Compared to Austen, Pandureni kindergarten was far more limited in terms of resources. They had one building which is due to be knocked down since it is dangerous and a tree for shelter. Inside the building it was sandy and had no lights, only the uncovered doors and windows. No posters were on the walls. If something needed to be stuck on the wall the teacher would ask the children to spit out gum if they were chewing it to use it as blue tac. Cooking was done outside but we only saw food once all week because they ran out. There was a building with a toilet in but not to the standard you can expect in the UK.
The younger children were taught in the building and the ones due to go to primary school were kept under the shadow of the tree. Tables and chairs were provided but were stored in the teacher’s home and the children would run back and forth to collect them as well as other materials. Since one teacher was ill on our first day we took the younger children, teaching them body parts and introducing discipline, usually getting a misbehaving individual to do the activity on their own in front of the class. One occasion Ester bought a child to the front and got the rest of the kids to laugh at him – a technique I wasn’t too keen on but preferred to the usual stick melee to the head the teachers offered.
For the rest of the week we helped with the older children since we noticed they were nowhere near ready for primary school. In Namibia schools are taught in English and these kids had only ever written in the sand. When we got them to write on paper letters were sideways, upside down and reversed. Only a few could get close to writing their own names. So writing was the area focused on for the week. Also shapes were unknown, some not even the teacher knew and we are talking basics – square, rectangle, triangle and circle. So we taught the teacher and she began to teach the children.
Similar games were played with the children as were in Austen. Both kindergartens loved bulldog style games, if you remember bulldog from school days. Some just wanted to be picked up so would run at you presenting their arms, but most enjoyed the challenge of dodging us. Once out they would still enjoy just watching their friends being caught. Football is also always popular with the children, as well as a relay game where they are in two queues and must pass a ball back between their legs and the last in the queue runs to the front. Frequently a smaller child would fall backwards causing a domino effect. Running around was always well received despite the copious amounts of thorns lodging themselves in the children's feet.
At the end of the week the teachers told me they had learnt a lot and were very thankful for our help and so I hope they have taken something away to continue a great job there.
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