It ain't easy being white... part two

So the last post never really got into how "ain't easy" it is "being white." But it shall be explained. I wrote about how I got here, now I will write about what I do here.

I've probably said this before, but I work at Lighthouse Grace Academy and Care Centre. In addition to being a school starting from preschool (or as stated on the door, Pre-Unit) and going to Standard 8 (grade eight) -- although I think a few of the classes are combined -- it is an orphanage that houses approximately 40 children. The kids are a lot of fun, but I'm not quite used to them yet. I'll get there.

I teach a Standard 5 class. There are usually six students in my class, and I focus on teaching them English. The first day that I was there (Tuesday), they were writing exams. First in English, then Kiswahili, Social Studies, and Science, with Math on the following day because the "short breaks" that I gave them were too long. The average mark on the exams were between 35 and 50%, if they were lucky. The highest mark was a 78%, and the rest of the students seemed thoroughly impressed. After they finished writing exams and I finished marking them (which brings us to Wednesday afternoon), I am left to find something to occupy the students. But I'm not a teacher! I have little to no idea what to do! If anyone has suggestions, I'd be glad to hear them.

Anyway, Lighthouse Grace is pretty cool. There are two other volunteers working there: Joe is from Massachusetts and is here with IVHQ, while Stephanie from New Hampshire is an older lady who came with IVHQ before and has returned independently. Joe doesn't really teach any class unless Stephanie is gone for the day, he mostly just hangs out. Stephanie teaches the Standard 3 class beside mine; she calls them little hellions. Before I arrived, Joe had arranged for the courtyard of the school to be paved with very rough concrete so they could put up basketball nets. The first day they worked on it was Tuesday, and it was finished by Wednesday afternoon. So for today and Friday, we've been taking it easy and giving the kids lots of breaks from class to play basketball. Joe is teaching them as much as he can.

Taking it easy seemed to me to mean that the two teachers who taught the older grades took the day off, and I was left with about twenty kids as opposed to the traditional six. So I had to occupy them. I did as much as I could. I wrote out English exercises on the board and they copied them into their books. We had a brief "Teach Meghan Kiswahili" time, but of course I don't remember any of it. I gave them a half hour break at some point, I let them out early for lunch and delayed calling them in again for as long as possible. We played a spelling game, but we stopped because the teacher next door (Stephanie) was tapping on the wall between the classes and shouting. Then I did more English exercises with them, before letting them out again 45 minutes early. I stayed late because James, Mike, and Joe from Fadhili were there, then I hung around a bit with Stephanie and Joe the volunteer. Then I walked home. I do a lot of walking here. Plus, I live five stories up and it's all stairs. I'm not used to that many stairs at home, so I run up them every time unless Erin is walking in front of me to pace me.

That's all for now, I'll write when I have something more exciting.