Wow. It's been awhile. The school year got busy, and now it's already on its way to wrapping up. I feel like I should write several blogs to make up for lost time, but instead I'll try making this one into chapters.
Chapter 1: An Inspiring Teacher's ExchangeLukas arrived about when I started to slack off on blogging. He brought his mother for his first month here; she is an ESL teacher in America. Both Lukas and his mother were an absolute blessing to me, personally. Lukas's mom -- I call her
mae in the Thai spirit of sharing family -- observed a couple of my classes and gave me great, constructive advice. Since then, I have re-focused my classes, making it a goal to teach reading first and foremost (besides the given goals of making English class fun, interactive, holistic).
When I first came here last year, I was disturbed by the culture of copying in the classroom. As far as I could tell, in every subject copying was the norm, and I couldn't tell what the teachers thought or wanted to do about it. In English class, I was told to always have a worksheet for the students, and always have the words with pictures on the board so that the kids who couldn't do the worksheet could copy from that. Usually the kids would copy from the board, if not each other. The root of the problem is that the students don't know how to read English. So, as Lukas's mom explained, they do not have confidence with the language, much less the ability to do the worksheets. I think the confidence aspect was illustrated to me last week, when I had my sixth graders line up according to what they felt their strength in English was: listening, speaking, reading, or writing. Most of the students lined up in reading, a few less in writing, not many in listening, and none in speaking.
Even more helpful, she gave the TTT and I some tactics for teaching reading. I think she made it clear that it can't be a side project, which is what I was attempting to do. It has to be the focus of at least part of the class.
Some of her other suggestions: publicize the semester's, and day's, objectives to the students; have the students journal about what they learned every class; pre- and post-testing; having a standard level 1, 2, 3 curriculum skeleton (for learning goals -- while process should be specific to each classroom); use paragraph frames when teaching vocabulary -- thus laying out a pattern of writing the students can see every class.
We're hoping to start a pen pal project between the KKEI classrooms and
mae's back in the U.S., and she has agreed to help organize a Portland leg for the future teacher's exchange.
Chapter 2: Team Teaching at Nong WaengMy Nong Waeng English classes went in 3 different directions, based on feedback I was receiving from the other teachers and observations about the students, and based on my teammates. Like a farmer wrapping up the season and about ready to start the next one, I'm looking forward to evaluating and deciding how to make the next semester more productive.
If I'm going to make a comparison to farming, I'll try carrying it throughout the Nong Waeng English classes. My sixth grade class had a drought. I'm not sure they learned anything. This was the only class for which I was left alone most of the time. This class pushed my comfort zone every Wednesday. I struggled to keep my temper, and usually failed. A learning environment was almost never reached. The only success I had was my 2nd to last class, when I had the students do a 3-legged relay race. I had them tie their legs together and then let them practice the reading they would have to do in order to race. I think due to the clear, immediate goal, and maybe a little bit due to the tied feet, most of the students tried and were focused. It felt amazing. So this is what I will need to try to re-create every class next semester. And/or, I was considering trying to set up a Montessori-style environment, where the kids could do whichever activity they wanted for each class, as long as they could successfully do each one by the end of the year. That, though, would take a lot of conceptualizing and creating in the next several weeks.
My 4th grade class is not a KKEI classroom -- however P'Leng the Chinese language teacher takes an interest in me and my teaching, and either her or another teacher is usually in the room with me. P'Leng is a supportive co-teacher (though rightfully taking a backseat role). She pushes me to speak one sentence in English and one in Thai. She probably has many more opinions about my teaching than she gives, but she has seemed to give me advice freely. Jennifer (the KKEI volunteer) was also a co-teacher during my second month of teaching the fourth graders. From the very beginning I have focused on the basics with this class. I think this was a very good call. My fourth graders will be late bloomers but I think they'll have time to bloom. I also think it will be possible to create a culture where they do not have to copy everything...though it will take imagination and careful intentionality to do so, since copying is such a solid norm.
I have mixed feelings about my 5th grade classroom. We did not focus on the basics, and I think for many of the students it would have been better to do so. On the other hand, quite a few students are right where we are. I successfully started teaching grammar (conjugation of "to be") and the "where" question structure, and I think for the most part it wasn't boring. The weeks built on each other and made sense as a whole. Half my crop is flooded, but the other half is thriving.
