End of term

 

The Easter holidays have arrived and school is finished. I was happy to be invited to the teachers' end of term meeting / meal.

This consisted of chicken and pork and rice and Irish potatoes and was verrrry nice. Also fizzy drinks which always come out on special occasions.

I had to first sit through a meeting where we went through every class and every lesson discussing achievements and challenges which took a lot longer than I expected but I suppose I'm not used to being a teacher and having these kind of talks.

We discussed ways of motivating children to work harder and behave better, however when I suggested using reward systems and working towards rewards (using the example of Samuel who loves football and saying that if he worked hard he can join in football in sports sessions at the end of the day, and if he misbehaved he would not be able to participate in what he loves) and a lot of the teachers were insistent that this was not a good idea. I explained that I though he'd definitely behave if he knew he could play his favourite game with his classmates, as opposed to sitting and watching if he does not behave. 

One teacher said to me that that might work in England but the children are different here...

I told her that the system doesn't ALWAYS work at home either but it can be a good method to encourage kids to work to goals. Also kids here might have a completely different life and live with a lot less that kids at home, however they are children and children are very similar wherever they are from. They can be cheeky, push boundaries and forget their manners. Anyway the teachers said they might trial it next term so we will see.

The results of the exams the children just did turned out good. Some of the P7s felt they could have done better but they haven't been at this school for long since moving from another local primary school so they had some catching up to do. They have improved their grades in comparison to last term and that's the main thing.

I have really enjoyed being part of the staff at Jinja Christian Primary School, the teachers are lovely, I have had opportunities to teach lessons every week without having had training - something I couldn't just do in England - I've lead chapel doing a talk in from of the whole school which was a good learning experience, and been able to watch the class I have been helping improving and learning more about English and seeing them gaining confidence in reading and writing in different styles. Very grateful for the opportunity!