Bagnas, Christmas and teacher training.

I had a couple of days in Tansen to get organised again after the Bhalebas trip and to start thinking about teacher training which was fast approaching. Saran and I also put in an order for 50 whiteboards which will mean that all of our twinned schools will now have a whiteboard in every classroom. Saran has been really great in getting this sorted and getting a good price for us. 

 

I was also able to squeeze a day visit into Bagnas, only a one hour walk from Tansen. I took Deepa from our homestay with me to act as a translator as Saran was not available and her English is excellent. We started off watching a couple of lessons and stepping in where required, as normally I do the teaching and so I wanted to get the chance to see how they do things . The first lesson we watched was an English lesson and I was pleased to see the teacher was getting the children to do some talking in it, although taking it in turns to talk to the teacher. I suggested that the children work in pairs and have a conversation together and with some encouragement they did start to be more willing to speak. They really do seem to lack confidence in speaking out though so it is really important they continue with these kinds of lessons. 

Pupils from Bagnas school.

The second lesson was not so successful. It was a science lesson and when I asked the teacher what it was that they would be learning today he told me he needed to check the book first. This was about a minute before the lesson started. The subject was different environments within the world such as desert, rainforest, mountainous regions etc. This could have been a really nice lesson with a little bit of planning. Pictures could have been found of the different environments and the children could have discussed what it would be like to live there and maybe how animals are adapted to that particular environment. However we had very little in the way of pictures, only a couple of tiny ones in the text book. I took the children outside and asked them to look around and tell me what they saw and then asked them if everywhere was like this. It was really difficult however without any decent pictures or visual aids and despite looking in the library quickly and finding  a few pictures there was very little to help the children understand how different the world is., bearing in mind most of the children may not have left Palpa district and most certainly none would have seen another country. Just a short amount of preparation time could have really transformed this lesson and this is something I am trying to get across to all the teachers out here.

Year 5 Bagnas children with their twinning dictionaries.

The afternoon was spent with Year 5 making dictionaries for their twinned school (Warkworth First School), though with Bagnas being such a small school there was only 5 of them!!

I hope in the New Year to spend a longer period of time at Bagnas as many of my visits have just been short day visits, owing to it’s proximity to Tansen. Hopefully with a greater amount of time I can work with the teachers to deliver some really good lessons. 

The following day was Christmas Eve but I spent it largely preparing for teacher training which meant trying out lots of practical experiments and was actually quite a fun day though I was definitely starting to feel some pressure about delivering the training. Saran was really helpful though in getting the snacks and drinks sorted for the day so at least that was one less thing to worry about. 

 

In the evening we started making some Christmas decorations, which Abhi really enjoyed and I put some Christmas songs on. We were joined in the evening by Sonja, a Dutch lady who is setting up a homestay in Badira National Park with her Nepali partner. She was really lovely and there was also a nice American girl, Rachel, staying so we had good company for Christmas.

On Christmas morning Dhanni, Sonja, Rachel and I set off on an early morning sunrise walk and it was a particuarly clear morning giving fantastic views of the mountains. It was a somewhat different (I have never felt the urge for a 6am walk on Christmas Day before!) but lovely way to start Christmas morning. Afterwards  we sat up on the balcony with the family and I opened some of the presents I had received. It was so kind of people to send me some gifts as I know the postage can be a bit pricey but it was really appreciated by me and the Bashayal famiy, who seeem to share my love for chocolates and sweets!!!

Christmas morning walk - first time I have ever woken at 6am on Christmas day to go for a walk!!!

After a good breakfast, Sonja, Rachel, Abhi and I went down to the Christian church in Tansen, which has a surprisingly large Christian community. I am not really religious but it was really nice to see the, rather bizzarre, it has to be said, service. It was very much a happy clappy kind of church and there were lots of songs and drama sketches by the children, though I couldn’t make out anything that was to do with the nativity story!

I was a little worried as we were a good 5-10 minutes late for the 10am start but I needn't have worried as we were amongst the first there and, in typical Nepali style, people trickled in through-out the service whilst it was in progress and also started to trickle out before it ended – we were amongst those but to be fair we did give it the best part of 2 hours and it didn’t seem to be showing any signs of ending!!!

