still sees mustachio'd coffee workers, wearing ponchos and the traditional regional sombreros sitting in cafes sipping cups of "deleeeecious" Quindian coffee, or riding in the back of jeeps, which locals usually refer to as "Willy's" A strong tourism industry has definitely been developed due to the charm and jaw-dropping beauty of La Zona.
Nancy was eager for us to see as much of the area as possible, and I continually reassured her that I came to Colombia to see the world through her eyes. She planned a host of memorable of experiences for us. It seemed we only had to wish for something, and she would arrange it! We almost had to be careful expressing our desires to her, because she would try so hard to make something happen for us, and I continually worried about the fact that she still had to balance a home, husband and full-time teaching workload. It was the end of the semester for her Normal (teacher training students) and she was struggling to get semester grades recorded. When I mentioned that I wanted to try Colombian tamales, she arranged to have a teacher friend's mother make them for us. When I complimented the wonderful flavor of the traditional cafe con aquapanela coffee she brought the ingredients and taught me how to make it. When I mentioned that I wanted to learn to make my favorite Colombian soup ajiaco, once I returned home, she took me grocery shopping to assure I'd have the correct ingredients. I needed a pedicure? I was sent to Estrella at Pelugueria Americana, where I received a beautiful pedicure for the mere sum of $10,000 pesos ($3.33). I wanted a hat for my husband, and she and her husband Andres escorted me to a part of town she felt that I shouldn't walk in by myself to buy a hat "because they had the best quality for the price there." Every morning, she sent her taxi driver friend, Cesar, to pick us up, to assure we'd be safe. I began to refer to Nancy as the "Colombia Mafia" because of her constant source of connections. There was no end to this woman's amazing feats. During our stay, I felt that we truly received a broad overview of the diversity of attractions in the area. We hiked, we rafted, we rode about the area as the locals do, on the small buses that service the region. For about $2.50, one-way, one can climb aboard and travel the region the way the locals do, climbing (sometimes rather frighteningly) winding mountain roads, stopping in small towns along the way, where folks climb aboard to either journey along with you or to peddle their homemade empanadas or handmade bracelets. I loved rolling through the countryside on our little excursions. Earlier this week, we met with a group of at-risk youth at Colombo Americano to have a discussion session with them in English about life in America. Colombo Americano Armenia is one of the nine binational centers in Colombia whose mission is to carry out a cultural liaison between two sister countries, Colombia and the United States. The center, founded in 1984, offers the community a bilingual library (English-Spanish), permanent cultural activities, counseling for studies in the United States and training in English from four years of age. The organization has branches throughout Quindio.
The particular group of students we met with are public school kids that are identified as showing high potential via leadership, academic and critical thinking abilities. They meet after school for English language and other development classes, and end each year with a camp. There is a great deal of disparity in Colombia between the private schools and public schools, and often public school children are pigeon-holed into a future based on their socioeconomic status from the minute they start school. These young people were full of insightful, thoughtful questions and comments. They were attentive, and fascinated by our presentations, and posed many, many questions that ranged from "How do are homosexual teenagers treated in the USA?" to "What are your favorite sports teams?" to "How do you like OUR food? You mean you don't have arepas in your country? How do you survive???" After our visit , we posed for a group picture and the kids said "Now....please...we want you to do the dab." How could we deny them? I'm not even sure I can adequately say what I need to in this post. Today we visited three rural schools in the Eje Cafetero (coffee region) of the department I am visiting. All of the children that attend these schools are coffee and plantain farm workers. The plantain trees come right up to the property lines of the schools. We bumped along dusty dirty roads for up to thirty minutes at a time, with nothing in site but trees and bushes. The schools are one-room school houses, all in by American standards, incredibly impoverished conditions. Most were open-air schools, with out-houses out back. The schools teach the children based on curriculum called "Escuela Nueva" (new school) that the Colombian Ministry of Education has designed for rural children. It encourages autonomy, real-life experiences and project-based learning. The children are grouped by grade level at tables, and each table has a leader. The students work independently as the teacher travels around the room, helping out with instruction as needed. Each school had approximately twenty children, and is run by an elected school council. The president and vice-president met us at the locked gate to open it, formally greet us, and give us a tour. The children proudly showed us their lessons and how they had to provide evidence of learning, how each student had a particular role, and how they led their class in various routines throughout the day. The children functioned as a family. These children are incredibly poor. These plantation workers do the work that no one else will do. The gratitude they expressed when we passed out the little gifts we brought was enormous. The teachers take great pride in the accomplishment of these students, and care a great deal for the whole child. I believe the photos in this slideshow will speak for themselves. For two days, I had the honor and pleasure of visiting with and teaching the children at the Uruguay School. A branch of the Escuela Normal Superior Del Quindio, this small pilot English language immersion K-2 school strives to have 60% of its instruction in English on a daily basis. These amazing teachers are creating their own curriculum, because resources and text materials do not exist at such early grade levels in Colombia. Although President Juan Manuel Santos has promised to pour more effort and resources into building a more bilingual Colombia, for a variety of reasons, achieving this goal is going to be a gradual and slow task. Teachers at the Uruguay school create their own teaching materials and classroom displays, and because most of the teachers are still English language learners themselves, they are essentially learning as they go along. The Colombian government in conjunction with the US Embassy, has several programs