Reflections, Final Thoughts, & Learnings

Zulfah and Koni seeing me off at the Medan airport.  Thank you for everything Zulfah.  You are amazing.  I sincerely hope that this is the beginning of an exchange between us, not the end.

I’ve been back just over a week now and it seems, simultaneously, like I was in Indonesia only yesterday and like it was already years ago that I visited Sumatra.  Time and space are funny things, and the mind is a very funny and complicated organ which construes or distorts things so readily and easily.  There has been some culture shock since my return, predictably, but not as bad as one might expect after such an intense month in a developing country.  I realized, mid-way through my trip, that previous travels and my diverse circle of friends and experiences in the U.S. equipped me quite well for what might otherwise have been unfamiliar or uncomfortable…and coming home (and feeling that I know live in 2 worlds, or multiple worlds) is not a new feeling for me either.  And so it is that I start this U.S. life again…

I want to put some “proper” closure on this blog, though, and so I return for this final entry.  With some time to reflect (although not much) and with my school year right around the corner (I’m on lunch break from a workshop that kicks off my work here), there are many things I wish to record and share in terms of my realizations and learnings this summer.  Given the title of my blog, the emphasis on education, this is appropriate I feel, and I hope, on some level, that this might be of use or interest to those who read it and perhaps even to me at a future date…when all of this seems more dream than reality.

List form will work best, I think, as I don’t have much time for this writing now that I’m back in the thick of it (my work that is) and seeing as I also have a thing for lists J…There is no way this list could ever be complete – each day I have a new epiphany as I process, on some deep, subconscious level, my summer and the other learnings, readings, and experiences in my life, but here is what I’m thinking and feeling now:

Professional Realizations/Learnings:

• Teaching is truly a passion and those engaged in this work that lack that passion and calling are merely collecting a paycheck and zombie-walking through life, to both their own detriment and those of the thousands of young people they interact with everyday.  Why do that?  Follow what you love.  Don’t settle for what you think will be an easy or safe path, or the only perceived available path….  I met some teachers in Medan who wished for other careers, other lives, and it made me quite sad.  I’ve met such teachers in the U.S. too.  While they don’t make up the majority in either place, these folks who teach as a job, not a passion, influence the climate of the schools they work in and impact the youth they meet in their classes.  We have only this one life and work fills so much of it.  The old adage, “Do what you love; love what you do” resounds in my head.  And I do.  I do love this teaching thing!  I hope one day that teaching will be a career that people aspire to have and that they take on with love and full commitment.
• Objectives that are clearly stated (and adhered to in terms of planning and lesson/unit focus) are truly critical.  With some goal in mind, a student can strive for understanding…if they know where they are going, they are more likely to try to get there…not always…but given my experiences in challenging content-area classrooms in a foreign language, I really needed something to hang my hat on, something to focus on and feel some success in attaining (if I could).  I needed to know what we were doing and why…and our students need to know this as well.  Doesn’t take much time or effort, but a world of difference may result.
• Money/resources do not make great classrooms, teachers, or schools.  SMA 3 Medan has very limited resources and severely restricted budgets (our budget woes in the U.S. are nothing, honestly) and yet I witnessed some of the best teaching I’ve ever seen.  Likewise, a projector and a PowerPoint doesn’t necessarily make for an engaged class or effective lesson.  I know this, or I knew this, but it was good to be reminded, particularly given the political rhetoric and maneuvering and the economic woes we face in the U.S. and in Arizona in particular.  This is not to say that money and resources are not important or that we shouldn’t invest in education and in modern technologies and creative approaches…this is only to say that the teacher is central and the content knowledge and skill that teacher brings to her/his lesson planning and delivery is critical.
• Global awareness and global education is not an extra, not a curricular add-on.  It is an essential.  We, humans, are collectively devastating this world environmentally and we are constantly working against each other in terms of economics, politics, social development.  Although we are bound as a species in these ways, how much do we really know about each other and how much do we care to learn about each other?  What are our schools and other socializing forces doing to increase global awareness and cross-cultural understanding?  What is our education system doing to develop thinkers who are able to hold multiple interests and multiple perspectives in their minds when making decisions?  How many languages (lenses) can we see the world through?  I have so many questions, concerns actually, about the state of the world…and rather than take a doomsday approach, I see real hope in our concerted effort as educators to develop a true global community…but there is much work to be done.  So, where will I start in relation to this particular issue? It overwhelms me, but there are small steps I plan to take this year and then hopefully I’ll meet others engaged in this work as well and new ideas will arise.

