October 2013 to October 2014

Distance is nothing. I am a firm believer in keeping your spirits high no matter what the situation is. As I look at the last few months in my village and the massive amount of work that is left to do, I'm alright. Though I've decided to extend for a year in South Africa, I will be okay with walking away from the work I've done. Just like the efforts I've undertook in the past and the ones that lie in front of me, I gave it my all and loved every moment for what it was. 

South Africa has not been this mind expanding experience or anything supernatural. It has been fun, relaxing and conducive to productive, healthy work. My thoughts on my career and life path have certainly altered, though. There is a real inner push to explore the question of how to increase the effectiveness of teaching outside of the United States. For me, I'll continue to answer this question for at least another year in South Africa.

Peace Corps South Africa has developed a position with the School of Education at the University of Venda. The faculty in the School of Education has requested assistance with a grant that works with a cluster of secondary schools. I decided to apply for the third year extension position and was fortunate enough to be accepted.

I will be on a university campus, which means more internet and hopefully more, better blog updates. Also, I will be back in the Land of the Free from Thanksgiving 2013 to New Years 2014. Cleveland is where I'll be, but I need to get to Nashville and see my students. I also need to visit Zack and Marion in North Carolina and properly congratulate them on their marriage!!!!! 

May 4th is the big day. Send your congratulations to zackoliver423@gmail.com. No need to know who they are, it's a wedding - send your congrats. Zack and Marion did Teach for America with me in Nashville. I knew this was going to happen since their first date at Georgia Tech during Institute. A simple break from the  hellacious workload of lesson planning led to two awesome years in Nashville and a fruitful future. I can't wait to see you two again and wish you congratulations. Though, sorry Marion, I'll have to take Zack from you to go play basketball and eat burritos. Haha!

Got to Save it Somewhere

Hey loved ones,

I've been doing pretty solid. Scouts troop is nearing what I would classify as functioning. I need to make a separate post from our camp. Maybe I'll copy and paste the article I wrote for the Peace Corps newsletter? I've been teaching English and, after a year of more observation than teaching, I am realizing how much of a difference a committed teacher makes in the classroom. Thank you teachers! Keep smiling. Keep working your butt off. Tomorrow I am heading to my shopping town to pick up around 500 books to put them in the abandon building and get the ball rolling on the library. Entering the unknown. I've decided to stay in South Africa for another year with Peace Corps, working with the School of Education at the University of Venda. That should be a separate post too. Oh, but the reason I started this!

In July, we are doing a science camp in my village. The idea is to have my really smart Peace Corps friends come to my village for a week, spend two days training some secondary students (mostly the Scouts) in experiments, then run a 5 day camp with primary school kids. This way the secondary kids are learning and leading while the little ones are learning and experiencing and it all is under the supervision of solid people. I may even get one of the teachers to volunteer some of their vacation time! Don't worry, I'm making a separate site for this whole effort. Ah, the actual reason for this post!

So I needed to save some images somewhere of shirts that I have designed for the camp. There really isn't much funding that I have found for science stuff at the primary level. Learning science in a fun, hands on approach could make a world of difference for my learners. There is no Great Lakes Science Center like there is in Cleveland and most of the teachers lack the equivalence of anything beyond a high school degree, so there is no real exploration of science. Students exposure to science is copying notes from the board after a teacher copied the notes from a book.

Enough babbling. I'll save that for a more formal site. The shirts are below. Do you like red, grass, slate or navy? Let me know your vote. Ask your co-workers. Ask you granny. Yell at someone from your house, have them come in, give them some tea and let them choose one.






The quote on the back is, "Science does not know its debt to imagination. Emerson."

The plan is to charge a price for the shirts that matches the cost of a shirt for a learner and some of the camp's expenses. Super excited!

Enjoy