I spent most of the afternoon skyping with my family and this year all 4 of us were in different countries, Rachel in Australia, Alan in France skiing and Dad back at home. It was lovely to speak to them all though. Skype has been really great here and it certainly would have been a harder trip if I was not able to keep in touch with them as easily as I have been able to. 

A packed out church on Christmas morning - Tansen has a surprisingly large Christian population.

Janaki, Deepa, Abhi, Rachel and Sonja.

In the evening Sonja, Rachel and I clubbed together and we ordered lots of food in from a local restaurant to give Janaki (the mum at homestay) a night off cooking. We had a really great evening eating good food, having a few beers and playing games, including a game I taught them called spoons which is a quick game where you collect cards and once you have them you and everyone else has to grab a spoon as quickly as possible. There is one spoon less than the number of players so someone misses out. It was a really fun game with lots of laughter and tug of war battles between people trying to grab the spoons!

With my baini (sister) and bhai (brother) on Christmas Day night with our Christmas lights.

Dhani in deep concentration playing pick up sticks!

Sonja and I with the Bashayal family for our Christmas meal. They really do treat me as a family member now and Abhi now calls me dai (brother).

The following day I was straight back to work on the teacher training but had a good productive day and by the end was happy that I had a good programme arranged for the next day.

A blindfold test to demonstrate the other senses we make use of.

There was fewer teachers in attendance than I had hoped but still a good representation from our twinned schools, plus a few teachers from other schools. I had the help of Sagar, a good friend, who has been absolutely brilliant in helping me out since I got here. 

 

The day though as a whole was a huge success. I demonstrated loads of practical science activities to them using only simple and easily obtainable resources. There was also lots of chance for them to participate and we did activities such as blindfolding for when teaching about the different senses we have. This enables children to see what life would be like without our sight and how they can use their other senses to determine what different objects presented to them are. This got a lot of laughs as did trying out different shadow puppets and this was exactly the reaction I hoped for as all of the teachers joined in enthusiastically and had fun but were also really focused on what they were doing. I hope they can see that if they enjoyed these activities then their pupils certainly will.

Shadow puppets!!!

                                                                                              The other experiments of note we carried out were the friction experiment I had carried out at Bhalebas previously and an investigation named ‘Making Alien Soup’. Those who are not primary teachers will probably wander what this is! It is a really fun practical activity where we explain to the children that we are making some soup for aliens. They really love this soup! The ingredients are: Water, Salt, Sand, Rice and lastly (this is the most nutritious part) paperclips!!! Once they have mixed together this bizarre concoction together we suddenly stop them and tell them we have made a terrible mistake and added too much salt!! There are no more ingredients available and so we need to find a way to separate them. They are then given a magnet, a sieve, and filter paper (I cut out bits of cloth bags in place of filter paper) and use these to separate out the paperclips, rice and sand respectively. The idea is then to boil the water and condense it off, separating the salt and the water. However without having the facilities to do this I suggested that they just use the sun to evaporate off the water. Once again the teachers seemed to really enjoy this activity so I really hope it will be used in schools as it’s not difficult and does not need too much preparation work or expensive materials. 

'Making Alien Soup' and a friction experiment.

After a really good lunch provided by Rock Regency Hotel, who hosted the event (and were fantastic), Mr Singh the headteacher from Bhalebas school, demonstrated a simple electro-magnet and also how to make a pin hole camera. I was really pleased that he was willing to participate and will be looking for future volunteers to contribute.

The teachers then were set the task of coming up with their own practical ideas and demonstrations which they presented to the other teachers. There was perhaps not as much creativity and originality as I would have hoped but at the end we still had lots of different presentations of practical science. 

Mr Singh (right), headteacher from Bhalebas school demonstrates his electromagnet

There was lots of practical science going on which was great to see. Top - a string and cups telephone, middle - demonstrating water pressure (the holes were not exactly the same size so it didn't work exactly but this was a good demonstration of how it is important to try things out before demonstrating to the pupils!). Bottom - My friend Biju, making duck noises with a straw (similar to how a reed works in a musical instrument).

