Chicken and spaghetti

Teaching continues to bring it's ups and downs. I've been incresingly frustrated when trying to teach my class of 50+ children English. I have to stick to the set text that I've been given but there are only 15 books to share between the class and as a result it's impossible for everyone to follow what I'm trying to teach. I can't blame the children for breaking into fights over who has the books - at least they're fighting over wanting to learn - but it does make me furious that the children are being held back because the government aren't giving the school sufficient financial support and resources. I was also really furious when an English exam paper was given to my class. The children asked me for help with it and I simply couldn't believe what I saw. It was an official printed exam paper with various tests on adjectives, abstract nouns, plurals etc etc. The first section was a comprehension with words taken out and the children had to fill in the correct missing words. Simple enough, but the comprehension went something like this...

"Mbela kicked the footballl onto the roof. It gotten stuck and he had to climned onto it to get it back. As he was climning up. He fell. His leg was badly injured and as he was climning up he fell. His twi friends came running to help." (sic)

See attached photo. How can they possible hand something out like this? I've tried hard to accept teaching practices that I don't like and to keep quiet when my instinct has been to complain or speak up but it seems unforgiveable that the children should be expected to complete an exam like this when the board of examiners and the teachers either haven't bothered to read it through or can't speak English themselves. I took the paper to the Headmistress who was pretty shocked but said there was nothing she could do. Argh - it drives me mad.

This major irritation aside, I'm still thriving on the moments that make it all worthwhile. I really enjoy spending my breaks in the container where I teach as many children come and find me there and spend the break happily colouring in scraps of paper and singing songs. Some of them are becoming more and more tactile and love hugs and holding hands which I am more than happy to give out. They are still forever touching my hair which seems to hold an endless fascination for them as it's "soooo sooooft" - they make me feel like I should be in a Timote advertisment! One of the teachers came into the container today and was absolutely gobsmacked to see about 15 children crammed in all colouring away quietly while a few played with my hair. He couldn't believe they were being so well behaved when I wasn't waving a stick around threatingly to make them behave. He kindly translated some of the lovely things the children were saying to him about me, all of which made me swim with happiness as they don't really say those sort of things directly to me and it's naturally wonderful to hear they think I'm alright! When one of the little girls I teach came up to me, held my hand and coyly said 'I love you more than chicken and spaghetti' I knew that my day couldn't get any better.