and initiatives in places to place teaching fellows in the schools to team teach with native teachers, and this has been helpful. My teaching partner, Lisa, and I observed classes on one day, and gave presentations about our culture and taught classes on the second day. I taught the students simple songs in English, gave a brief presentation on maple syrup production, and had the children taste maple syrup. Lisa and I met with the teachers and discussed what we could do to help them. Their biggest desire is to have bilingual teaching materials. I promised to see what I could do to help them. Today was my first day at my host school, Escuela Normal Superior Del Quindio. "Normal," as it is often referred to, is a K-11 and teacher prep school that serves lower middle to middle class students and is considered to be one of the more exemplary schools in the region. It has a model English language immersion program, and is in alignment with President Juan Manuel Santos' vow to improve public school education in Colombia. There is a great disparity between public and private schools in the country. Whereas private school students attend school eight hours per day, public school children only attend for five or six. Infrastructure suffers, schools have far less technology, and other resources, a methodology of repetition can sometimes be the accepted norm, and teachers are very poorly paid. Sadly, of the 500 top schools in Colombia, only 30 are public. This disparity means that a child's future depends on the level of education they are able to receive. Since the negotiation of the peace agreement with FARC last year, the Colombian Ministry of Education has made great steps trying to move the country forward, and education is of the highest priority. With Santos' announced initiative to make Colombia the most literate and bilingual country in South America, for the first time ever, the Education budget now surpasses the military budget. Colombian schools still have not met the requirements to join the OECD and it still ranks at the bottom of the PISA exams, but with fellowship programs, scholarships, investments to supply students and teachers with tablets and computers, and the development of early childhood programs for at-risk students, it is making positive steps in the right direction.
Educators at Normal have formed a cohesive team, much of it on their own initiative and on their own time, to aid in advancing the pilot English language immersion program. The curriculum is project -based, and throughout the week, we were able to review with students the culmination of some of these projects, including having groups invent "camps" to attend. Each group had to plan a themed camp - all in English. Two American fellows - paid for with funds by Santos' initiative - work at the school to collaborate and support the Colombian teachers in curriculum design and instruction. We also visited - and taught classes - at the Uruguay school, which was a model lower elementary bilingual immersion school. Approximately 60% of the daily instruction is in English. Because there is no designed curriculum at this early level for the children, the team from Normal has designed and implemented a curriculum and oversees the teachers at Uruguay. The All classroom rules, bulletin boards and posted instructional material are in both Spanish and English. Most lessons are in both English and Spanish. It is a fascinating model. The teachers are desperate for instructional materials, as nothing at this early grade level exists in Colombia. I worked with the children there teaching music lessons in English, with an interpreter at my side. We also visited Funanza, an arts immersion school affiliated with Normal. It was AWESOME!! It is the only school of its kind in Colombia and children become expert folkloric dancers. Students study an academic class load, interspersed with band, chorus, dance, Orff Ensemble, or jazz band.. Fundanza had a theatre program for developmentally disabled adults and we were invited in to meet them. One lady learned English as a child and introduced us to her friends. They insisted on many photo ops. I was also brought to tears by the 4th-5th grade choir students, who so VERY proudly sang a song in English for us. Fundanza produces a dance team of the highest quality that tours the world representing Colombian Folkloric Dance music. Some differences in Colombian vs. American education: -Class sizes are much larger! Classes are anywhere from 30 to 45 students. -Colombian children are LOUD! Exuberant, loving, cheerful, and LOUD! There is no waiting one's turn to be called on in Colombia! It's a cacophony of "Teacher! Teacher! Teacher!" Children may be talking to each other or pulling another student's pigtail, and the teacher just keeps on teaching. I had a difficult time acclimating to this different standard. -Students have a great deal more down-time than our students do, and more freedom in the hallways and within the classroom. Sometimes it works, and sometimes it doesn't. -We noted a great deal more horseplay, running down halls and loud mayhem than what would ever be tolerated in American schools. Again, I need to mention that the children were nice, outgoing and polite - just LOUD. -Students and teachers are quite physical with each other - even at upper levels. The standard greeting in Colombia is to kiss each other on the cheek. Children and adults hug and hold hands constantly. It is nothing to be alarmed about here. This is Colombian culture. I like it. - The children have more breaks throughout the school day. -Most public schools are so big that children go to school in shifts! The morning shift (usually 6-12 and the afternoon shift 12:30 to 6:30) -Although the schools are being extremely creative with project-based learning projects, at the public school level, we did not witness a great deal of higher level thinking or in-class thoughtful discussion in the lower grades. However, when we attended question and answer sessions with older students, we received many, many thoughtful and "deep" questions that exhibited that they were using some very solid higher level skills. -Not a learning objective or "I can" statement was to be found anywhere! When we finally arrived in Armenia, we were met by our host teacher, Nancy Echeverri. A diminutive, but energetic young lady, I knew the moment I met her that we would connect well, just by the warm snap in her eyes and the easygoing nature of her personality. She and one of our her colleagues, Melissa, and Lisa and I chatted easily in the car on the way to the hotel, as we wended our way past beautiful coffee and plantain farms. After checking us into our hotel, she allowed us to settle in for a while then returned to give us a tour of the neighborhood and to discuss the activities ahead. The upcoming weekend was just for recreation, and would provide us all with an opportunity to get to know each other. It was the perfect way to begin our stay in the Coffee Zone.
