EXPERIENCE/Teacher Martine (Back to Experiences)

Volunteer work in the interior of Suriname
Nieuw-Aurora
On June 4, 2005, I departed for Suriname and on June 9 I traveled to the interior. On that day, I went with a group of tourists over the bauxite road and across the water to Isadou where we stayed in traditional huts (with beds though). The next day, we walked past Gunsi to Nieuw-Aurora. Fortunately, the boatman brought my belongings to the final destination. The tourists were even more curious about my stay and surroundings than I was.

At 1 PM we were introduced to the head of the school, Mr. van Dalen. Afterwards, we walked to my temporary accommodations where my belongings had already been delivered. When the tourists left, I was given an explanation about the house, toilet and shower. In comparison to other inhabitants, my facilities were reasonably luxurious. I had a toilet and shower cabin which the van Dalen family used as well. Afterwards, I was introduced to the food, it was reasonably good: rice with tayerblad (Surinamese vegetable). In the evening, it was time to go to bed. In the first weekend, I unpacked my belongings and explored the village a little. Then, I was introduced to the whole community in the church.

On Monday, June 13, I visited the J. Arabieschool in Nieuw-Aurora. The school had approximately 300 students and classes were from 8 AM-10:30 AM and from 11 AM-1 PM. Every school day started with the raising of the flag, whereby the children sang the national anthem. The fact that, in school, mostly the Saramaccan language was spoken instead of Dutch was something I had to get used to.
For most children speaking Dutch was difficult; they rather not speak it. The classes were very big, which made the students less disciplined. Still, it was a challenge to teach them for a few months...

After I had observed classes a couple of days, I decided to teach the second grade with 45 students. Because the students now had a Dutch teacher who could not speak the Saramaccan language, they were forced to speak Dutch. After practicing a couple of times, their language skills got better. In addition to second grade, I taught fifth grade as well where the students' Dutch was much better. It is remarkable that listening is much easier than speaking.

After a while, I found out that some teachers only attended a one-year teacher's course to teach the children in the interior. This is because of the lack of teachers. Now it became clear why some teachers had difficulties with pedagogy and didactics. Some teachers wanted to learn it, but somehow found it to be difficult. On the other hand, other teachers did not have problems with these subjects, but were not willing to do anything with it.

The people of the village all knew me after a couple of weeks. Both the inhabitants and I made the effort to communicate with each other: a combination of the Dutch and Saramaccan language. My neighbors tried to teach me the Saramaccan language as well.

Almost all children enjoyed visiting the new teacher's place (me). Actually, they would rather stay the whole day. It is, however, not improper to ask them to return home after a while. After approximately one month in Nieuw-Aurora, I returned to the city. I had seen what the school lacked in terms of school materials, so I now had the opportunity to buy them. I was able to buy these materials since the children of the Hapse primary school in the Netherlands (the school where I usually taught) had raised some money. Once I arrived in the city, I went looking for cases, pens, pencils, erasers, sharpeners and notebooks. As long as you can catch a taxi, things will go fine with the entire load.

Five days later, I returned to Nieuw-Aurora, exhausted but satisfied. This time, I had a new set of goals: distributing the materials and observing the teachers and students. The head of the school thought that this was a great idea since he valued the quality of education.

The children living in my neighborhood enjoyed helping to unpack the materials and bringing the stuff together. Every child received a case with his or her name including a pen, pencil, eraser and sharpener. This made it easier for the group, as the children did not need to walk through the class anymore to borrow each other's materials. Then, I wrote the names on all notebooks. Next school year, every child will receive three notebooks. Usually, they need to buy it themselves, but most of the families cannot afford it.

While distributing the cases, I noticed that approximately half of the children were happy, the other half of the group was also happy, but behaved quietly and properly.

Upon arrival in the interior, I noticed what life is without electricity. The electricity generator had run out of diesel, so there was no electricity between 7:30 PM and 11 PM. I did, however, had an oil lamp for the light, so I went to bed reasonably early.

The next period was about observing and writing. The teachers were curious about what I was writing, so I told them that meetings would be planned to discuss the conclusions. In those meetings, I highlighted the most remarkable aspects that needed changing. The positive points were told to the teachers individually, as they were too different from one another.

The remarkable aspects were mostly in the area of didactics and pedagogy and some related to the teacher's attitudes. Some points:

• The Saramaccan language is spoken much more frequently than the Dutch language;
• Many students do not move up to the next grade and repeat the same grade two or three times; Teachers claim they are lazy, but the problem lies in difficulties with the subject matter and not getting any help with it;
• Teachers are trying to minimize their lessons in terms of time. It is "customary" that teachers start late, make phone calls or send letters during classes, or have a conversation while they are teaching.

In short, these are the most important points that I noticed. Of course, there were many more in comparison to the Dutch manner of teaching.

The last 2 weeks, I paid attention to the children in second grade who could hardly read. These children had to repeat the same grade, but did not even understand the subject matter of the beginning of second grade. I experienced this as fun and meaningful. Usually, it is very difficult to realize these things in big groups.