BRYANNA
Elementary Education Undergraduate |
BRYANNA
Elementary Education Undergraduate |
I must say, I have a mix of emotions being back. I loved seeing my family, but I also miss the staff at Twangale and my students at Libala. I’m still jet lagged, and I wake up at 5:30 every morning because I’m still on Zambian time. I really wish I could go back and see everyone in Zambia again.
The culture shock I have is a lot worse than what I thought it would be. I miss being around Zambian people all the time, and I definitely miss the food. I can’t explain how badly I want a samosa, and I’m going to have to look up a recipe to make them because I don’t believe there will be anywhere in Buffalo that sells them. I could also go for some nshima and beef, as well as a Debonairs pizza. Now that I’m back though, I know it’s time to use what I’ve learned and apply it. I have a notebook full of ideas that I learned that I want to use in my classroom, and I can’t wait to actually try them out. As I end my blogging, I would like to thank Dr. Shandomo for sharing her wonderful culture with us. Thank you for taking us to your family’s houses and showing us what the real Zambia is like. I don’t think going to Zambia would have been nearly as interesting as it was without you, a real Zambian. I have to go back to Zambia one day because I want to take a helicopter ride over Victoria Falls, so this is not a good-bye, but until next time Zambia!!
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As my journey comes to an end in Zambia, I must say feelings of sadness overwhelm me. I don’t want to leave, and I definitely think I could have used an extra two weeks here to visit more schools and interact with the people more. For this last blog I would like to reflect on the entire experience, and I like to reflect on things using a roses and thorns activity. Roses are good things that have happened, and thorns are the not so good things. I will first talk about my thorns, and then talk about my roses. My first thorn would be the one mosquito bite that I got! Contrary to what I thought before I came to Zambia, there actually weren’t that many mosquitos. I don’t think many people in our cohort even got mosquito bites, and that’s why I’m shocked that I even got one. Of course thoughts of malaria came to my mind, but one thing I learned here is that malaria is not as bad as it seems. Yes you will get very sick if you get it, but all you have to do is go to the doctor if you think you have it, and you will be fine. Everyone that I’ve met in Zambia has had malaria at least once, and they are all living. So even though my mosquito bite is one of my thorns, it will not stop me from visiting Zambia again. My second and last thorn would be the little bit of time we had to spend with our students at Libala. I can’t explain how difficult it was to say good-bye to the students. They all were so bright and had so much potential. They were intelligent and attentive in class, which was something I enjoyed seeing. I would have loved just one more week with them, because one week was just not enough. Now that I’m done with my thorns, I will move on to my roses. There are far too many of them, so I will only state a few. My first rose is the friendships I’ve made on this trip. I can tell that the ladies I’ve met on this trip will still be around in the future. I have a space in my heart for each and every one of them, and I’m glad that I was able to embark on this experience with these wonderful women. My second rose would be how comfortable I felt with the culture. I lovveeed the food (samosas, nshima with beef, and biscuits). Many Zambians practice an extension of Christianity called Seventh Day Aventist, which is very close to what I practice, which is Baptist Christianity. Dr. Shandomo even took us to her Church, which was a lot like mine at home. I never felt uncomfortable anywhere I went because everyone was very nice and loving. The last rose I will talk about is the strategies I learned about teaching. I recieved a teaching position that I will start in the fall, and I closely examined teaching styles in Zambia so I could bring them back to my class. Every teacher had their own little handclap, and this is something I will develop for my classroom. The teachers had high expectations for their students, and I know I will have high expectations for my students as well. All in all, observing the teachers helped me think about how I want to run my classroom in the fall. I can’t even begin to explain how blessed I am to have had this opportunity of a lifetime. I don’t want to leave, but I know I have work to do at home to help those students. I will never forget these experiences, and I hope to be back soon to visit. The cohort and I visited a history museum in Lusaka a few days ago. The museum first talked about the beginnings of man, and a lot of this I learned during high school. After learning about this, the tour guide began to talk about the history of Zambia. I noted that Zambia never officially had a real war, and I think this causes the country to have such a peaceful environment. We also learned about their flag and what it means. The picture below shows what everything on the flag stands for, and