The following morning, Nancy, Lisa, myself, and other host teachers and fellows set out to the Parque Del Cafe, a park celebrating the area's chief agricultural product. Think of it as a coffee Disney World. We all felt emboldened to try rides we hadn't attempted to try in a while, and took in a wonderful dance show depicting the folkloric dances of the country. The gardens and walking paths were worth the trip alone. The sun in Colombia is much more direct than in Michigan, and the weather was quite warm. After the events of the week, we were quite tired upon our return home. The next morning, we toured a coffee plantation. We learned how the beans are grown, harvested and dried, and the proper Colombian way to brew and drink coffee. We even playfully dressed the part of coffee farmers, and picked the beans ourselves. We followed our tour with a delicious al fresco lunch of chicharrones, ground pork, eggs, rice, beans, plantains, and always....arepas. Nancy and Biviana, the other Armenia host teacher, wisely chose these activities to allow us to interact on a casual level, and at the end of the weekend, we all felt prepared to start the work week. Colombia is known for its coffee in general, but nowhere is the prized bean more important than in the departments of Caldas, Risaraldo and Quindio, which is called the Zona Cafetera or Eje Cafetero (coffee axis). It is to this area, in the city of Armenia (population 279,000) that I will spend the next twelve days working with my guest teacher Nancy Echeverri at the Escuela Normal Superior Del Quindio, a K-11 school consisting of three units and almost 3,000 students. As a teacher in a tiny school in a small, rural school district, this was going to be quite a different setting for me. I had been preparing presentations and lesson plans for weeks, but still had some trepidation and many questions about how my stay there was going to transpire. Because my complete lack of familiarity with the area and my lack of Spanish language skills, even securing a hotel was a challenge. Finally, however, the day had arrived to begin attending to the primary reason I was in Colombia - to work, as a teacher, alongside and with a Colombian teacher. I was cautiously hopeful that my experience would be a positive one. I had done some reading on Armenia prior to my visit and knew that much of the town had been destroyed by an earthquake in 1999, and that it had been completely rebuilt. I also knew that there were many coffee farms in the area and that these farms capitalized on the increasing amount of tourists visiting this beautiful region as a source of sustainable income. One could come to the area and rent a farm, or "finca" atop a hill with a gorgeous panoramic view of coffee and plantain fields. I knew that the school I was going to had a model bilingual program was considered the best in the area. That was about it.
