As I mentioned, the volunteer assignment I had was teaching conversational English to women aged 18 and up. I would say the average was 30, but they ranged from 18 to 50. It was a very interesting opportunity and perfect for what me. I mean, really who do you know that talks more than I do??!
(Below: Class teaching me a local dance and performing a skit)
Actually, it was harder than I thought and from a “responsibility” and creativity standpoint. My co-teacher, Marissa, and I had to fill 1 ½ hours each day. Marissa had some training and experience doing this, so she created a format for the class and the rest of the work was us brainstorming topics and content. We created lesson plans around topics of interest: cooking, their daily routine, going to the doctor, going to the market, pop culture, world news and events, family, dreams, life goals and experiences, etc. This was quite fun for us because we learned a lot of things from these women.
(Below: Yamine was the Sayhog Center Coordinator on the left. Some of the women just "holied" us.)
One of the most interesting topics we discussed was about their town: What it was like 10 years ago, what it is like today and what they would like it to be in 5 years. They all said their town used to be cleaner and less crowded and in the future, they would like better roads interconnecting the towns and Internet for everyone. WOW. I was totally amazed by these responses. To put some context around my amazement, you should know that the class was almost cancelled before I arrived because the women were going to have to walk 3 kilometers away every day to get water for their homes due to the water shortage – thankfully, they did not have to and class went on. They can’t even count on a regular, sustainable water supply and their first instinct was to wish for roads and Internet.
We also talked about what they do for fun and watching television with their family was a significant part of their daily routine. All the women were impacted by television: asking us questions about the presidential election, following gossip of American and Bollywood stars, and aspirations to travel to places like Switzerland and Paris. I read that the government has helped subsidize buying TVs, getting networks on the air over the last 20 years and about a controversial collaboration between India and the US to offer a culturally appropriate version of Sesame Street to India a few years back.
For my industry colleagues (or just me) who have doubted that what we do for a living matters, it does. (Ok, they didn’t ask for DVR – but obviously the Internet and TV are HUGE influencers on their dreams, aspirations, education, socialization, and current culture clash challenges.)
(Below: Class playing vocab bingo and Marissa and I with Namita and her son)
I was relieved when it was over because it was hard to come up with lesson plans and teach a class to motivated, hard working adults who didn’t have to come to our class. They took over two hours out of their busy days with work, family and in some cases school responsibility to come to our class every day of their own volition. We had to make it worth that effort for them. I am not sure if we succeeded, but we did have a lot of fun, I learned a lot and was surprised how sad I was when I left when they all presented me with thank you gifts!
(Below: On my last day, we attempted to teach the electric slide. Another volunteer in the kids class next door, Arlene, came over to help me because my co teacher was too young to know the electric slide! Yikes that made me feel old. The ladies also demonstrated one of their dances)