to me, the most important color is the black. Black stands for the people of Zambia because the color of the majority of the people in Zambia is very dark. I love that they put this on their flag because it’s important to have pride in who you are and how you look. This shows that Zambians feel empowered by who they are. Another important thing that we learned was that there are 73 local languages spoken in Zambia, and the language you speak depends on the location of your tribe and who migrated there. The nations official language is English, but during my time here thus far I’ve heard Tonga, Lozi, and Chinyanga (Tonga is the language Dr. Shandomo speaks). Also, the English spoken here is far different from the English spoken in the U.S. (sometimes I have no idea what they’re saying!) Even though there are 73 local languages, a lot of them are very similar. Often, you will find someone who knows 4-5 of the local languages because they were not hard to learn or they moved around a bit. Learning about the history of Zambia made me feel more at home. Although it’s sometimes hard to understand what people are saying, I feel the comforting, empowering environment all the time. Dr. Shandomo always tells us she’s proud to be a Zambian, and I can see why. Zambian’s are hard-working and kind people, and who wouldn’t be proud to be from a country with people like this. This weekend I had the experience of a lifetime. I went to Mukambi Safari, where I did three land safaris and one boat safari. I felt like Steve Irwin; on the hunt for different animals throughout Kafue National Park. We stayed in little huts called chalets and here is where I felt like I was really living like an indigenous person. There was no wifi, no heat (although they did give us these warm water pouches that we put in our beds to make them warm), and the electricity occasionally went out. There were animals all around our chalet, and the guards told us that during one of the mornings there were lions walking around where we stayed. I’m upset that I missed it, because that sure would have been a sight to see. 5 minutes into my first safari, our tour guide David drove us close to some elephants. We stopped, because he told us that the elephant presented lines on her face that meant she was getting ready to charge. She did not know us, and an elephant’s first instinct is to protect their young. Thus, we had to wait for the elephant to calm down and get used to us so we could proceed. I’ve never been more scared in my life, but this also got my adrenaline going to see more animals. Throughout my safaris, I saw more elephants, puku, wild bucks, water bucks, antelopes, hippos, crocodiles, and wild dogs. I learned that nothing is more dangerous than a hippo because they are very territorial. When they feel attacked, they can run fast as lightening and cause serious damage. Our last night we had a bonfire, and the workers of Mukambi sat us down and talked to us about how to interact with nature. I loved this part of the trip because it helped me realize that as humans, we are really attacking animal territory. At one point in time, both humans and animals were able to live in harmony together. Now, humans are so concerned with tearing down land to build houses when really this is where animals live; we took their habitat. As humans, we are supposed to co-exist with animals, and the tour guides tried showing us that. The workers knew how to handle the animals because they understood that they are supposed to live on this Earth with animals. I loved every minute of being at Mukambi, and I can’t wait to one day go on another safari. Since I’ve graduated, I can tell you that I’ve learned numerous concepts and ideas about how to run my future classroom. I took a class on classroom management, how to use manipulatives in math, and how to teach pedagogy using different engagement strategies (ex. Mini white boards and handouts). I sat in a fifth-grade classroom today and was in awe by how the teacher ran her classroom using very few of the things I learned school. Her students were engaged in their learning, and all they had was a chalk board, pens, and paper. The class started out with students walking in late, and when students arrive late here they must see the teacher and explain why they were late. The teacher just gives them a stern nod and the students silently walk to their seats. She eventually proceeds to do what we would call in the U.S., gradual release of responsibility. She did one problem in front of the class, had a student come up to the board and do a problem with the class, and then she gave the entire class two problems to complete by themselves while she walked around and did formative assessment. Not only did she have this in common with what I’ve learned in school, but she had the students do a specific clap after another student did something correct (ex. Clap clap, pause, clap clap clap). Although there were some similarities, one thing that stuck out to me was that this classroom did not need a behavior management plan. These students were so well behaved because school in Zambia is a competition. Not everyone gets to make it past 9th grade because there aren’t enough spaces in the schools throughout