One flies almost everywhere in Colombia. Only 6% of the roads in the country are paved. Colombia has the highest rate of air travel in the world. As a representative of the Department of State, extra precautions are taken to ensure my safety, and bus or taxi travel in the country can sometimes be considered unsafe. Due to the traffic and road conditions in the country, renting a car would be unfathomable. So, a plane was the best way to make the 300 kilometer jaunt to Armenia. After a three hour delay due to a hydraulic problem (I must have a hydraulic jinx about me!) we finally landed into the most magically magnificent land I've even seen in my life. I could not believe my eyes when I departed the plane. The countryside of La Zona Cafetera was stunning - simply stunning. I felt like I had been picked up and dropped onto a movie set. Armenia is similar to any other South American city. Large, congested, dirty, shabby, and sprawling. There are pockets of great wealth amidst large swaths of unimaginable poverty. Street vendors line the streets so tightly one wonders how cars manage to pass by. There are little, if any traffic signs. Traffic laws are largely ignored. "Motos," motorcycles are everywhere, and many people do not drive them well. Small children cling to the backs while adults weave in and out of traffic. My host teacher told me that there is a saying in Colombia - "You can get a license to drive a moto from inside a potato chip bag." This is quite obvious as one sees them dart everywhere to be the first and fastest. Once we checked into our hotel, we ventured out into the streets to buy some lunch. We launched ourselves into the swarming crowds, and we were immediately quite terrified. ...we go! Today, in celebration of Colombian Independence Day, we took a tram to the top of Montserrate (alt 10,300 ft) and enjoyed the panoramic view of the massive mega city of Bogota, which has a metropolitan wide population of twelve-plus million. After enjoying a wonderful lunch at a mountain-top restaurant that was a historical home moved all the way to the top of the mountain, we rode the train down back to our bus. Because of its high altitude, Bogota is rather chilly all year round. The temperature seldom rises above the 60's. It was even breezier and colder atop Montserrate. We we were all a bit chilled when we returned to our hotel, but our in-country coordinator, Yiannis Romero, rectified that situation by arranging a surprise performance by a Colombian band. The dancers tried with modest success to teach us to dance South American-style. I am quite certain they are still laughing at us. Tomorrow, I head off to Armenia, to my host city and school!
July 19, 2017
Today my TGC cohort members and I filed into our cute little bus and drove across town to Institucion Educativa Aquileo Parra. I am beginning to get a bit more accustomed to the mayhem that is Bogota traffic. We wended our way through neighborhoods that were so exclusive that they were walled off with razor wire-topped brick walls, past exclusive designer clothing shops and car dealerships, until we once again enterered an extremely modest area of Bogota, where the school was located. We walked past the ubiquitous South American snack carts lining the sidewalks,tables of old men drinking coffee and sleeping dogs and lined up outside a walled-off area that was the entrance to the school. We had to pass by a security guard to enter the compound. IEAP is a public high school which offers education from nursery school to eleventh grade. It has approximately 1,500 students. Their educational mission and vision helps them develop projects in different subjects which resemble the community where the school is. Aquileo Parra is located in the northern part of Bogota in a locality called El Verbenal. This is a lower middle class community. Its principal as well as some teachers have been involved in exchanges with US schools. The embassy of the United States has worked with students from 9th and 10th grade and has provided lectures about civil rights. One note about Colombian schools: most public schools operate in shifts, because they service so many children. The morning shift attends from about 6:30 to 12:00, and the afternoon shift from 1:00 to 6:30. Some teachers work one shift, some work both! That is a very long school day! Class sizes are large - anywhere from 30 to 45 students - which often makes for a high noise level in the classroom. As we walked up the walkway to the school, we were greeted by children. Many, many children, at all grade levels, each wearing its own distinctive uniform. Preschool children wore tiny blue and white gingham check smocks, other grade levels wore plaid skirts and ties, while upper grade levels wore track suits. There did not seem to be any sort of system as to how these uniforms were chosen. The primary grade levels were holding and waving American flags that they had made themselves. They were smiling and waving at us. Tears immediately sprung to my eyes, and I can almost guarantee that every other teacher had the same. We felt like rock stars as we bent over to greet these children, saying “Buenas Dias!” or “Good morning” to them. Many of the little tiny children said “Hello!” with bright, dark, shining eyes looking up at us. We visited a few moments before the principal spoke to us about the mission of the school. I noticed that the principal talked about issues and problems his school faced - single parent homes, marginalization, teen pregnancy, bullying - and how they were seeking to rectify them, and that they were identical to the struggles my school faces. We were subsequently treated to a lovely dance and musical presentation of traditional folk dances. Presentations were given by older students outlining programs that the school had about conflict resolution and global understanding. The school also had a Model UN group, which very much impressed our teachers. We loved how the young people here spoke with such passion and eloquence about their wish for world peace and understanding. They were articulate, intelligent and poised. We all walked away feeling we had made many new friends. In the afternoon, we visited the Instituta Educativa Distrital Usaquen. Located in a part of town that had a higher level income of housing, the school still served a similar demographic student, as they were bused into the school. There, we observed several classes, and held a panel with a group of young students that were equally passionate and eager to communicate with us. Everywhere we went, we were mobbed by beautiful, curious children, wanting to say hello and practice their English - they were shy and boisterous all at the same time. They ran around the school grounds behind us, following us, jumping up and peeking into the windows of classrooms we were in, waving and calling to us. Several children asked me, “Are you famous?” I think that each and every one of us ended this day smiling. |
Julie SherlockMusician, teacher, wanderer, human being. ArchivesCategories |