Dominican Schools

Exciting news!!! Starting this coming week on Tuesdays and Thursdays I will be teaching English to 6th and 7th graders actually in the Dominican School for one hours each day. This is in addition to the preschool class I teach with Loryn in the weekday mornings. I´m super excited. So now I teach preschool in the mornings, tutor English in the afternoons on Mondays and Wednesdays and teach in the school in Pueblo Nuevo on Tuesdays and Thursdays. Busy busy busy! But awesome. The class in the Dominican school is more of the age group I am interested in as opposed to preschoolers and although one hour may not sound like I lot of time in the states, here it is a ton! On Thursday I sat in on the class to get a feel for their school day and let me tell you, I was less than impressed and very very disheartened. I have never felt so blessed for the education I have.
For starters, than are not in school all day like we are at home. The day is broken up into two sessions...half the kids go in the morning and half the kids go in the afternoon. (Similar to some of our kindergartens, only it is for all ages!) This is partially due to poor standards of education and lack of space. Poverty...go figure. This is the day that I observed: (afternoon session)
2:00 pm- Students arrive to school. Teacher was late. However, they rely on taxis to get them everywhere so they are on Dominican time.
2:22 pm- School ¨began¨ 22 minutes ago, but the teacher ran off leaving the class unruly and unproductive. I didn´t interject.
2:29 pm- Teacher returns, still no instruction given for the day. Apparently the teacher´s job is to sit and grade the work that they children have copied from the board, but she doesn´t give any explanations.
2:34 pm- They are doing math problems that I find unnecessary. Examples: 5432 x 68, 7654 x 68, 9842 x 42, 8535 x 42. At first I thought, who needs to know their times tables up to 68? But, perhaps I was thinking limitedly, its not like they have household calculators or phones so if they don´t know how to multiply then they are screwed, however for the most part I found it to be busy work.
2:51 pm- Teacher finally addresses the class to hurry up so she can switch the problems on the board.
(My thought at this point: What are the kids supposed to be doing while the teacher spends all thisa time grading their work? Twindle their thumbs? Because that is what they were doing. What a waste of time...)
2:54 pm- Kids do more problems on the board.
3:37pm- Teacher rings a bell...guess it is time for snack and recess. I asked the teacher how long recess was...she said 20 mins. Teachers gab inside while kids play outside...there is no supervision at recess, these kids range from ages 5-13)
4:37 pm- Obviously longer than 20 mins.... no more recess and kids return to class.
4:51 pm- Kids copy homework problems from the board and line up to leave for the day.

Yeah...that is it. A Dominican Education. So my hour with them will go a long way.
As a side note, I noticed that the workbooks that they use have a ¨fill in the date¨portion on each page and it states ___ de _________ 19__. These school books haven´t been updated in at least 12 years! I suddenly have a whole new appreciation for OSU charging us an arm and a leg for new book editions every year.

Oh boy, there is so much work to be done. The preschool has been very successful in our eyes and it is my hope that working with the older kids will have a similar result.
Adios!

Loryn y Jamie solamente

Welp, I am running out of things to report really...hmm, Chris left on Thursday for the states...he will be gone for 10 days or so..so its just Loryn and I. Few tribulations these past few days but nothing major. The kids got me sick...duh. Thats what happens whn you give up childcare to work at a bar for a year or two, your immune system goes down...but anyways, I didn't go to school on Friday because I was bed ridden with fevers all day. Pretty boring, but I was able to read The Shack start to finish in one day so...there's that. Luckily the doctors gave me antibiotics before they left and by Sunday I was super bored and couldn't wait to get back to school today. Then today I broke my motorcycle again..sigh. When Bill gets down here in a few weeks and sees what I have done to his bike he is gonna kill me. But hey, that's what you get for sending a girl to a foreign country and after a 20 min lesson say, "okay here's your bike!" Specifically today I dropped the bike down a small hill..whoops...and the front-end brake and the gas handle were broken, but it was still driveable. Luckily, at lunch I mentioned to the kid I've been tutoring in English that my bike was broken and he fixed it. So the gas handle works now! Woohoo! As for the brakehandle, I can get that repaired for 150 pesos in town some Saturday (about $4 give or take). So yeah, I guess that's it. Loryn and I are busy getting ready for her departure for the states in October when I have to lead class for two weeks by myself. My biggest fear is that the parents won't want me because I don't speak as much Spanish as Loryn. My second biggest fear is driving her car on busy roads...eek! Dominicans are crazy drivers! We will see how it goes. We are arranging a parents meeting with us before she goes so hopefully noon will have a problem with me. For the most part the parents are super sweet and thrilled that we are there to help their kids, whether I speak good Spanish or not it is still helping their children.
Alrighty that's about it...gotta get on facebook and do stuff for school. Talk to you next week!
<3 James

