Day 31 (Monday)

An interesting day at work.  The new headteacher I am working with is indeed new.  He has only been the Head of the school for six months.  He explains how busy he is, but stays with me all morning translating the school action plan (which he did not write) from Kinyarwandan into English.  I write notes so I can re-write the plan and present it professionally with a critique at some time in the future.  Before I leave the Head shows me an official letter that he has to respond to by tomorrow.  He obviously feels very pressured so I offer to do it for him.  He has to write an action plan for a child centred, girl focused health related initiative.  He has already selected the initiative with the school governors; it just needs to be written up properly.  This is a great opportunity for me to demonstrate the difference between objectives, activities and outcomes/success criteria in more than a theoretical exercise.

Day 32 (Tuesday)

I catch an early bus and am at work by 7.10 a.m.  The Head is glad to see me as I am not sure he trusted me to do the job and return in time for him to submit the plan to the sector office.    I have brought my work on a flash drive, so I load it up on his office computer (the only admin computer in the school) and pick up two viruses.  We go through my plan together and put on the official headings and footings, print it out and it is ready to go.  He will deliver it by hand leaving me to do 3 lesson observations in the senior part of the school.  These are classes working towards GCSE standard exams.  The lessons are all copying from the blackboard for the full 50 minutes.  I won’t be recruiting any maths teachers whilst I am here.

Day 33 (Wednesday)                                                         

The rainy season must have arrived.  We are getting thunder storms and rain every day now.    It may be early days, but if the pattern is as it is now, then it rains every afternoon.   This will make an impact on the way I do my work and plan my visits.  It is not too much fun being stuck out in the rain when you are travelling to or from a school.

Day 34 (Thursday)

We awoke in mist and low cloud, but the sun had broken through by mid morning (9 a.m.).  I have been observing lessons for the last few days; unfortunately unaccompanied, so there is no one with whom I can share my reflections and who might learn some of the objectives and activities of purposeful teaching.  In a break to the recently established pattern, there is no rain in the late afternoon.  We have an opportunity for some shopping in Kabarore.  There are new shops opening every week, so there is a slightly wider range of products on sale.  We can now buy strawberry yoghurt and “five day old” milk.  There is also inflation.  The biscuits we like have gone up by nearly 100% literally overnight.  Still no meat or cheese, though!

Day 35 (Friday)

Up early again.  The passers-by on the road chatter as they walk and although there is a fence and they are 25m away, the sound seems to be right outside my window.   We have spent the early part of the last two evenings in the local bar having our regular order of goat brochettes and chips.  An interesting day at work though, because in my last half an hour with the Headteacher I think I managed to get him to take seriously his role in improving teaching and learning.  There is naturally a belief that this is almost impossible.  The teachers have taught in French, now they have to teach in English.  Until a year or two ago the pupils were taught in French, now they have to try and understand English even though it is their third language and one in which they have really had no instruction. However, the easiest solution would also make the biggest impact.  They have text books but they are locked away and the teachers never use them except to prepare their lessons.  They copy from the text book into their preparation and planning book and then in the lesson they copy from there  on to the blackboard so that the pupils can copy this down! I guess this gives them a job, but the pupils might well be better off with the text book as strangely the teachers never attempt to copy any of the diagrams and those and the pictures in the books are really helpful learning aids. Using textbooks  may not be much pedagogically, but it would be a start. We just need to unlock the store room and produce a system for looking after the books.

Day 36 (Saturday)

Disaster!  Our kettle, which is only three weeks old no longer works.  We have no idea about consumer rights in Rwanda, but it is back to the shop with our kettle.  The owner of the shop is not there, so we are told to come back later.  We have booked a day in a 4x4 exploring the local safari park for tomorrow.  We will be off at dawn and back at sunset, so we plan and then purchase all the ingredients for our picnic lunch. The best we can do is bread, boiled eggs, biscuits, tomatoes, bananas and guacamole.   I empty the memory card for my camera and charge the battery.  All ready for a great day out!

Day 37 (Sunday)

Our day in the Safari Park ...except it wasn’t, as the 4x4 did not turn up.  So at 6.30 in the morning we are back at our house kicking our heels with nothing to do and a long day in front of us.  Perhaps the saving grace is that it is raining, so we might have had a disappointing day anyway.  Clearly it is difficult to arrange things from Kabarore, as in no way could this be described as a tourist centre.  By 6.45 it is raining heavily and looks like it is set in.  So, I’m just waiting for the Sunday Observer to be delivered and then I’ll sit down and catch up with all the news!  Looks like it will be a quiet day except for the rain battering down on the tin roof.