My First Full Week

I have had the most amazing week. I was sent along with two Cambodian staff members to observe a school in Preah Vihear. It being my fourth day in Cambodia, I didn't really know what that meant.

Essentially, two hours down a paved road followed by 1.5 hours down a dirt road to a very small village. The reason I was sent here was because this is where Elaine and Nicholas Negroponte, some of the principal developers of the one laptop per child project, personally support the elementary and middle schools to have computer and English classes.

It was very impressive. Children who may not have electricity in their homes are programming robots to pick up, carry, and drop small objects with minimal help from a trained teacher. The buzz is that Pepy will also be getting these robots next year and we will be able to incorporate them into our lesson plans which I'm very excited about.

One of the best parts about this week, however, was getting to spend time with Sarakk and Leda, two staff members that I will be working quite closely with this year. They are wonderful. Within a day we were good friends and I feel so happy to know how comfortable and easy working with them will be.

In working with them for a few hours each night after our days of observation, I got a much stronger handle on my role in the organization. One of my main jobs will be to help them develop curricula for a creative learning class (mostly Leda) and an English class (mostly Sarakk) for grades 7, 8, and 9.

What I've done so far is talk with them about making sure their lessons are developmentally appropriate and that they have an idea of what they want to teach before they start looking for lessons, rather than just finding cool lessons and saying "yeah, teaching all that stuff would be good."

I think one of the bigger hurdles will be developmental appropriateness. Pepy recently transitioned their classes from a Primary school to a Junior Highschool and all of their materials are, for the most part, aimed at students ages 5-8. Which means they have a bunch of lessons that are teaching at the right level but are made for little kids. So, we need to acknowledge that we can't expect a bunch of 15 year olds to be excited about standing in a circle and singing goofy songs about English...

Next week I begin my first regular work week. Monday and Friday in the office in Siem Reap and Tuesday - Thursday in Chanleas Dais with Sarakk, Leda, and hopefully a lot more new friends!