Navigating the Classroom in Rural South Africa

As I prepare to begin Term 2 teaching and working in South Africa, I thought this would be the perfect time to reflect on the life of a teacher in rural South Africa. Let me preface this blog post by saying that I am not an expert on this topic. I am only writing what I know through my short time here teaching, through conversations with my fellow teachers, and through observation. As one of my closest friends/fellow PCV Kelsey remarked: this subject needs a book to properly cover everything. However, I am going to attempt to give you a glimpse into the struggles as well as the joys of teaching in the village through this blog post. So buckle your seatbelts everyone as we enter into the South African Classroom.

Class Size

In an American classroom, you will find a maximum of about 30 learners for every 1 teacher. Not a bad ratio. When I was in high school, for my AP classes, we sometimes had as little as 15 learners for every 1 teacher. An ideal learner to teacher ratio, in fact, this is a teacher’s dream ratio. I can still remember my AP US History class with Mr. Graham. There were maybe 10 of us in total; with this small number, we were able to have in-depth conversations, receive individual attention, and be known by name rather than by number. We were even able to get off-task, go on wild tangents, and still cover all of the material with time to spare. In rural South Africa, this is not the case. Most classrooms have at least 45 learners (my smallest class numbers 44). This is if you are “lucky.” Some of my fellow volunteers are teaching classes of 90 learners (this would be 3 classrooms in America if you went by 30:1). It’s not so much a concern about keeping order in the class (my learners want to learn and they are usually very attentive) but more of a concern as to how the heck can I properly meet the learning needs of each of my learners? If you’ve ever heard of Howard Gardner’s multiple intelligences, everyone learns differently – we have our verbal/linguistic learners, our logical/mathematical learners, our visual/spatial learners, our musical/rhythmic learners, our bodily/kinesthetic learners, our interpersonal/social learners, our intrapersonal/introspective learners, and our naturalist/physical world learners. So, in a class of 44+, it becomes rather tricky to meet each of these learning styles. It also becomes difficult to coordinate group work, pair work, etc. Additionally, when you are teaching 2 or more classes, these numbers add up rather quickly when you start thinking about grading, making worksheets, etc.

Resources

Another glaring difference between the schools in rural South Africa and America is the availability of resources. I have learned rather quickly that imagination comes in handy around here. I am fortunate because I have access to paper, chalk, a chalkboard, markers, crayons, old books, computers, and printers. However, due to budgeting problems, some of my fellow PCV’s didn’t even have paper or chalk last term. Please tell me how one teaches without paper or chalk? Thank goodness for being able to draw in the dirt. Going back to class size, resources become a problem with such large numbers. In most of my classes, learners sit 3 to a desk. At the high school where I teach on Fridays, a few of my grade 11 learners don’t even have the luxury of a desk. Combine this with 40+ (Celsius) temperatures and no aircon, and you have one very lethargic, cramped classroom. Prior to coming to South Africa, I never really thought much of pens or pencils. You need them to write, no big deal. Wrong. Now, I treasure my pens and pencils. At the beginning of the school year, each learner is given a certain number of pens and pencils. They are responsible for these for the entire year. Now, remember, these are kids under the age of 14. You can’t really expect them to keep these for the entire school year. The only times I see learners get into fights is over pens and pencils. Sometimes my learners will not be able to do their class work because they have lost their only pen. Other times I will be blown away by how creative the learners are in keeping their pens together. You would have thought the pen went through WWII, but somehow the learners manage to get them to write.

Classroom Management

My biggest issue/hurdle has been that of classroom management. Prior to coming to South Africa, and during my application process for the Peace Corps, one question I was asked was how I would deal with corporal punishment if I came across it in my work. Naively, I answered that I would not let it affect my work, that I would continue in my teaching without letting it bother me. I realized how wrong I was the first time I witnessed corporal punishment; seeing it for the first time was like a punch in the stomach (that feeling does not go away nor does it diminish in the times that I have seen it since). The first time I saw it, I went into the classroom, took the stick, and threw it into the dustbin. I have since made my stance on corporal punishment very clear to both my learners and the teachers I work with – I will not tolerate it. Let me take this chance to backtrack a bit. All of the teachers I am privileged enough to work with care deeply about their learners. They only want the best for their learners and would never intentionally hurt them. These teachers grew up in the Bantu Education system, where corporal punishment was not only used, but accepted. Now that corporal punishment has been declared illegal in South Africa, these teachers don’t know how to manage a classroom without corporal punishment. One of the measures I have found most effective, which I am working with the teachers to incorporate, is positive reinforcement. Rather than disciplining a child for negative behavior, why not encourage and motivate good behavior? Get rid of the need to discipline all together. So, for every class that I teach, if my learners have a productive class, they get a sticker. At the end of the month, depending on the number of stickers earned, they get a reward day. Let me tell you, I have never seen anyone more excited about getting a sticker!

Parental Support

In rural South Africa, a very big problem is that the majority of the learners do not have parental support once they leave school. Teachers often play the role of teacher AND parent, something most teachers in America do not have to do. It is estimated that there are about 5.6 million people living with HIV/AIDS in South Africa; it is projected that there are 1.9 million children who have been orphaned because of AIDS. Many of these learners are brought up by their Gogo’s or their older brothers/sisters, because they do not have parents at home. Often times the Gogo’s are illiterate, and the siblings are either working or are in school themselves. Still many learners do have parents, but the parents are working in order to put food on the table. With all of these situations, the learners do not have people to help them with homework. This is not to say that the parents don’t care. They do; I have met most of my learners’ parents and/or guardians and they care very much. They either cannot help due to a lack of education themselves or due to other restrictions. So, talking to the students back in America, give your parents a break when they “bug” you about your homework. Indulge them. Let them help you with your Science project or with your Math Homework. You’ll only be helping yourself by letting them help you.