At the end of the session the teachers were given a feedback form to rate the session and to give suggestions. The main suggestion seemed to be to give more to give more training! They marked the following areas out of 10 with 10 being the highest. The average scores are listed below:

The language was easy to understand: 6.7

The ideas were easy to understand: 8.5

The aims and objectives were easy to understand: 8.4

I enjoyed the group activities: 9

The group activities were useful: 9.2

I feel I could use some of the ideas in my lessons: 8.3

The materials used in the demonstrations are accessible to me: 7.8

I feel the training has been of benefit t me: 9.3

The language score was a little low but I think they meant how easy it was to understand me personally rather than the translation they were given. Apart from that I was thrilled with the feedback – I just hope they do actually use the ideas or at least use the session to inspire them to create some good practical lessons.

I really enjoyed the day, as the teachers seemed to also. I was however glad it was over and now have some time off as schools are on exams and then have a holiday. I won’t in fact be back in school till 19^th January. Whilst I’m always thrilled to have holiday in England it has been rather frustrating just how many there are over here. I will make the best of it though and have some good things to look forward to. 

Hope you all had a great Christmas too. 

Andy. x

Bhalebas

Hi all, 

After a freezing cold day at Saran’s house I was back in school again – this time at our latest twinned school, Shree Bhagawati, Bhalebas (twinned with St. Pauls school). It was good to be back here and having already done all of the welcomes and formalities last time we visited, I was able to get straight into teaching some lessons.

Gifts of books and teaching resources given to Bhalebas. We give each of our twinned schools similar things and there is more to come.

In the morning I took Year 3 for odd and even number work, Year 2 for body parts using the ‘draw around the child method’ and finally I did some work with Year 4 on measurement where I took some of them out onto the playground with a large measuring tape and got them to estimate and measure the length of the playground. 

More labelling body parts - this time Dillip from class 2.

Teamwork: Measuring the playground.

In the afternoon I took Year 8 for a science lesson focussed on friction. I first demonstrated to them the concept of friction by flicking the pages of 2 books together and then showing them that it is impossible to pull apart without opening the pages up. I asked them how this works but couldn’t get an answer so explained to them about friction. I then asked them to talk to the people around them and to come up with occasions when friction is useful and when it is a hindrance. After some time they did come up with some good ideas which I was pleased with. Normally they would just be given some examples and told to remember it so it was good to get them thinking for themselves. Afterwards we conducted an investigation into which items had the most friction by taping an elastic band to an object and pulling it. At the point it moved the children had to measure how far the elastic band had stretched before it started to move the object. Mostly the experiment worked really well though the elastic bands I was able to get out here aren’t up to much so there were a few breakages and we had to try and stick to lighter objects! I got the children to write up the experiment with a title, methodology, prediction, results and a conclusion. It was really pleasing how it worked and they were mostly fairly enthusiastic about it. 

Friction experiment.

I even gave up my shoe for the cause!

As far as I’m aware there is very little practical science done so hopefully this should change after the next teacher training session! The science teacher did come in for the lesson which I was glad of as it is good for them to see how simple investigations can be carried out without any sophisticated or expensive equipment. 

Before I left for the day I also made sure that the poster which I did with Year 2 on body parts also went up on the wall!

Whilst at Bhalebas I stay at Sarans house which is not far from the school, only a ten minute walk though we usually go on his friends motorbike. I really enjoy staying at Saran's house and him and his wife make me feel very much at home. It is also nice to see his son, Sohan, growing up a bit more every time I visit. When we first arrived he could not stand himself up without support, yet now he is tottering around everywhere. It is difficult but important to keep tracks of him as there is no safety barrier on the stairs and countless hazards in and out of the house which he almost seems to look for!

Saran's home in Bhalebas.

My bedroom window view.

Saran's son, Sohan, aged 1 1/2 (roughly)

The following morning I did some twinning letters with Year 5. It was good to see in this classroom a different seating layout – more of a horseshoe shape. This might seem irrellevent but actually it is really important. The classroom benches are normally set up in rows like you would see on a bus. This means that the children can only really talk to the person next to them and cannot see or speak to anyone else without turning around. I made a big point of saying how much I liked this and asked if they could do it in other classrooms which they have said they will look to do. 