o   First, I plan to create weekly bulletins (with quick fact summaries and then weblinks for additional information) for our school staff (and for interested students) about each of the countries represented on our campus.  I think we need to start with the population we work with directly…there is so much we don’t know about our own students and the diverse countries they come from. ..we can build from there.

o   Second, I intend to work with my students to develop their thinking and their analyses beyond that of their home country and the U.S.  There is so much they are processing as they try to understand their transition here to the U.S. and work to find an individual fit between two cultures (their home country culture and that of the U.S.), and yet there is much more to the world than only those two countries/cultures.  I want my students to see themselves as truly global citizens and to have understandings of the entire world and a sense of responsibility and love for the entire world…basically to see possibilities for their life anywhere on this planet and thus feel connected to the entire planet and to everyone on this planet.  This will break down either/or paradigms, black/white thinking and open up, literally, a world of possibilities…which I hope will be exciting for them and productive for us all as we learn, share, discuss…

o   Third, there are many small projects I’m considering taking on to develop greater global awareness in my school, city, and among my students: a project on world Englishes and on the implications and impacts of English being a global language to be done with my Academic Writing students, a local radio program weekly featuring the voices and stories of the immigrant/refugee students I work with; a debate club/team as part of the Finding Our Voice club with a focus on researching/debating global issues; publishing articles about the work Josh Schachter and I do with Finding Voice as a way to share the both our work and our students’ voices….

Personal Realizations/Learnings:

• I am a strong, physically and mentally, woman.  “Duh!” some of you reading this will shout, but this summer provided a very good and very necessary reminder for me.  Most significantly, I tested my digestive system (my weak point as many of you know) to its true limits and I survived.  And, I completed the most arduous hike I’ve ever done – actually the hardest thing I’ve ever done physically – with greater strength, agility, confidence, and stamina than I thought possible for me.  The “silly” talk about a triathlon or a decade of thru-hikes is not so silly anymore.  I know that I can take on these physical and mental challenges, and much more besides.
• I have much more time available to me than I recognize.  Being unmarried and without kids, most people assume that all of my time is my own and that, of course, I have tons of free time… but those who know me know that I fill it fully with work and hiking and other odds and ends.  What I realized in watching dynamic-Zulfah move through her very busy, very complicated, very full of people life, is that I can manage my time more effectively and find ways to get together with friends and family more, write and publish articles about what I do as a teacher and perhaps other things too, create some art, hike, bike, swim, plan vacations, cook, and much more.   In other words, balancing my work life with other aspects of my life and personality is possible!  Every year I feel that I come closer to this (during my 1^st few years of teaching I thought it might be impossible), and this year may be the break-through year.  It’s really about priorities and focus and will.
•  And finally, with regards to social justice and environmental stewardship – the well-being of the world on all levels and in all ways - the actions of one do make an impact.  Of this I am more certain than ever.  Nothing like being in a dirty, crowded city in a developing nation to awaken these social responsibilities and a sense of agency.  Tucson is so spread out; people live in relative isolation of each other and of the rest of the world (or so it seems to me much of the time); and it is easy to ignore things or to feel apathetic or ineffectual (one reason I thought I would never return to Tucson to live).  A big city wakes one up – wakes me up…and there is much I need to do to be certain that I am living as I want to be living, doing no harm and doing some good for and in this world.  I don’t want to sound preachy or holy in any way, just want to record that I know that what I do and how I live impacts others – across the globe even…and if I care about this Earth and profess a socially conscious mind and empathetic heart, then I have to monitor how I live and what I do and make changes where I see things out of line, things causing harm... 