Let the Good Times Roll

I´m sorry that I didn´t post on Saturday, but it has literally been soooo busy here. I feel very productive now a days. Let´s see, let´s start with last weekend. We took our friend Palermo out for pizza in Luperon last Saturday and it was to die for...well it wasnt rice and beans...and it was the first time I had actually had a night out of the village. Nothing was really going on, but it was nice to not fall asleep at 730pm out of boredom. Then on Sunday we went to the beach. Gorgeous, of course, and we packed 20 of us...not an exaggeration, I actually counted..into Chris´ truck to take to the beach. Ugh, but it was nice because these families don´t get the opportunity to go ever, even though they only live about 2-3 miles from the shore. So then we began our second week of class and it went a LOT smoother this time around and we actually had tables and chairs so it was less hectic and I think for the most part the kids are responding to the schedule. By the end of the week no one cried anymore at school..well at the beginning, which was a huge thing. When kids cry and scream at school, neighbors and parents come running over to the school, which just disturbs class even more. Hence why we have a security guard staying outside the school now for us...he also keeps other kids away. We are very excited because we have had several parents come to us, wanting to get their kids into our school. (Remember, preschools are very rare and unheard of usually here.) It sucks to have to say no, but we simply do not have the space for more children. In future years loryn hopes to expand the program to several classes.
These past few days have been very hectic. Friday--One of our kids had pink eye, poor Julio. I was super cautious and am fine so far, Loryn was not so lucky and came down with pink eye the next day. Sorry let me backtrack..there has been a group of doctors and nurses here from Ohio here since  Thursday afternoon working with our healers and I have been with them everyday since. That being said, in Loryn´s absense Saturday, I, yes ME!, I was the sole translator between the nurses and the healers...and let me just say that it worked! I get discouraged often down here because I don´t know as much Spanish as everyone else, but with the group down here I was able to realize how much Spanish I actually do know. And it was very liberating to not have Loryn by my side as a crutch, God love her. When I am the only one struggling with the language it is difficult for me to learn because people answer things and translate for me, probably just to save time. But after these past few days I must say, I´m thrilled. One of the doctors even mistook? me for being fluent. Love it.
The group has also opened my eyes to new opportunities for myself, to give me more of an identity in the program. It looks like I may be´put in charge of overseeing the healers and making sure they are satying up on their home visits and skills once the doctors and nurses leave on Friday. (Side note, they amputated a guys toes, it was awesome.) This responsibility would give me an opportunity to do something with my free afternoons. This past week I worked with Carmen´s son Ney and kind of with her daughters in English. That was Monday, Wednesday and Friday for about an hour in the aftrernoon. I really enjoy it, but it was heartbreaking to look at the girls´homework and realize that in their school system, they were being taught improper, almost unrecognizable English. Education down here is very upsetting unfortunately. Oh and today I went with the group to climb the waterfalls. It was glorious.
There is so much more that I wanna tell you guys right now, but I am running out of internet time. I will come back into town later this week so I´ll leave you with this final bulletin: I milked a horse.
I love you all. Quote of the week is: òne can only mature to the degree that one puts others ahead of one´s self´.

Thank Goodness It´s the Weekend!

First of all: Go Bucks! I´m totally wearing my jersey and everyone thinks I´m crazy, but whatever. I heart the buckeyes. So anyways, the first week of class with the little ones went very well. You have to remember that these kids have never been on any sort of schedule before and this experience is totally new to them. At home they are only disciplined by hitting and yelling or they have no discipline at all...so, as a result they hit, yell and unfortunately bite to get what they want. It´s trying, but worthwhile. By Friday I think everyone KNEW it was Friday and needed it. The concept of a weekend break from school will either be refreshing for the kids or we will have to start all over trying to introduce them to this schedule. We will see of Monday. Loryn and I joked about how much we wanted to do a teachers´happy hour yesterday afternoon. Oh well. I napped instead. Equally nice. There is a student named Angel (irony) and he is Satan´s child. He is consistently acting up, but Loryn says I do a good job of staying on top of him. I´m pretty good at disciplining kids, but there is nothing I can do to this kid as far as punishment that will make him listen. The worst part is that he is LITERALLY ALWAYS SMILING. Oh, gosh, that´s not the worst part, the worst part is that he is probably one of my favorites, he crack me up. It´s difficult to get a point across when he is making me laugh. I´ll work on that.
So my Spanish is getting better. I am making a point of sitting with the family for longer periods of time to try and pick up more. I´m not gonna learn sitting in my room. :) The thing is most of the Dominicans I know under 25 want to learn English from me. I´m like No people, I´m supposed to be the one learning your language. Ha! But, I´m sure we can work something out where we are learning from one another. Afterall, I did come down here to teach English. Outside of the classroom is no different.
Okay well, that´s all I have to report for now! I´ve noticed that no one has commented on my past few posts...if no one is gonna follow me, then I´m not gonna waste my time on the internet writing out these updates, or at least not as often. Let me know.

Love Jamie. Go Bucks!