The children worked really hard on the twinning dictionaries and probably produced the best ones I have seen. There is still a tendency to copy from things and despite asking them to draw typical Nepali things I got several ‘Donald Duck’s’ amongst others!! However there were also some really good original drawings and although they took a lot of time on it (we extended the lesson which didn’t seem to be a problem), they looked really great.

A much better seating arrangement where the children can see and talk to each other.

Year 5 twinning dictionaries.

Once the twinning letters were completed I went to the nursery and gave them the building blocks and number mats we had brought along. I tried to emphasis that these should be made available to the children and not locked away and that the building blocks could be used in a number of ways for teaching number and colour, as well as for playing!

The children loved the bright and colourful number mats.

Using building blocks to teach number.

But blocks are for playing too!!!

In the afternoon I worked with Year 7 and I gave them fact sheets of various areas of the world along with copies of pages from  a picture atlas. I wanted the children to design a tourist brochure for their particular area and include some pictures and facts of what the place was like. I was a bit dissapointed to be honest in the complete lack of originality. There was so much that was copied directly word for word and one boy had even copied out instructions for making a model (he had clearly had no idea of what he was writing). Possibly it was a bit too challenging for them but I think it also has a lot to do with how they are taught. In exams they pretty much write word for word the answer they have been taught in the class. In the future I will need to think of a way of getting a bit more originality out of them! The work they produced did look good though and I stuck it on backing paper and it has made a good display.

Making tourist brochures - not as good an activity as I had hoped.

Morning exercises are part of the routine in assembly. Below: The little ones try to keep up with the routine.

 

In the evening I visited Mr Singh, the headmaster’s house for some snacks and coffee ( I had always though I hated coffee but out of politeness drank the one I was given and found it fairly tasty!). After dinner back at Saran’s I once again had an early night, partly as I was shattered but also there isn’t a great deal  to do in the evenings in the villages after it gets dark, and I tend to do my preparations in the morning as school doesn’t start till 10am. 

On Friday morning, after watching their morning assembly and all of the exercises they do. I did some work with Year 1 on phonics. When I walked in the room there was the word mango plastered all over the blackboard in different fonts. I asked them what they had learning about and couldn’t help but laugh when one little boy replied ‘oranges’!!!

'What have you been learning about then?' - 'Oranges!' - I had to smile at that one!!!

This lesson was largely for the benefit of the watching teacher as in reality a one off phonics session will not do much good. I did lots of practical phonics activities including playing ‘cross the river’ which they seemed to enjoy once they got used to it.

Spot the mistake?!! Yes I put the 'a' upside down!!!

My final work at Bhalebas was some more twinning letters, this time with Year 8 and, like the twinning dictionaries I did with class 5, I was really pleased with these. During this lesson and once they were underway I noticed a big hubub of activity outside and found that the school were having a big tidy up, picking up rubbish and burning it. It was good to see them tidying up, though of course it would be preferable if the litter wasn’t thrown in the first place and also if the clean up wasn’t done in lesson time…you can’t have everything though!

The big tidy up!!!

Watering the plants - good to see them taking care of their school...even if it was in lesson time!

I often seem to have spectators in my lessons!

The standard of these twinning letters was really high, especially this boy's.

Class 8 with their twinning letters, destined for St. Pauls school in UK.

The teachers seemed really pleased with the visit and I was too. The teachers all showed a good interest in what I was doing and hopefully will take on some of the practical activiites and also start to do a bit of display work themselves. I was presented with a huge flower garland and lots of tikka and then I was invited with all the teachers for a celebratory lunch (school finishes at lunchtime on Friday), which felt a bit like a christmas party at the end of term!

A sort of end of term Christmas party!

Some of the staff and a couple of the children from Bhalebas school.

I really felt quite sad to leave Bhalebas but I’m sure I will be along there again soon.

I’m looking forward to a good Christmas now back in Tansen, though I will try to get one more day in at Bagnas and of course I have lot’s of preparation to do for teacher training on 27^th December!!

Hope you are all enjoying the festivities at home!

Andy. xx

Carrom board - a popular game in Nepal.