So I realized I need to take a step back and really explain what school's like, from the beginning.
I have afternoon classes only, as I only have the 9th grade. 10th grade has classes during the morning, 8th also has classes during the afternoon. 11th and 12th grades are also at my school, in the morning, but in the 2nd cycle. 8th-10th are in the 1st cycle. The 2 cycles make up the secondary school. There are additionally night classes for all of the levels. Morning session starts at 7 AM and goes until 12:10 PM. Afternoon session starts at 12:45 PM and goes until 5:55 PM. Night session starts at 6:00 PM and goes until 11:10 PM.
Every school has a director, and a pedagogical director for each cycle for day and night classes. Thus, my pedagogical director is only the pedagogical director for day classes in the first cycle. Every discipline, of which there are 10, has a director, and every turma, or group of students, has a director from the staff.
Of the 10 disciplines, Portuguese and Mathematics meet 5 times a week, Biology, English, Chemistry and Physics meet 3 times a week, and Drafting, History and Geography meet twice per week. Physical Education meets during the morning for 8th and 9th grades and during the afternoon for 10th grade. I am not certain of the 11th-12th grade schedule, but I know they study Philosophy and French instead of 2 first cycle disciplines.
Each turma has a room that they stay in while the professors move around (making dramatic entrances!). They elect a chief (chefe), kind of a class president, and other officers. The chefe, who has not been appointed yet in my school, can be very useful in class. Volunteers often use the chefe to help control students, read things to be dictated, or even help teach, depending on the quality of the chefe.
Regardless of being elected, leaders naturally crop up in the classroom, with or without a chefe. You can count on them to help quiet everyone down, and answer questions that should be obvious but are presented to involve students in the class.
But I'm getting ahead of myself.
I walk to school every day around 12-12:30, depending on if I need to talk to people before class. Many students call me "Stor" - but I don't know the exact derivation of the term. It seems to be short for Professor in a weird kind of way. But it's only about a 4 minute walk to school, which is a two-story building dressed in pink, the compound surrounded by a fence that's red wire on top of concrete - in 10 foot sections that are in various states of disrepair - spread over 4 or so blocks. The lower level houses the pedagogical director's offices, the director's office, the professors' room (that now has 6 computers - more on that later), the secretaries, and about 11 classrooms. The upper level houses the students who stay at school, mirroring the rooms below them.
There are four other buildings on the compound. Taking north to be straight ahead when you walk in the front entrance, there is a volleyball/basketball court with an equipment room of sorts on the southeast corner, a gymnasium due north, an old dilapidated classroom complex (that I described before) in the northwest corner, and a snack stand on the western boundary. School sits due south, a little west. The soccer field makes up the rest of the eastern boundary.
I walk in through the main entrance, bypassing the downed fence that would save me a minute's time if I hopped it. My house is northeast of the school.
As soon as I step into the compound, I can feel the stares of students who are hanging out on the "hallways" (everything is outdoors, of course). It's not that they don't stare at me while I walk to class, it's just much more obvious when they don't have walking to be preoccupied with.
As I say my greetings, some in English if students want to practice their English, I inevitably see a couple other professors and ask the usual questions and say the usual things.
If I'm going to my first class, I grab the Livro de Turma (the "Book for the Class") for my first class (which is also the chefe's responsibility to delegate) and head into the room after chatting with the woman who guards the books and keeps the professors updated with what's going on today.
The book contains the names of all of the students along with their assigned numbers. It has a weekly schedule for the turma, where the corresponding professor writes the summary of their lesson and signs off on it. Additionally, and some would say most impotrantly, marks absences with a black, blue or red pen. Roll must be called every period, and normal faltas are marked with black or blue. Red faltas are considered extremely severe and a student with a certain number of these can be expelled.
When I walk into class, the students stand up and wish me good afternoon in a very militaristic, tortured manner. But without it, they would be treating me differently, with less respect. I sometimes have to cue them to stand, but they'll do it as reluctantly as I order them to.
I unpack my matierals for teaching and my eraser. This is around the time I start getting into character and planning out what I want to do in the next 5 minutes. If this sounds like acting, that's how I've been approaching every class. It's a small, somewhat improvised performance - but I find this necessary because my in-class personality has to be strict and confident. These are two qualities I don't naturally have very much of, at least at this point in my teaching. And I don't know if I ever want to be "strict" per se, but playing the same role 24 times a week for two years...we'll see.
I start every class with a small discussion about AIDS, what I believe to be the biggest problem plaguing this country that can be solved through education. I usually let discipline go a little during this part of the lesson, so as to facilitate participation. But then I start the lesson and ask for silence.
Lessons vary tremendously, depending upon the time of day, how much information needs to be presented and in what manner, the rowdiness of the students, and the mood I'm in. Also, if something funny happens.
On Friday, the door to the classroom was opening and closing, being very disruptive. So I asked a student to close it, and he kept shutting it, but not latching it, so that it didn't fully close. I was getting pretty frustrated, so I went over to the door, and demonstrated how to open the latch, close the door, and release the latch. Unfortunately, at this moment, I noticed that there was nothing for the door to latch onto, which had been the problem all along. This prompted an uproar of laughing, and it was all I could do to say "in character" and just play it off as a simple mistake. I knew smiling would just set them off more.
So I told one of the students to move his desk (where another student was sitting as well) up against the door. While I walked back to the front of the room, they moved the desk against the door, with the student who was seated away from the door seated again, but the other student who needed to get back in, standing up behind the desk.
Realizing he had just painted himself into a corner, and that it would be rude to me to hop over the back, he half-moved in every direction, exploring every option in a very panicked manner. Watching the whole thing develop, I just couldn't contain myself - the comedy of everything and how formality was ridiculous when kids are dressed in flip-flops and t-shirts. I sat there and laughed, prompting the students to laugh as well until he managed to get back into his seat.
They quieted down nicely, having gotten some energy out of their systems.
I do not wish for peace.
I wish for the abandonment of war. Peace is something that happens because of war, but I want the whole idea thrown out altogether. Without dark, there is no light - without peace, there is no war.
Therefore, my simple wish is for a world without peace and thus without war.
Back to teaching.
I find that I'm getting really good at only making a mistake once. This is good, because I have to essentially do the same thing eight times, every time.
It's fun being in front of the class, especially when a student is participating. They are trying so hard, so much harder than American students, to "wing" it when called on to do so. When they are in front, their voices get low, their body language is sheepish and in general they seem to understand what it's like to have to teach. But that role of student temporarily teaching is so much different. When you are teaching, you are assumed to be correct and so you can behave with confidence, even if you're not. As a student in front of their peers, there is no assumption of correctness. Being constantly scrutinized is one of the major causes of tension, and though the information I present is mainly devoid of that, my appearance and simply my presence causes a lot of scrutiny.
I get 1/3 to 1/4 the salary of the other teachers at my school, and though it's partially compensated by free rent, electricity and water, being held to all of the same (if not higher) standards is frustrating.
The plight of the development worker, I suppose.
Peace
John