Distance

Most of the teachers I work with live very far from where they teach. Due to a limited number of teaching posts available, teachers take the first available post. One of the teachers I work with was without at job for 10 years. When the post at the primary school became available, she didn’t think twice about it. For many of these teachers, they will live close to the school during the week. This means that they live away from their family (spouses and children) for the majority of the time. On Fridays, they will travel rather far distances in order to get home for the weekend. For the teachers who cannot afford two homes, they make the long trek each day, to and from school.

Time

When I write about “time,” I am writing more from an observer’s point of view. Granted I get up earlier than I ever did in the states – I try to get up around 5:30/5:45 to squeeze in a run before school. Heck, “sleeping in” is now anything past 6:30. However, this is NOTHING compared to some of the men and women I work with. The Grade 1 teacher I work with at one of the primary schools leaves her home at 4:30am every morning. This means that she must wake up around 3:30am in order to bathe and get ready for school. I’m not sure how she manages, but she still finds the energy to work with about 50 grade 1 learners throughout the day.

Language

South Africa has 11 official languages – Afrikaans, English, Ndebele, Northern Sotho, Sotho, Swazi, Tswana, Tsonga, Venda, Xhosa, and Zulu. Most people I meet speak at least 3 of these languages, making me feel quite down on myself about my language abilities. In the school system, learners have their Home Language and English. In recent years, learners were also expected to learn Afrikaans. Luckily, this has been phased out as it really didn’t benefit the learners. Grade R (kindergarten) is taught solely in Home Language. With the new curriculum (CAPS), learners are now introduced to English in Grade 1. Starting in Grade 4, all the way up through matriculation (Grade 12), learners are taught and tested in every subject (save for home language) in English. When you consider this, it is no wonder that learning is such a struggle for some of these learners. How do you expect to understand Physics, an already foreign subject to many of us, if you hardly understand English? In America, learners are taught all subjects in English (their home language) and take one additional foreign language as a subject.

Feeding scheme

At all of the schools where we (PCV’s) are teaching, we are in a Quintile 1 school. This means that the learners do not need to pay school fees or for school lunches. If I am correct, South Africa has Quintile 1, Quintile 2, and Quintile 3 schools. As I mentioned previously when discussing parental support, many of the learners we teach are orphans. Unfortunately, sometimes the learners’ only meal is the meal they receive at school. This usually consists of pap, beans or fish, and a piece of fruit. Some villages have Drop-In Centers (like my village) where the learners can receive a second meal after school. The women who cook are volunteers and receive either a small stipend or nothing at all.

Physical layout of the school

The physical layout of the school is very interesting to me. With the schools where I am teaching, there are blocks. At both of my primary schools, there is a dilapidated block (due to high winds, storms, poor construction, etc). The one school has mobile classrooms until this block is demolished and replaced. At the other school, the grade 4 learners and the school cooks are forced to learn/work in the dilapidated block because there is no other option (very sad especially when it rains). With the blocks, each grade is allocated a classroom. So, Grade R has its own classroom, Grade 1 has its own classroom, and so on. Unlike in America, in South Africa, the teachers move rather than the learners. This DEFINITELY has its downsides. The learners do not get to move ALL day; by the last period of the day, the learners are bouncing off the walls…literally (hence why I much prefer teaching in the morning rather than in the afternoon). Sometimes the teachers simply do not go to class. In addition to this, the teacher does not have the same sense of ownership over the classroom. While in America I was able to prepare the chalkboard for the next day with “Do Now’s,” the day’s schedule, homework, etc. I cannot do that here. I have finally been able to put up posters and classroom rules without having my learners take them down. I have my learners help me put these things up so that they have a sense of ownership over making the classroom look nice.

Learners

Now, dearest blog readers please do not assume that teaching in rural South Africa is a bad thing in the least. If I have realized nothing else in my 9 months here so far, I have at least realized that I love teaching. I love being in the classroom and working with the learners. Even if I am having the worst day, the learners always manage to bring a smile to my face. Never before have I met learners with such an eagerness to learn. There have been multiple occasions where my learners have come to the office to remind me of English period…15 minutes before it is scheduled to begin. There have been multiple occasions where my learners feign crying when my period is over. There have even been multiple occasions where I will be walking around the school yard and learners who I do not teach wave me over so I can teach their class.

They always say that “Before criticizing a man, walk a mile in his shoes.” I never fully understood the meaning of this old English Proverb until last term. When I came to South Africa, and when I started working with the teachers, I was a bit critical. I couldn’t understand why some of the teachers were unmotivated. I couldn’t understand why the learners weren’t earning higher marks. After teaching for a term in rural South Africa, I am more empathetic to both the teachers and the learners. This is not to say I still don’t expect the best from my learners – I tell them all of the time that I want 100% from all of them. This is to say, though, that I now have a better understanding of where these teachers are coming from. I think this will only help me to better help them in their work as teachers.