On that note, I end this list regarding my Sumatran Pendidikan. 

There is a phrase in Indonesian: “Buah Hati” which means the fruit of my heart – corresponding loosely to the American phrase: “The apple of my eye.”  Indonesia is now among my buah hati nations, the many fruits that nourish me and color my life, the places and the people living in those places that are in my heart.  Thank you Zulfah, TEA program folks, and everyone else who helped make this summer possible (including my wonderful mom who spent time with my cats).  I hold each of you in my hati.

Saying Goodbyes

I can't believe that this one month adventure is nearly at a close.  Tomorrow will be my last day at school. Tonight I went out to eat with my host family as a way to say thank you and prepare the kids for goodbye.  Lulu has become quite attached to me (even though we can't communicate) and I to her as well.  This is the thing about travel...you meet wonderful new people and then have to say goodbye.  But I hope I will return someday and I hope that some of the amazing students I've met will one day be studying in the U.S. and we will have a chance to meet again.  A few parting photos (you'll notice they all revolve around food :)

Dinner at Ibu Dewi's last night with Zulfah and Suriana.  Such delicious food - chicken, veggie soup, prawns, and the most amazing pineapple curry-like dish!  YUM

The last class I taught today (XII IPA 9) - an absolutely wonderful group!  They were working on recipes of classic Indonesian dishes for me.  I now have 10 English-language, delicious recipes to try at home!

The same class - after presenting their recipes.  Yeah :-)

Wonderful Mia (the older daughter I've been living with) who has helped so much with translation around the house and just making me feel comfortable and happy...and little Lulu!

Lulu drinking her avocado and chocolate "juice" or shake type thing.

She dug into her clams like a pro - sucking out the meat and drinking down the juices.  So fun to watch!

We ate the most delicious grilled fish (the fish we ate is called Bawal), crab, veggies, rice...Ani, the mom, is on the left, Bram is in the middle, and Mia on the right.

Lulu dancing around the house, with Ani watching in the background.

Doesn't Bram look like a future wildcat?!

And Lulu has a bit of Catalina spirit, and a cool hat that she wanted to show off as well.

My Medan Home & Neighborhood

Just a quick post (though it will take an hour or more to upload the photos) to show where I've been living and a bit of the neighborhood and school...some interesting highlights of this neighborhood include a skate park and small soccer field just down the street, a train track just beyond the houses across the street (with the cutest, shortest trains I've ever seen delivering gasoline around the region), and the high school (SMA 3) with it's graffiti art wall designed a couple of years ago.

This is the home where I stayed, just a 3 minute walk from school.  One of Zulfah's former students is related to the owner of the house, a policeman who works far away, and so I was able to stay with a wonderful family (mom, two daughters, and son) in this very nice house.

Just a block away from "home" is the railroad crossing...and it looks very rural and village-like along the tracks.

Seems many becak drivers live along the railroad tracks.  Most homes here are constructed of scraps of metal and wood.

And, just beyond the tracks, one finds this sort of residential area.  These homes are private homes, most have "gardens" along their driveway and sometimes on the upper terrace too.  Bars are the norm for all middle-class and upper-class homes here, and also for schools and stores.

This is Jalan Bilan...a larger street just around the corner from my homestay home.  It recently got paved (yahoo!) so some of the dust has settled :-)

Jalan Yos Sudarso, the major street near the school and my homestay home...it's quite busy.

Another shot of Jalan Yos Sudarso - rather calm at this moment and nicely walkable.  I enjoy walking, as you know, and so I have walked around the neighborhood quite a bit. Usually, I'm the only one on foot and the becak drivers are beside themselves and confused, trying to get me to hop in for a ride.  Walking is not common here - mostly because there are no real sidewalks and traffic is horrendous and quite dangerous.

The entrance to SMA 3.  Renovations are under way and you can see the construction in progress behind the gate.  It's a bright, cheerful school, though, which I like.

Some of the art students created for the school wall a few years ago as part of a graffiti abatement project.  The wall just to the south of this school wall is tagged by local gangs I'm told...haven't seen any gangs to be honest, but then again, I'm not sure what they might look like.  Maybe it's the boys from the skate-park up to some mischief at night...ha!

