CBT – My heart break and tears caescad down my cheeks.

(written 12/11/09)




So, I forgot to upload those pictures last time. Oops. Here they are.



Today was the last day of our practice teaching at Berea High School. It was a very productive and very memorable experience. The students were fantastic. First off, their willingness to come to school during the summer, to get a jump start on next year’s material and to help us PC trainees get some practice – that was impressive (though possibly only for lack of anything better to do). But also, their genuine interest in the material, their energy, their discipline, their general good nature – it made teaching a blast. I had students come find me after school to ask extra questions about biology that were on their mind. I had students ask to stay late at the end of the day to finish our statistics activity. They showed up to take 6 exams in one day on Wednesday, came back Thursday to see how they did and review, then came in today for goodbyes, pictures, and an assembly which featured giving of prizes to the top scorers and some songs/speeches. I gave closing remarks at the assembly on behalf of the PC folks. I told the kids how great they were and how much we would miss them. I’ll be totally shocked if my permanent school has such great students.



So with that in mind, here are 2 pictures of me and some of my favorite students. The girl in the picture, Tsepang, was particularly fun. Interesting story, though – one day she had her head down on her desk in the middle of class. I walked up to her desk to wake her up. Her friend next to her frantically got her up first. I reached her desk, pointed a finger at her, and said something to the effect of “Hey – no sleeping.” As soon as I raised my hand, though, she leapt back in her chair with a horrified look on her face. I realized she thought I was going to hit her. Corporal punishment is brutal in Lesotho, and it is everywhere. She’s been ingrained to think that when a teacher approaches to discipline her with a hand in the air, she’s about to feel a lot of pain (case in point, in my other class, which had just 9 kids, 2 have previously had their hands broken from corporal punishment). I felt bad for freaking her out, and apologized to her later in the day. By then she didn’t seem too concerned, and from that point she actually blossomed to be one of the more active students I had. And she asked me to take that picture with her, today, so, I guess it’s alright.



Another funny story about teaching. A lot of us asked our students on the last day to write things they liked and didn’t like about our classes. One kid named Simon, a really bright senior, wrote the following: “…Anyway, wherever you go, May you stil remember us, The more I say the more My heart break and tears caescad down my cheeks. Stil love you and Thank you for doing your work excellently!” Of course, I felt great after reading this. But a short while later I had a conversation with my friend Kimiko, another volunteer. This is what she said: “Eric, I was just talking to Simon, you know what he said? He told me he loves me, and when he thinks of me leaving his heart breaks, and tears cascade down his cheeks!” My eyes were wide. I was astonished, amused, slightly betrayed. I thought his heart only broke for me. But hey, what could I do… I showed her what he wrote me, and we had a good laugh. THEN, at the assembly today, another student from that class, Tanki, gave a speech. In his speech, he said “We love you, and when we think of you leaving, our hearts break more and more.” Again, I laughed, and rolled my eyes. Perhaps it was all totally sincere, but it was pretty silly, to say the least. In any case… really great kids, I’m very glad to have met them.