Zambia. This causes students to try hard even at an early age because they want the chance to go past 9th grade. If school was a competition in the U.S., I doubt that any teacher would really need a classroom management plan. I also noticed that these students were engaged without all of the extras we have in the U.S. It seems that many schools in the U.S. make it necessary for teachers to have smartboards and iPads, when in all reality we don’t need them. The students in my fifth-grade classroom were able to tell me about numerous different diseases without ever touching an iPad or a smartboard; just by what the teacher told them. Seeing this had me realize that sometimes in the U.S. we’re too focused on making sure that students have all of these different resources, when in all reality all they need is a notebook, pen, and a great teacher. I’ve loved every education class that I’ve taken at Buff State, but I must say it was quite the experience to see teachers not use a lot of what I’ve learned. I think this goes back to the students that teachers are teaching, and I’d be lying if I said the students in the U.S. and in Zambia are the same. The students in Zambia fight for what they want, which causes them to be so well behaved. Unfortunately, many students in the U.S. don’t understand the education that they are given and believe they can make it in life without school. The students in the U.S. have caused colleges in the U.S. to make their teacher education programs fit to students who might not necessarily even want to be in school. But Zambian students want to be in school, which causes the teachers to not need as much training on different ways to make learning engaging and fun. All in all, teaching is very different in Zambia. We all know that the media portrays Africa as a poor country. We’ve all seen the commercials that say “Donate a penny a day and help feed this child” while sad music plays. And what I’m going to say does not mean that there are not hungry children in Africa. But in my personal opinion, it is not wise to believe the hype; ALL of Africa is not poor. With the idea that Africa is a place where people live in huts and starve, I thought I would be stepping foot in a country where people would be begging me for money and food. To my surprise, there is actually a mall with designer stores including a MAC makeup store and Pandora. Everyone looks like normal people with jobs and money to spend. There are grocery stores and fast food restaurants like KFC and Pizza Hutt. I must say, walking around in the mall makes me feel like I’m right at home. Now this might sound silly, but the most important thing that I’ve noticed thus far is the amount of black people that I’ve encountered that had jobs in clean environments and were successful. It’s Africa, of course everyone’s black. But where I’m from, this is not the case. Buffalo is a VERY segregated place. Most black people live in the city, while many white people live in the suburbs. Unfortunately, in Buffalo many of the stores have workers of color and they are not well kept, while the stores in the suburbs have more white people and are always clean when you walk in. I grew up in the suburbs, so it was not all the time I saw people who looked like me working in a nice, clean store. This is why I say it was truly a sight to see so many people of color working in a nice environment and being successful. Now of course we have come across some places where there are poor people. Some people live in small houses (not huts!) and don’t have nice clothes and look like they struggle. However, do we not have communities like this in Buffalo? Of course we do. There are children at home who go nights without eating and struggle to make it. As Americans we just simply think that only poor and hungry people live in Africa.
The entire point of this blog is to inform you all to stop listening to what the media tells us. My experience in Zambia has been entirely the opposite of what I thought. There are people of color thriving, while many Zambians suffer from the same problems that we have in the U.S. The media develops our minds to believe a certain thing, but in all reality, you’ll never know what’s true unless you see it for yourself. In less than 24 hours, I will be traveling to Lusaka, Zambia. Although I'm excited, there's a lot that I'm nervous about. The flight is 20 hours! And although I was able to master a 10 hour flight to Chile, doubling that time is nerve-racking. The 20 hours is broken up; JFK to Dubai is around 12 and a half hours, and Dubai to Lusaka is around 6 and a half. I have music and a great neck pillow, so hopefully I will be able to get some sleep!
I think I'm most excited about working in the schools and with Zambian children. Teaching is what I love doing, and I love seeing smiles on children's faces. The schools in Lusaka have around 60 students, which is more than I've ever seen in my life. When I went to Chile, the classes had around 40, and the teachers were able to make it work. I can't wait to see new classroom management strategies that I will be able to use in my own classroom in the fall. There's so many things for me to explore when I'm in Zambia. Keep reading to see what's new! |