Life with the Mobile Teaching Unit: First weeks in Mae Sot

I was working as a teacher trainer on a CLIL project with Maths and Science teachers in Qatar when my friend put me onto the BEP ad on tefl.com. My interest was immediately aroused, perhaps in sharp contrast to the artificial life I was leading in Qatar. A chance to work in small schools with minimal resources, cycling between schools and working at grass roots level. Right up my street so I was overjoyed when I was accepted and invited to join what was to become another family to me.

My first week in Mae Sot and the rain came down. How green it was compared to the desert of Qatar. I could see the imminent purchase of many fine pairs of flipflops coming on.

The night after I arrived, Bob took us all to visit our schools and we diligently followed our trusty Bob down alleyways, round sharp bends, through maize fields and lush green vegetation, often being met by numerous dogs. Having a bit of a phobia about dogs, I wondered how I would cope having to face my fears on a daily basis, living with constant adrenaline levels. After a small dog chasing incident, I armed myself with a stick and ready to shout 'Bai' at any approaching dog. I felt a lot more confident about what I might find round the next corner. Dogs, cattle, bulls......

I arrived at the school, a low rise bamboo/concrete structure which houses grades 0-7, no classroom dividers, and a separate room for the youngest members of the school.

I greeted the rather terrified looking English teacher and it soon became apparent that she wanted me to teach the class. No way. I was prepared for this and stood my ground feigning ignorance of levels, what they have done and an insistence that I am here to help the teacher not teach for them. I got my way. The teacher, a lovely young Burmese woman who had learnt her English in the refugee camp, began her lesson tentatively but with many encouraging smiles and enthusiastic nods from me, she got underway.

The lesson proceeded to be getting the 8 kids to read a dialogue about going on a picnic and going camping for the weekend. The appropriacy of which is questionable for migrant children. She had a lovely manner with the kids and asked them for the vocabulary they
didn’t know. Too shy to point out all the words, the respectful kids mentioned the more complex words such as ‘would’, ‘seem’, ‘camping’, ‘pillow’. Most of the lesson was in Burmese punctuated by choral repetition of random English sentences. However, it was done with elegance and great discipline.

And then it came my turn to introduce myself. Horror struck, the kids looked up at me wide-eyed as I asked them how they were. After showing pictures of my brother and sister, mother and father (we’ll keep to the easy words for today) I asked them about their brothers and sisters. Pleading looks to the teacher for help. Whispered numbers were barely audible above the continuous chanting from the other grades along the building with no partitions. Months later and the kids have no problems answering questions in English.

Grade 4 next. No books, no teacher’s book and a tiny whiteboard hooked onto the bamboo struts that make the outside wall. Teacher A copied a dialogue onto the board from a precious copy of the book procured from a student still lucky enough to have a book. Skateboarding, roller skating, playing catch and tag were a few of the leisure activities Again of questionable appropriacy to these beautiful kids who come from families devastated by decades of war.

After class, the teacher and I talked about when we could meet to plan lessons together, discuss lessons and also have English lessons with the other teachers in the school as well as those from 2 nearby schools. Her teaching timetable is basically from 9-1 and 2-3.30 with no breaks and only 3 lessons free a week. Intense. I suggested after class but she gets transport home so can’t miss it. Not having been paid for 3 months she is unlikely to come to school on a Saturday for classes with me. I suggested Friday afternoon, sports afternoon, a time when I presumptuously thought the teachers were less needed. How arrogant of me to assume things would be the same here as in other places. It turns out that child-trafficking is an issue here, so all teachers are needed for strict supervisory duties during sports afternoon. The head mistress rotates with the teachers so someone accompanies all the kids home on the bus everyday to make sure they all get home without being stolen.

Susan.

This year TEFL.com is sponsoring The Burma Education Partnership's Mobile Teaching Programme on the Thai/Burma border.  You can learn more about BEP here.

Anecdotes from Mae Sot

Today at school, the teacher asked the kids ‘What did you do at the weekend?’ and wrote it up on the board.  Sell flowers, carry water, look after baby brother, play football – quite a far cry from play baseball, go to camp, go in-line skating, go in a balloon that the book has.  We then did actions and I asked the teacher to elicit the actions from the kids.  I was wondering what they would do for sell flowers, and they immediately put their hands above their heads as if carrying a large box on their heads.

I was with grade 5 recently and doing some revision on jobs. After playing a game I asked the kids what jobs they knew. Doctor, engineer, businessman, farmer and the like were mentioned. Then one kid said a job I couldn’t understand. He wrote it on the board. Rich man’s wife! Volunteer also came up as a job and given that these are migrant schools, I guess they have come across a few volunteers in their time.

At another school I played ‘What’s the time Mr Wolf?’ only wolves aren’t that common here so I asked the kids what animal they’d like. Lion came the unanimous answer. Not too common either but easier to mime than wolf. We gathered outside and I chose the only tree in the playground to play under, a rather skinny one which gave limited but welcome shade. The tree was base to where the kids would run to on the shout of ‘It’s dinner time!’. The kids raced to the tree, 6 deep around the trunk. They peeled themselves off, giggling with a few rubbing their arms. Who puts nails in trees? I felt awful almost impaling the thin kids. We chose a safer base but had to compromise on the sun. Sweating we returned to class for something a little more gentle. Poor things probably hadn’t eaten all day either.

In the teachers’ class, we were playing musical chairs and I was anticipating chair breakage, shards of plastic slicing arms but we finished unscathed. One teacher is weaker in English than the others and when she had to move place, she took her chair with her to avoid the pain of being in the middle and speaking English! A very creative way of dodging the centre of the circle.

Last week I was doing Scottish dancing with the kids. I press-ganged some of the teachers into helping me but when the rather dishy Thai teacher had to twirl the young English teacher, she was overcome with shyness in front of this dashing man and hot-footed it into the safety of the school leaving a bewildered 7 year old to take her place.

And the final school had the pleasure of my adapted Scottish Country dancing world tour today. It was a lot of fun although it soon became apparent that they don’t know how to turn each other by linking arms at the elbows.  I realised that this was what had been causing problems in previous attempts so we had a little lesson – hand on waist, move hand away from waist, raise hand and elbow towards the chest, approach partner and hook arms then turn.  This robotic like set of movements worked and no longer were the kids holding each other’s arms and rotating in the same direction.