Our afternoon beta test took place in Sinthiou Mbadane, our ever-ready test school in a village on the outskirts of Mbour. The children should have had the afternoon off, but were asked to stay to participate in this test. After a quick lunch together, thanks to their school lunch program, we began the lesson.
Again with the first graders, we began the “Discovery of the number 11” lesson, but these children were even more intrigued by the interactive whiteboard. Other than the projector that the school had been using recently, they had not seen much technology in their short lives, and their exclamation of “television! television!” was definitely a positive sign of their motivation.
A bit unsure of what to expect from the village children, Saliou had planned to spend more time explaining how to use the pen, and especially how to drag-and-drop. But no need! Within just as little time as the city kids, these children were clicking, writing, and dragging as if it were second-nature. Eager to use the new and shiny board, they seemed determined as ever to not let its crazy “clicks” and “drags” stop them. Sometimes hesitant about the instructions, they relied on their classmates and on the panel of teachers in the back to repeat the French in Wolof, Pulaar, and Sereer before completing an activity together.
During one activity, the first child to participate at the board was then asked to hand the infrared marker to a classmate who would continue. As Saliou explained this instruction, first in French and then Wolof, the boy just stared at him. Hearing it again in Pulaar and Sereer, he smilied shyly and then openly as he scanned the class, made powerful by the decision that had been entrusted to him alone. A girl in front jumped out of her seat and sidled up to him, smiling and clicking her fingers in the air. “Me! Me!” she proclaimed and, with one last glance around, the boy handed her the marker and headed back to his seat, satisfied with his decision. What a radical change from the teacher-led classes! He, a mere student, got to choose a participant from his peers.
Ending the lesson once more with a game, the students clapped together when they accomplished the task at hand, and the kittens pounced happily off the screen. They were then released for the day, and quickly grabbed their backpacks and rice sacks to stream out of the door and rush home.
“Their parents will be getting an earful tonight!” the first-grade teacher laughed, watching the childrens’ faces, still lit up and dreamy, as they broke out in runs once in the courtyard. “I wonder what they’ll think about having a ‘big television’ at school!”
"And having a successful math class with attentive students in the afternoon?" the director breathed, as if the results had knocked his breath clear out of his lungs. "Now THAT's a feat!"
No comments:
Post a Comment