This one is rather interesting to me - those eyeless eyes, soulless eyes, are intense...and the tagging adds an interesting layer over the school name I think.

So sweet and nerdy.  Love this one!

This was the "winning" design...to the right is a motorcycle streak which adds a cool effect not in the original artwork :-)

Love it!  This design is so western, so urban, so bad-ass...and then the main message at bottom reads: "Without teacher we're nothing."  Sweetness all around.

Global Awareness, Global Education, Global Citizenship

"Imagine there's no countries
It isn't hard to do
Nothing to kill or die for
And no religion too
Imagine all the people
Living life in peace...

You may say I'm a dreamer
But I'm not the only one
I hope someday you'll join us
And the world will be as one..."

While it may be cliche or trite or cheesy to quote these lyrics by John Lennon as I start this entry, it feels right to me as the song is running through my head right now as I think about what I am going to take away from this exchange, this summer adventure, and what I'm hoping to share with everyone who is reading this blog and everyone I talk with about my experiences when I get home.  The beauty of my work is that I do work with an international student body and that we do explore issues of global concern through the international language of English...but is our school really an international school or a globally aware and engaged campus?  Are U.S. schools in general preparing global citizens?  Are other countries doing so?

According to a just released report on ASCD Newsbriefs, Americans are scoring terribly in geography.  This is not new, in fact, and is no surprise, but it is still quite depressing.  With all of the connectivity via the internet and all of the broadcast global struggles (political, economic, environmental, social) and the import of foods and goods from around the world to feed the insatiable American appetite, what do we really know of the world?  Very little, clearly, as indicated by the geography statistics and also from some anecdotes about pre-travel preparations.  When I called my bank to ask them to put a note on my account that I would be overseas and told the service agent that I was going to be in Indonesia, his reply was, "Ok.  Where is that?  Can you spell it please?"  And when Dustin was talking with a college secretary about his pending journey to Sumatra, her reply was, "Oh, so you can practice your Spanish there?"  And while I don't expect everyone to know everything about the world (there are many gaps in my own knowledge), some basic knowledge and some fundamental interest would be a very big change and good step toward global citizenship.

A student in one of the classes here asked me the other day, why do Americans only know about Bali?  Of course this is a generalized statement and not entirely true, but then again Bali is well-known....though I wonder how many Americans even know that it is in Indonesia.

Some ideas that come to mind regarding how to turn this around:
1) Continue to support and develop more exchange programs like the one I'm on or the programs that bring international exchange students to U.S. schools...and help others become aware of and take part in these opportunities
2) Engage individuals with international experience (including our refugee students!) in discussions about their home countries, the world, and more with American students and in multiple contexts: Social Studies classes, English classes, workshops, festivals, etc.
3) Use project-based learning, webquests and thinkquests and other pedagogical strategies as a way to have students apply their learning in a global context and share their ideas with peers worldwide
4) Critically explore the implications of the "Americanization" of the world - from McDonald's & KFC, to fashion, to movies and music cultures, to English, to "democractic" movements, and much more...
5) Create PLCs (professional learning communities or teacher-teams) that explore, analyze, and evaluate their teaching and their students learning in both a local and a global context...engage in intellectual, broad research of methodologies, successes, and so on both within a school and around the world
6) Work with curriculum design committees to make global awareness and global citizenship (and responsibility) central topics across disciplines

...I will return to this entry and add more ideas and some more concrete thoughts about what I might bring back to my class and school directly when I have more time...

Until then, what do you all think?  What can/should be done?  What role can you play?  What steps do we need to take as a community to turn these things around?  Imagine...

