Wednesday 20th March - Exciting Progress

I was overjoyed on two separate occasions before 9 am today!  First of all Jorjor came up to Tonka Kunda at 8.00 to ask if I would write some more Early Morning work on the board or could she?  Could she? Could she????  I nearly hugged her!!  When I went into her classroom about ¼ hour later there were about 20 children all sitting at their desks filling in the missing letter of words she had written on the board and, more to the point, she was overjoyed at their response.  I have to forget that it is nearly 2 years ago that I first suggested that this might be a good idea to engage pupils as soon as they come to school.  It is happening and that is something to be delighted about.  I went from there to write some work on Darbonding’s board in Grade 3 and happened to call in on Ansumana at his desk in Grade 4.  He established early morning work about 2 terms ago so he is the crowned lord of following up ideas from workshops!  Anyway he asked me for more folders for his Special Needs pupils and I was amazed when I saw the completed one from Effo who has profound learning difficulties.   Ansumana had marked it all carefully and she had excelled.  That was not all though, he then told me that he had recently learnt a little about psychology and as a result had interviewed each child in the Primary School who has been identified with Special Needs and made notes on what they enjoy doing after school.  He wants to compile a profile on each one of them so that they have a positive dossier when they leave school.  He almost blanched when I told him I was so impressed that I wanted to hug him.  Instead he informed me he would type all his notes up for me to file!

From start of school till break time both Tony and I prepared documents and files on the computer to back up everything we have done so far.  We are both determined to follow through everything that we start and try to avoid being pulled into new ventures.  Having said that, I talked with Moses about the fig tree.  Ebrima had injured himself with his machete when chopping up the branches yesterday and Moses was supervising Abdoulie doing the same job.  I was relieved to hear that he had changed his mind about investing in charcoal.  Instead of paying a man to put the wood through this lengthy procedure (which could easily result in a pile of ashes costing D1000) he was going for the safer option of selling off the wood to local bakers and anyone else who wanted wood for cooking.  The only other distraction was listening to a mother coming to claim she had paid her child’s school fees waving receipts.  The argument was over the fact that the receipts were from a totally different school!  The policy of sending pupils home if they have not paid up is working but the real problem is that the policy does not wholly go into action unless we are here. 

During break Tony met with Abibatou and Amodou Lamin to plan the lunch and breakfast for Saturday when I am running a Workshop for 27 Nursery teachers from Farato and Modou Lamin is concurrently running a Red Cross workshop.  GamBLE is donating the lunch for the latter in lieu of a cash donation. 

In the middle of my meeting with Abi Sanna had introduced me to a gentleman who was organising Tag Rubgy Leagues in The Gambia.  I had in the past been in email contact with him and Bruce, my brother, had connected me to him through a lady in UK called Margaret who worked with UK Rugby Clubs and the Tag Rugby movement in The Gambia.  I had asked him to wait for me but, I admit totally forgot, so when he stepped forward literally as I walked towards the teachers in the classroom I could not avoid talking with him.  This made me very late and I have always prided myself in demonstrating the importance of teachers being on time and prepared in the classroom.  Of course, everyone was very understanding and we started straight away with more handwriting.  I was extremely pleased but also very surprised that every single teacher was able to write perfectly within the handwriting lines, whereas yesterday many of them struggled.  It seemed like instance success!  We continued with sound building exercises and everyone seemed very enthusiastic.  I do hope that this approach filters through to the classrooms so that pupils are encouraged to work out spellings and reading from the skills and clues that they build up.

Straight after the workshop I returned to Tonka Kunda and put the kettle on for our lunch of hot bouillon.  Tony was still in the office on the computer but he came up to the house and we sat down at 3.45 for our simple lunch.  I had promised the Grade 6 pupils they could come to Tonka Kunda Club and called to them.  “Wait a minute” came the reply from somewhere among the banana trees.  Then 4 girls appeared and told me to close my eyes.  I did so and when I opened them I was presented with 4 huge bouquets of bouganvilla flowers.  I felt so happy.  They eagerly settled down to Ludo and within a few minutes we received the message that Kemo was ready for a meeting with us and Moses.  So we abandoned our drinks, left the girls playing with instructions to return the game ot the office when they had finished and settled in Moses’s office for a meeting about the Upper Basic School (UBS).  We covered every aspect and all agreed that clear and regular records of staff attendance, staff qualifications, pupil attendance and test results were essential.  We are working towards proving that this school will be a UBS that parents will pay any amount to send their children to, but in the present situation we are seen as an experiment.  All the more reason to be diligent about records. 

After 1 ½ hours we returned to Tonka Kunda to write up more records, but sitting waiting for us under a tree was a Nursery teacher that came to our workshops in 2006.  She had seen us at the Independence march past and came to visit.  She spent a good half hour with us and asked to be remembered to Sarah who came from Kent to work in the school in 2006 and had had her hair plaited by this teacher.  It was really humbling to think she had made such an effort to continue a friendship that started so casually 5 years ago!

It was 6.30 pm and we really had not stopped all day.  So we settled on the balcony with an early beer to write up records. Supper was curried cassava and yellow split peas with a cucumber salad.  One pot cooking is required as the gas for the second burner is finished.  We played 2 games of draughts and then fell into bed.