From the depths of frustration, intolerance and stress to the highs of satisfaction and pleasure, this week has had it all. My Higher Diploma Group finished the first module of the course and completed a self-assessment. They had to assess themselves as “Poor”, “Fair”, “Good” or “Excellent” in the areas of: Reflective Activities, Lesson Planning & Evaluation, Contributing to Group Work, Portfolio, and Attendance & Punctuality. I already knew from other Leaders’ experience that candidates tend to over-estimate their performance, and my group were no exception. The high point was one candidate (a very experienced teacher) who evaluated himself as “Excellent” in nearly all areas despite lesson evaluations with comments such as “the lesson was all good”. I learned early on that most teacher educators have very little, if any, experience of being encouraged to critically reflect on their practice. If gave them back my marks of their performance yesterday and was anticipating a bit of a backlash after marking everybody down. I’m sure there were grumbles, but after giving lots of feedback nobody complained. I think I’ve reached a point with my group were I know them a lot better as people and they have some trust in me. It’s like being a teacher at home: you start with a new class of pupils and then get to know them as a group of individuals. I like all twenty six of my group. They lack skills and experience in areas most teachers at home would be quite familiar with soon after a PGCE, but some of these people have life experience no teacher at home could match. Some of my candidates started life in absolute poverty in a rural area, looking after livestock while running around barefoot. One of them worked for the government during the reign of Mengistu and spent 14 months in prison in appalling conditions for a “crime” he had nothing to do with.

Only one of my group could not pass the first module. His English is so poor that I cannot understand him. He has a wide vocabulary but his grammar is so poor that his speech, and especially his written work, is like a near-random collection of words. He is an art teacher with over twenty years experience and yet he has never had any teacher training or professional development. Most instruction is conducted in English so I’m a bit mystified about how any of his students can understand him. He desperately wants to stay on the course as he’s gaining a lot from the basic teacher training contained in it. I will have to remove him from being assessed so he cannot gain the qualification, but I’m happy to keep him in the group so he can learn what he can and I’ll work with him on his English.

I continue to be amazed and shocked at the sheer lack of resources here. After observing the Head of Music teaching a lesson, I learned that he studied Cello and Piano in Addis and played in a national orchestra for two years, but cannot practice now he is in Awassa as he cannot afford to buy a cello. He tries to encourage his students to appreciate music by playing them tapes, but they are his own tapes. The music dept have NO recorded music to play to students. There’s a tape recorder, one guitar and a small electric keyboard that doesn’t work, otherwise the students learn to play traditional instruments by sharing 14 instruments between a class of 30. Tomorrow I’m spending some time with the Physics Lab Assistant going through what little Physics equipment they have. I want to get involved with helping the science teachers to develop decent teaching workschemes and practical activities.