Another good day in Malawi

Life as a PCV is full of ups and downs. It is easy to complain about how hard it is to be here, living in less than ideal conditions, thousands of miles away from my loved ones. If everyday was difficult, I don't know how long I would last here. Thankfully, there are good days here too, and they keep me motivated and feeling like what I am doing here is worthwhile.

This blog post is about one of those good days. This particular day happened last year when I was still teaching Biology (and I forgot to post it), but it's also a good representation of what it's like for me as an Education Volunteer in Malawi.

I arrived at school a little before 7:30 and started preparing for my first lesson. I had a double period of Physical Science to teach. We are learning about the three states of matter. I brought in a lot of materials to use for demonstrations, like a jar, a cup of water, a box of matches, a bottle filled with beans and a stick of incense. The incense was to demonstrate how gas molecules move freely and do not have a fixed shape or volume. When I lit the incense, the class got really excited. When I was finished with the demo, I asked if I should put it out, but they said no because they liked the smell. At the end of class, they asked if I could bring incense to our next class too!

Later in Biology class we were finishing up our unit on respiration. I went over the four adaptations of respiratory systems for their functions, and then asked the students to work in groups and tell me how each adaptation applied to the specific respiratory systems of humans, fish and insects. I have tried activities like this before, and they have not gone well, but today the students all worked quickly and efficiently to complete the activity. After class, I saw students going up to copy the diagrams and make sure they copied down the answers to the activity. That made me feel good.

I noticed that a few of the students were milling around outside about half an hour later, and I asked if there was a teacher in their class. They said no because the teacher had just given them notes to copy, and they were finished. I had a couple videos about respiration in fish, so I took the students in groups of 10 to another classroom to watch the video on my laptop. Afterwards, they thanked me for showing them the video.

I didn't have anymore classes to teach after that, but I decided to take advantage of the free time to work in the library. I am the Co-Librarian, and we just received a large shipment of books that needed to be arranged. While I was there, a few students dropped by to chat, teachers came in to borrow books for their classes, and I talked with a teacher about how she can use the new books for her subjects.

By 2:45pm I was ready to head home. I said goodbye to the teachers and then headed over to the market to buy some bread and potatoes. On the way I greeted a lot of people, as you do in Malawi. When I got to my house, the neighbor kids asked if they could draw with me. I said no because I was tired. And I was. But after I went inside, changed clothes, made a quick lunch and read the news a bit, I decided to invite the kids over. We sat on my porch, drawing with crayons, reading my Chichewa book, and listening to Yusef (one of the kids) singing.

Some of my "iwes" aka the neighbor kids that keep my home life busy and interesting

Then we went to check on the garden (Note: the photo above is more recent, so the garden looks a lot different than when I originally wrote this blog post). I let the kids pick a few cucumbers and radishes, much to their delight. You would think it was candy-- they were so excited! They helped me weed a little bit, and we put the weeds into the compost pile. Then I grabbed the leftover sugarcane I had bought yesterday to share with them. I wasn't sure how to break it, but no worries-- the 9-year old used a machete. (I spent the whole time fretting she would cut her fingers off, even though the children wield knives when they are three years old here). As we sat munching sugarcane, I was just overcome with this sense of contentment.

I'm a Rebel

The title is mostly in jest. As Colii can attest, I am quite the rule-follower. But when I strongly disagree with a rule on principal, I have few qualms with not following the rule.

This came up yesterday at school. I had been up early to prepare a lab for my Form 1 Physical Science class. We are studying methods of separating mixtures. I was just explaining the lab to my class when a school prefect came in. He said he had a list of the students that reported to school on time that day, and that they were the only ones allowed to be in class. I looked at the list. It had about 11 names out of a class of 90. So basically my whole class was supposed to be punished during my lab period? No way was I gonna let that happen.

I told him that my students were not going to leave my class because we had a lab, and that he should let whichever teacher assigned the punishment know that they should be punished afterschool for their tardiness if need be. Then I sent him on his way and I gave my class a quick lecture on how they need to be at school on time because I don't want them missing my classes.

After that we had a great lab. We looked at separating mixtures by evaporation, filtration, chromatography and hand-picking. It was more of a demonstration since we have very few materials, but I was able to have each group come up and observe all the separations and answer questions about them.

Magnetism Lab

We are finishing up Magnetism in Physical Science. I've done a lot of talking and demonstrating about magnetic force, North-seeking poles and attraction/repulsion, but the best way to learn about magnets is to actually use them. Unfortunately, my school had four magnets and I have about 90 students. What to do?

Luckily I had received some magnets in a care package a while ago-- thanks, Brandy! I've been saving them for this unit and they worked great. With the extra magnets I was able to set up four stations for the students to learn about magnets.

1) Magnetic vs Non-Magnetic Substances

2) North-South orientation in magnets

3) Attraction and repulsion between like and unlike poles

4) Effect of distance on magnetic force

I divided the class into 11 groups and brought them into the lab four groups at a time. The students in class had a homework assignment to work on while they were waiting. It ended up taking an extra period to get all the groups through, but they had an empty period today so it worked out perfectly.

One of my rules was that every student had to use the magnets before leaving the lab. I think this was the first time using magnets for many of the students. I helped them during the lab and they seemed to be getting the material. Plus they were having fun too!

Camp Sky Part One

Malawian students + PCVs = Camp Sky!

Camp Sky was an amazing week! 72 students from all across Malawi came
to learn about math, english and science to prepare for their Malawi School Certificate Exam (MSCE).  There were also 8 Junior Counselors who had attended camp last year and were selected to come back and assist the new campers. Then add about 20 PCV Teachers/Counselors and you have the Camp Sky team.

This year the camp was held at Kamuzu Academy in the Kasungu District in the Central Region of Malawi. The school was closed for Easter Break so they let us use their wonderful facilities for Camp Sky. The campus had brick buildings, manicured lawns, a huge library, computer labs, science laboratories, a pool, a cafeteria and a football field. They even had a beautiful lake in the center of the campus.  It looked like a university in America.

I was a Teacher Counselor at the camp. I taught lessons during the day, and in the evenings I acted as a Camp Counselor for a group of 9 students, along with my PCV Co-Counselor Devyn and a Junior Counselor named Sinoss. Here is a photo of my group, the Bald Eagles.

I taught Biology from 7:30 to 12:00 each day with my PCV co-teachers Kade and Steph. We covered Genetics and Evolution. It was wonderful to be able to teach such small classes. We taught the students in groups of 18, so the teacher:student ratio was 1:6. We were able to provide individual student assistance and answer lots of questions. I also really enjoyed the co-teaching. It was fun to bounce ideas off each other and I received a lot of good ideas and feedback from them. Plus it was nice to have help with passing things out, erasing the chalkboard, and getting prepped for class. I wish I could teach with them all the time.

After lunch the students attended science and computer labs. I assisted in the Biology and Physical Science labs. For Biology the students were given a different ecosystem (dryland, forest or
lakeshore) and asked to come up with a bird that would be adapted for that environment based on the resources available in the habitat. Then they had to present it to the class.  Here is a group presenting their bird for the dryland habitat.

And one of their birds too:

In Physical Science lab the students did a titration.  They added NaOH to an aqueous solution of HCl with phenolphthalein indicator included. Here is one group after completing their titration.  It was only a very light pink-- a perfect titration!

More Camp Sky to come in part two...