I will bring my gun to school tomorrow and shoot you

Education, what does it really mean? Is a bad formal education worst than none at all? Imagine everything you were taught was wrong. What if history books outside the U.S. reflect Christopher Columbus as a lost two bit ship captain who thought he had docked in India thus giving rise to the term Indians for Native Americans. Or maybe you attend a quiz bowl that questioned what European settlers pretend to be upon arriving on any foreign land. Traders would be the correct answer, lol! Of course both these examples are things most of us already know but it is hilarious for me to read it in a history book or witness someone insult Christopher Columbus. We have songs and a holiday just for him! Just for all his glory! When I am standing over that turkey feast with my head bowed every November I thank God for Christopher Columbus sailing the ocean blue lol.

What I am getting at is what they learn, the way they learn it, how they study and the method they teach here is different from that of the states. I like to sit in on classes when I am done teaching. The classes are small and you learn as one (as a group) instead of as an individual. It reminds me of my Morehouse days, you know, the whole “I got my brothers back” idea. They talk, debate, and consult with each other and decide the best answer amongst themselves before giving the correct answer. They share work, they look on each others paper as if it is there own. Now you may read this and jump to the conclusion that there is no learning going on but this is a class with no individualized pressure to out perform your peers. We stress over others laughing, being labeled (dumb… or nerd), tests, having the wrong answer. They don’t have those problems. Its almost like a group study session being lead by someone who has taken the class already. I don’t teach, I explain and discuss. There is room for jokes and opinions in the discussion, every one is involved, and most importantly it works. Very well I might add. Their worst schools have hand made desk, chalk boards, no a/c, and 1 heavily used book for every 2.5 student. Yet they could compete with our best even with all the internet computer labs, libraries, smart boards, and all the other learning tools we have like paper! I sit in on these classes and watch these kids spit facts without books in front of them to look at. Reminds me of the potential that each of us carry around with us.

I do see one common factor though. One of my classes is mixed, boys and girls. I find that both sex are easily distracted with the additional presence of opposite sex. Smh, Young thunder cats and their hormones! Some things never change, lol. I have a player or two in my class and the word for player is opinpay which also has something to do with goats lol. *Wow! This kid just said girls are a b---h! They have no understanding of curse words! Before I go deeper let me explain. They are discussion troubling situations and in his answer of such a debacle he gave an example involving women but instead of using the vocabulary word obstacle (or even trouble) he used B---h as a synonym. So to be absolutely clear his context for the word was not to degrade but simply to say girls ain’t nothing but trouble (Will Smith song). The funny part about it was nobody reacted but the teacher and me. The words fail on ears that were death to the alternate meaning. The teacher corrected him and warned him about using words they hear in AMERICAN rap music.* Sorry I just had to share that tidbit

Before that happened I was about to talk about puppy love, but I rather move on now to something else. Some of the students have become frustrated with my lack of language arts. I am really trying to learn the basics in Twi but it is very hard and confusing. Twi is the most common language used here and it’s a b---h  (obstacle) lol. They speak it so fast and the words they form are unnatural to an English tongue. Plus I learn by word association and I have nothing to relate the words or phonetic sounds to. By the way, we joke and south park jokes about Africans clicking there teeth to speak. Well they do click but it is not any different from when we suck our teeth to show disappointment. I have not heard it much but when I hear it, its usually to express that you are thinking of something, the English equivalent would be “ummm’. So let’s have a role reversal. If they were to make fun of us they would suck there teeth and repeat “ummm” and “like” over and over again. LOL “ummmm, like ummm, ummm, like ummm”. I don’t know about you but that’s hella funny to me! I mean I am seriously  cracking up over here.

I am reviewing this post and there is a lot of randomness to it. I apologize for that, but there is a lot I would like to say but I can’t type the thoughts out completely before I get impatient and tell you about what else I learned! Its so many little things you learn here that create the bigger, over all experience.

Oh, I almost forgot! The title of this entry comes from one of my students today when I asked him about personal protection. He said “Yes, I have a gun. I will bring it to school tomorrow and show it to you.” I thought he said “shoot you” i.e. perfect title for an entry about the nuances of learning and communication….I am thinking you would like to know about why we were talking about guns? That deserves a post of its own.

And internet has been crappy so sorry, no pictures...i am doing good to stay online long enough to post