Food & Sightseeing Fun

Ok, having gotten so serious in my last post, I think it's time to lighten things up a bit and talk about the food, the sights, and so on...To be honest, Medan is a crazy city - it's big, it's hot, it's polluted, and the traffic is awful!  But, it is also incredibly fascinating and layered and is situated in the most amazing region in North Sumatra which is surrounded by beautiful places (at least in the areas where palm oil and rubber plantations have not taken over)....and the food is outstanding, especially for one like me who eats a rice-based diet :-)

So let's start with food...I've tried so many new things in the past few weeks that I can't even begin to describe all of them, but I'll list some highlights and then give you a couple of visuals so that you can get a sense of the feasts I've enjoyed...Rendang (a food I knew from NYC actually) is my favorite of Indonesian foods and I have feasted on it three times thusfar.  I love it!  Sate is also well known in the U.S., but not in all the varieties one can find here: clam, beef heart...I stick to the chicken sate.  Lontok is a pounded, steamed rice that is then sliced and eaten with a spicy peanut sauce and vegetables such as pacal or with sate or whatever.  It's kind of like mochi, though not quite as dense and it is served savory, not sweet.  Bakso  is incredibly popular with the students and is supposedly one of the two foods (the other being sate) that President Obama said he liked on a recent visit to Indonesia.  Bakso are meatballs and their served in a soup with vegetables and noodles.  Nasi goreng  is a classic: fried rice.  Ayam penyet is a kind of pounded and fried chicken...I don't understand how it is made actually, but it is like a roast chicken, sort of, and is quite delicious.  Bihun kuah is a rice noodle soup with vegetables and seafood that can be quite spicy or not and is really good and nourishing.  And these are just some of the Indonesian food highlights - there are delicious Chinese foods as well...and the veggies (especially the greens) and fruits are amazing!  So fresh, so flavorful, so delightful.  I'm feasting on as much pineapple and papaya and mango and passion fruit and rambutan (just came in season) and watermelon and asian pears as I can!

This was a delicious meal of fresh fish, vegetable soup, spicy tofu and shrimp, and rice.  We were at a wonderful roadside restaurant with Ibu Dewi, a friend of Zulfah's, and we sat and ate lesehan style...meaning sitting on the floor around a table outdoors.  Wonderful!

Here's Ibu Dewi with so many amazing dishes.  This type of restaurant has many, many, many foods prepared and they bring you a bit of everything.  You pay for what you eat...and we enjoyed chicken, fish curry, wonderful sauteed greens, spicy eggplant, green beans, and more.  Most of my meals are much simpler than the two illustrated here - my lunch is rice and some protein and veggie dishes wrapped in a banana leaf; breakfast is rice and egg or whatever yummy treats my host family is eating that day.

In addition to eating well, I've had the great fortune of having many gracious and generous tour guides take me to the sights in and around Medan.  I've seen so many things and will offer a few photos and short stories below:

Danau Toba (Lake Toba) viewed from the road leading into Parapat.  The countryside near Lake Toba is lovely - terraced rice paddies, small vegetable farms, some plantations...and then you see this.  Gorgeous!

Another view of the hills and the lake, from our ferry en route to Samosir Island.

Yes, this is still Lake Toba!  I love the color of the water - wanted to swim and play here so much and hope to return.  I also loved the canoes (roughly-carved from a single tree it looked like) kids were steering around a tourist spot.

The ferry ride was an hour long, and cool, and relaxing...Suriana took a sweet nap as we traveled.

When we arrived on Samosir Island we encountered a great monument to Batak culture which included these symbols: geckos and four breasts.  The geckos are the key symbol of the Batak and are said to represent protection, loyalty, and adaptability.  The four breasts represent the two wives that a Batak king took (the 2nd one he married because the first was infertile) and, according to a guide who showed us around the sites, they symbolize life, fertility, harmony, and peace.

Zulfah and I are standing by some ancient sculptures of guards to a graveyard area that has the graves of three Batak kings: one from the kingdom of wood, one from the kingdom of stone, and one from the kingdom (or era) of bone.

Parapat is a very popular tourist destination for both Indonesian and foreign tourists.  Families were picnicking, swimming, and relaxing at this port area.

Before visiting Toba, we went to a palm oil refinery construction project that Ibu Dewi has contracted and which she needed to check on.  It was fascinating (and horrific) on so many levels.  The smoke you see in the background is from a neighboring factory already in operation.  The effect of the palm oil industry on the environment is absolutely devastating...and where can it be found?  In our junk foods: oreos, chips, etc. etc. etc. 