What I think could have helped this classroom is if P'Aom and I had discussed an optimum way to use co-teaching. As it was, she wanted me to take the lead, in both planning and execution. She usually served as my adviser. Though this made sense do to her seniority and my inexperience, and due to the other responsibilities she had to take on this semester, I think a more collaborative relationship between us could have been more empowering for us and for the students. Elementary school students are at a stage where monitored work is the most beneficial for them (rather than doing all their work on their own), and I think this is something classrooms in Thailand, including ours, lets slide too often. The norm is to explain and then give an assignment for the kids to do on their own. I think its best for the teacher to be as present as possible (to help) in the classroom, and if there are 2 teachers, more power to them. They can both be present to the many individual learning styles and levels before them.
As for the integrated afternoons, I am sorry to say we never really got out of our bored funk. We were passed down a curriculum from the Buriram school, which also prescribed how-to's. And though we probably should have put this in a drawer for the semester and thought from scratch, with those goals and how-to's in the back of our mind to inform, instead we opened their curriculum to ask, "what's next?" every week. I'm pretty disappointed with this, especially as it included the subject of climate change, a subject I would have loved to think about creatively. The integrated curriculum could also have led to dialogue about issues in the students' communities, and projects to address those issues. Considering the railroad communities are currently facing displacement due to national development plans, it's a crucial time for students to dialogue and for teachers to facilitate participatory and collaborative projects between the students, the school, and their communities. See a little bit more about this in the last chapter.
Chapter 3: Team Teaching at Non ChaiEnglish classes at Non Chai started going well when we realized how much the most disruptive students in the classroom thrived and took leadership when we focused on cooking. It was really fun to play with different ways of presenting vocabulary through food, such as writing on eggs and potatoes. And this is where I started using paragraph frames repetitively. I'm hoping that the class can make a Chankra Cookbook, maybe even to sell in America. But it will take a lot more work to get them at that point. It could be the project for next semester.
I think, however, that we could have focused on the basics much more frequently, and thus gotten farther ahead. Gaolee and I had planned to split the class into 2 reading groups each English class, especially since each student is at a different level of reading. This might have happened twice. Most weeks, I felt that Non Chai had a difficult learning environment. There is too much going on at the school, and always something to distract the students and teachers from class.
I also felt ineffective on our integrated Mondays. I was usually the English word speller, rather than the teacher, as Gaolee would simply ask the students to use as much English as possible on their assignments, and send them to me for translations and how to write the words. We should come up with a better plan for how to integrate English into those days...except that next semester I will probably not be part of the integrated Mondays (see last chapter)!
Chapter 4: KKEI ActivatesKKEI has a busy year ahead of us. We received nearly 300,000 baht to execute about 15-20 camps and events in the next year, including monthly English camps to help kids not fear the English language; a parents and guardians camp; a life skills camp; and teacher camps and trainings. We had our first English camp last week, where all 4 of our KKEI classrooms came together. It was a little chaotic, but good to see us all working together.
Chapter 5: Checking in on my Own Teaching PhilosophiesI have been reading 2 books, which have started to inform the way I think about education and how to facilitate a good learning environment: 1)
Democratic Schools: Lessons in Powerful Education and 2)
Your Child's Strengths, by Jennifer Fox. Democratic schools highlights several schools' stories that embody democratic education, where the goals of alternative schooling are to create active participants in society, rather than creating better behaving students.
One of the stories was particularly inspiring to me, as it was about a fifth grade class in Chicago who, once their teacher facilitated a conversation about the issues in their community, decided their biggest issue was that they needed a new school. They had been promised a new school by the local government for six years, as they did not have a cafeteria or heating; their windows did not let any light in; their bathrooms were unusable; etc. Once the students identified the issue, the teacher facilitated a space for the students to strategize on how to solve the problem, and the whole school year revolved around solving it. They interviewed important people, they read about law, they created media and a website, they wrote letters, etc. The students, normally disengaged, found importance in their work. Even the teacher didn't know if they could succeed. By the end of the school year, they had not received a new school, but they had attracted tons of publicity and they had learned a lot -- on all levels, including academically. This was a truly integrated curriculum.
Overall, the book made me see that even though our KKEI classrooms are heading in the right direction and alternative relative to the mainstream, we have a long way to go before even our own teachers fully understand what it means to have a democratic classroom. First and foremost, we will need to create a culture amongst ourselves where talking about our core values, and pushing each other on our core values, is the norm. Currently, I feel that we have not created the space to do this, and we have not had fundamental conversations about our own teaching philosophies which are hopefully continuing to evolve and develop, even for the most senior of us. Thus, while I would like to live by the principles of democratic schools, I'm not sure how the other KKEI teachers would see this.
