School is out

So the first term has actually ended. The exams are over, the learners have seen their (unfortunately mostly dissapointing results), and Sinead and I are about to take off for South Africa. I have to say I'm very excited for this break, but strangely enough I aslo feel like I'm going to miss teaching and my learners for the next month. Maybe I'm being silly, but this place has really started to have a hold on me. But all that aside, I think both of us sorely need a vacation, as exams have been especially taxing.

Every day last week I had to invigilate (a crazy word, I thought it was a Namibian invention, but apparently its used in Ireland as well) two tests for 1 hour and 20 minutes. At first I thought this would be a chance to catch up on grading, but then I found out that learners had been cheating under my watch, so I had to give that up. So instead I just sat there, hot and bored, watching anxious teenagers take tests. I would get up every five minutes to walk around the class, but I never saw any evidence of cheating, so they are probably too clever for me. We were supposed to teach during the periods when there weren't tests, but my learners all wanted to study, so I made a compromise that I would teach the first half of the period and they could study for the second half.

Their studying was not so effective, as most of them did not get the marks they had hoped for. After the English test several girls came up to me and complained that "the test was soooo incredibly difficult Mr. Douglas". But it turned out that English wasn't as bad as maths, where the highest grades were Ds (which here is 50 -60 %). The tests were hard, but they were pulled directly from the end of the year exams that learners have to pass in order to be promoted, so they'll have to rise to the challenge at some point. I'm going to focus much more on teaching to the test next term, but I'm worried that at this point, and even before I got here, it is too little too late for many of them.

But enough worries and pessimism- I'm sure some of them will surprise me and do better than I hoped (one girl in ninth grade did that on this test, but her grade is so much better than her past performance that I'm pretty sure she cheated somehow). For now it is off to Cape Town and other adventures in South Africa- stay tuned for photos.