Bamboo is used as a common scaffolding material throughout Indonesia (and other parts of the world).  I love the way it looks and the patterns which are created.

On a different trip, Ibu Dewi, Suriana, and Zulfah took me to see the port just outside Medan.  I'm so glad I got to see the water there!  Wish I could have gone out for a boat ride, but looking at the condition of the boats it is probably best I didn't.

This particular port area has heavy industry to the left and then a sort of touristy area with an enclosed swimming area that was empty on the Friday afternoon we visited, but is packed on most weekends and holidays.

Today I had a chance to visit Maimoon Palace, a late-19th century palace build for a Malayu sultan which is being haphazardly preserved today as a tourist attraction while also being lived in by descendants of the sultan.

Sukmawati and Mince, a physics and an English teacher from SMA 3, served as my tour guides on this outing.  Sukmawati loves to sing and had a song for almost everything we did this afternoon :-)

The sultan's throne is behind us.

Indonesian tourists love to dress up as Malayu princes and princesses and have studio portraits taken...the activity in this part of the palace was particularly fun!

The Grand Mosque near the city center.

Crocodile Park is a local tourist attraction as well...and it is a rather dismal place.  Look at all of these poor 4 year old crocodiles packed together :-(

Conditions are somewhat better for the bigger crocs that get to swim in this swampy lake...but not much.  There were so many of them crowded together I wouldn't be surprised if they turn on each other and cannibalize from time to time.

Teaching Conditions in Indonesia

Since I know many teachers are reading this (and other folks interested in and supportive of the lives of teachers), I thought I'd create a short entry this morning outlining my observations and some gathered facts about the teaching conditions here in Indonesia.

To start with, the teachers here are government civil servants (have the uniforms and everything showing that affiliation - yes teachers and students wear uniforms here).  They are employed by a regional education department, from what I understand, and are at the mercy of that department for their job placement.  They can be shifted to another school or village as numbers and budgets require, and many of the teachers here at SMA 3 have actually taught in other towns and other schools - not by choice, but by assignment and necessity.  Just as there is anxiety about being RIFed (layed-off) or transferred in TUSD and in other U.S. districts, there is also fear and stress here.  Most teachers, though, stay in one school for a rather long time it seems - at least based on the teachers I've talked with here and the stability I've seen in this first two weeks of school.  Changes in placement happen at the start of the school year, I'm told...so having not seen any such changes yet, I think the SMA 3 staff is safe.

Teachers are contractually obligated to teach 24 class sessions a week.  Each session is 45 minutes and their schedule corresponds to that of the students (7:30-1:30 Monday-Thursday, 7:30-11:30 Friday, 7:30-12:30 Saturday).  The master schedule is a true nightmare here as students take 16 subjects and thus have any one particular subject only 2-3 times a week, at different times each day.  So, for example, Zulfah teaches 7 different groups of students and sees most of them for 4 class sessions (3 hours) a week in blocks of 1 and 1/2 hours each.  Dessy, a biology teacher, works with 5 groups of students, teaching some 2 period blocks and some singletons.  Neither Dessy or Zulfah have classes on Saturday (luck of the draw?), but many teachers do...and some days are super busy (Zulfah teaches 6 of 8 periods on Tuesday), while other days are relatively relaxed in terms of actual classroom hours (Zulfah has only 2 periods of class on Monday).  It's VERY different from the U.S. and seems to me, in some ways, to be a more relaxed and nice way to work.  Teachers actually only have 18 instructional hours a week under this schedule, if my calculations are correct (45 minutes each, 24 sections).  U.S. teachers, at least at CMHS, have about 25 hours of instructional time (5 hours a day x 5 days).

That said, the teachers here have about 40-45 students per class...a much larger student load than in the U.S.  And, they have very limited resources to work with (government issued textbooks, little access to other book budgets or materials budgets, very slow and unreliable internet and few computers on campus) and rather difficult weather to contend with...it's very hot and very humid and there is no a/c, so it is rather exhausting just to get through the day.  Still, they seem do their best and some do a most excellent and impressive job indeed.

