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!