15. September - Observing at a school

Today was excursion day, so we had to wake up a little earlier than we were used to. A little past 9 o’clock we arrived to a private school. We were going to observer a normal school day and then we are supposed to teach at the same school the following day. The settlement was arranged with help from Khaji, because he has two children at the school. Originally we were supposed to observe more than one class, but because today was ‘Children’s day’, the pupils only had a half day of classes. When we arrived, all the pupils were doing a morning ritual, where they were standing in lines and talking in a choir. It was much disciplined and very different from the Danish school system. Afterwards they went to different classrooms sorted by age. After a briefly introduction we were divided in smaller groups. Six of us went to a nearby kindergarten/nursery school. There were three different classes and Catharina and I went to see a class with around 20 four years old boys and girls. They had just started learning English, so they couldn’t even say their own name. In the classroom Catharina and I was placed on small plastic chairs and forty big brown eyes were starring at us including Khaji’s four year old son. He was a straight A student. We were participating in the class for about 45 minutes. And during the class there was singing, dancing and repeating, what the teacher said. The discipline from before was totally gone now, and during the class, one girl just suddenly stood up and started dancing, while others were climbing on the table. They were all very adorable. I’m very excited to see if Catharina and I will succeed in teaching Friday, when the children are in such young age.
After observing the class, we all gathered together and shared experiences. We then watched the ‘Children’s day’ ceremony, where five of us participated and gave present for some of the pupils. During the ceremony there were different speeches, a quiz, music and dance. It was a great experience to be a part of. Some of us really wanted to stay longer, but we had to go home for lunch. At lunch we had burgers for a change, but honestly I already missed nepali food. In the afternoon we had an energizer and a meeting, where we talked about our emotions and different issues as toilets and food. We were supposed to have a session about learning methods, but since we all were very tired, we instead had time to prepare for tomorrows class. Before dinner most of us went to Thamel to book the weekend trip to Last Resort, where we are going bungee jump, river rafting, tree climping, relaxing and rappelling. It’ll be fun! Tonight is a very exciting night because of the election in Denmark and hopefully we can hear some Danish radio. And hopefully the right party will win.