The salary for teachers is 3,000,000 rupiah (about $350) per month, a salary that was just doubled by the government recently.  In talking with a private school English teacher two days ago, I learned that most teachers actually teach evening courses (tutoring sessions that students pay for individually or university courses) to supplement their incomes which have not been enough to live on actually.  Now, this gentleman said, he expects the situation to improve as the salary is twice as much as before...this is good for the teachers, obviously, who are exhausted and also for the students, who (a couple of different people have told me) sometimes receive sub-par instruction because the teachers are too tired or because they give their real energy and instructional planning and efforts to their private tutoring session classes.  In any case, when I think about how much things cost here (a nice dinner out for 3-4 can cost between 100,000-150,000 rupiah; school books and uniforms for one student per year cost about 1,000,000; a becak ride costs on average 15,000-20,000 rupiah - $2...) I can't believe that just last year teachers only made about $150 a month.  Recruitment of teachers is difficult, as it is in the U.S., because of the conditions outlined above and thusfar I have only met one student interested in becoming a teacher...and I've met quite a few teachers who did not intend to become teachers, but came to this career by default and necessity.  It's a shame.

What is the future of our profession?  Teachers are critical to the development of both basic skills and 21st century skills (critical-thinking, technology, collaboration, leadership, problem-solving, etc.)...and yet the profession is not valued, the educational experience is commodified and reduced to the lowest common denominators, to the point of only very little added value in some cases and to the point of actual harm to young people in other cases...

Are we able to effect positive change in the world as teachers when conditions are so poor...and are we even motivated to try to do so?  I have met so many wonderful teachers here and in the U.S. and from other nations...but what are we really accomplishing?  And what more could we accomplish if it were decided that nothing were more important than the development of each mind, each heart, each individual person in this world?!

Studying math in a foreign language

Let me start by saying that I never forget where my immigrant students in Tucson come from or what their struggles have been and still are...but let me also say that reminders are essential, experiences of stepping into another person's shoes are critical, in terms of really having the empathy and of developing the skills to work with others effectively.  I spend so much time talking with content-area (math, science, social studies...) teachers about how to work with English Language Learners (ELLs), but it has been a while since I have had a student's experience of what it is like to try to study these subjects in a language with which you have only basic familiarity.  The other day, I attended a math class taught in Indonesian (of course) and it was so eye-opening.  Below are some excerpts from the notes I scribbled in my notebook as the lesson was being taught:

"...able to follow bits and pieces, but I missed the opening and so I don't know the real focus...and this all looks familiar, though I don't recall it fully nor understand its application, so I'm lost...How must our immigrant students feel during their math lessons at Catalina?!"

"...as I watch the 2nd example, I'm starting to get it - sort of - but that's because I've studied this before and in my native language..."

The conclusions I can draw from this experience are that: (1) math is truly it's own language and that discipline-specific vocabulary MUST be taught in order to one to enter into the math world; (2) students with interrupted formal education - such as many of our refugee students - are at a severe disadvantage in any content-area class in that they have no reference for what they are learning, no experience of it in a language or culture which they understand and now they have to try to learn it in English?!...no small task!; (3) teachers must provide clear objectives to all students - it really helps to know exactly what you are studying, what the goals of that study are, and what the applications (or uses) for that knowledge are; and finally (4) the more examples and guided practice one provides, the better chance there is that students struggling with both ideas and language will get it.

None of this is new, I know, but it was a truly profound experience to sit in a class in which I knew that I should know the material and be able to figure it out based on the few words I could catch (numbers I know and there are some cognates I could work with) and my background knowledge and still feel completely lost.  How differently might everyone teach if they could have these experiences too, and on a regular basis lest we forget the actual feeling and fail to empathize and then adjust to meet and support a student as needed.

Ms. Esmina teaching something about mode, median, mean, quartiles, and so on...She's fabulous, by the way, and the students were totally with her...I being the only exception :-)