It is week two in teaching and i can honestly say that things are going O.K. My first day doing actual teaching was a little nerve-racking and i talked very fast and went through the lesson pretty fast as well. After a couple of more sit-in's and familiarizing myself with the course material, i think things are going smoothly now. So my typical day starts at about 6:30 or 7:30 a.m. when i have my first class. Each period is an hour and i usually get a one-two hour break in between classes. My counterparts and I are doing team teaching, where we all attend all the classes and take turns going over the material. Usual one person begins the lesson and the others can chime in here and there to make the point more clear or just add something. I actually really like this method. It's nice to not be just put out there by myself, with no teaching experience, and expect to teach something like 230 students. but i must say, for my students, they are great! Well great compared to what i have heard from teachers at the junior and senior high school levels. I suppose its typical though. Even though families pay for their children to attend the primary through secondary education schools, it is the kids that do better in school that can move on to the college and university level. Colleges of education and Universities also cost a lot more money, so it is not likely that students will slack off when they have been given the opportunity to further their education. For the most part they pay attention and participate..usually on a very small scale. I can sometimes get 1-3 hands raised when i ask a question, other times…nada. I don't blame them though, ICT is A LOT of information for them to learn and for most they are just trying to copy notes down and memorize so they can pass their exam. See, ICT is required for all second year students to take, whether they want to or not. There in-lies the first problem. A computer, to some to maybe even most students, is really just a concept. Most have seen one but have barely interacted with it and here I am talking about the internal components of the system unit and how the processor and memory works. It's a little extreme. But this year we are trying to get the first year students to start taking some lessons in ICT so that when they need to pass their class for their exams in their second year they are not coming into the course blindly.
I have been finding that i do a lot of board writing and talking AT the class instead of interacting with them. It's hard to engage them because usually i don't have enough time and also i do not have many resources at my disposal. I have made an announcement to one of my lecture classes( yes i teach about 125-150 students at a time, woohoo!) that i will be holding a review session over the weekend, and every weekend henceforth, for their benefit. Now, i have no idea what im going to do at these review sessions but step one is to actually get people to come. I hold my first one this sunday so we shall see how it pans out.
Oh..right, so back to my day. I usually teach 3 classes a day and go back to my house for meals and such. They serve breakfast and lunch in the staff lounge but i usually try to steer clear of that. Although it is great getting free food, don't get me wrong, but they always have porridge in the morning and by always i mean every.single.day….so there's only so much of that i can take. And for lunch they have a mixture of banku or fufu with stew or rice and beans. Usually these dishes are safe but with the rice and beans there is always some kind of mystery beef in there( im still whole-heartedly trying to be a vegetarian) and with the banku and fufu they always serve me and i get tremendous portions that i feel bad not finishing, so i do then i get a stomach ache and hello uncomfortable rest of the afternoon. So i stick to my own veggie concoctions and that keeps me quite congenial.