The strengths book has also been informative. The first part of the book lays out the different ways that mainstream schooling creates a weakness-based society and the potential that this crushes, even on an economic level. The second part explains what it means, concretely, to identify strengths and develop them into skills. And the third part gives tools and activities to do so. The author of the book leads a school using a strength-based curriculum, and she also shares that curriculum in the book.
Once again, the book lays out many steps towards developing strengths that are in line with KKEI teachers' stated philosophies: creating spaces of stillness and reflection for students, asking them questions about their preferences and feelings, etc. But I can't say that I've witnessed the core of this philosophy at work. The book offers great tools to use even within KKEI meetings -- as I think it will be important for us teachers to be able to identify, communicate, and use our own strengths in the classroom before we can successfully facilitate our students' strengths (or before we can even be speaking the same language about strengths, for that matter).
Chapter 6: Prospects for the FutureThis is of course the most exciting chapter, since it hasn't happened yet and so there is all the room in the world for success and no failures yet to speak of. The prospects are big, however, and will seem too formidable until I find more Thai teachers to work with me.
1) Keeping the KKEI Spirit
Next semester P'Aom will be moving to Non Chai as their new vice-principle. I will be splitting my time between 3 schools: 2.5 days at Nong Wat School (not a KKEI member, but enforced by the new municipal policy); 2 days at Nong Waeng; and half a day at Non Chai. Unless I, P'Aom, and/or P'Noos can make something else happen at Nong Waeng, this may mean my only team teaching class will be held during the half day at Non Chai. Nong Waeng will still inevitably be a member of KKEI, but currently this does not require them to implement team teaching between the Thai teachers and foreigner. It will be ideal if KKEI can implement team teaching as a principle in the schools we work in.
P'Aom will continue to serve as a member of KKEI. Who knows how her new position will affect her on a personal and working level. Just will have to wait and see. I'm personally saddened and worried with the loss of both P'Aom and P'Dtu (the Kindergarten teacher at Nong Waeng that I used to volunteer with -- she will be the new vice principle at Non Thun). For me, I think it will be a matter of finding ways to step up in her place despite my foreignness, push the other teachers to step up, and work towards understanding concepts like democratic schools, little by little. I feel good about my relationships with a lot of the teachers at Nong Waeng, but I don't feel like I know how to function on a facilitative level within those relationships. I think I will need at least one ally...and I'm hoping I can find that with P'Noos.
2) Non-violence workshop
I contacted P'Ben about wanting a non-violence workshop for teachers, and if she knew of anyone who had experience facilitating them. She gave me a contact, and we are trying to work something out. I think it will make most sense as a KKEI event where we invite other teachers at our school, so I hope the other KKEI teachers see the same value as I do!
3) The Displacement of Nong Waeng Community
This is still the plan. You can watch a video and read an article about the double railroad tracks planned for Thailand to facilitate international North-South trade, and the effects it will have on slum communities all along the railroad tracks:
http://isaanrecord.com/ (2nd story down).
Given that this development plan will displace most of the students at Nong Waeng School, and given the principles of democratic schooling (which Nong Waeng does not prescribe to, but which I would like to prescribe to), I want to figure out how to create a dialogue about the future between the teachers, and more than that, with the students.
Rather than asking other teachers to start talking about it, or at least in addition to doing that, I would like to serve as an example. But English class with a foreigner is probably not the most ideal place to start. Maybe with the help of P'Kovit (ngo) or P'Goong, we could organize an after school club that is naturally geared towards dialogue and action about this issue. So I think that's my next step.
4) Education Committees
Speaking of P'Kovit, he sees potential for developing democratic schools in Thailand through the Education Committees. Every school has an education committee composed of teachers, parents/guardians, political leaders, and people from the education department. As of now, education committees are untapped -- they serve as decision makers about buildings, he says. When someone wants to build something at the school, they go to the education committee. So no one, including the teachers and the education committees, themselves, is seeing the potential for developing education through these committees -- even though that was the reason they were formed. But P'Kovit believes that if we can develop relationships with these committees, and invite (or force?) them to go to alt edu trainings with us, then we can get them to force the teachers to change their methods of teaching.
It's a dream. I guess we'll see what we can do.
I will try for another blog update once KKEI has its retreat in a couple of weeks. I think that's when I will know how much of my dreaming in this blog can become reality in the upcoming semester.
