Teaching: Taking It One "Stitch" at a Time

By: Cindy

Three weeks ago, Willie, the RTC School Manager called a teacher’s meeting. Since I agreed to help teach a course or two in the coming year, I was invited to come to the meeting. Originally, I said that I would take on teaching a class at the RTC when we came back for our second lot of time in May. I figured that would give me three months to get used to life here and a month in Port Vila to prepare for my class. Well, naturally in Vanuatu things don’t always go the way you might expect. So…we go with the flow and on with the show!

As it would so happen, the “regular” Home Care teacher is away somewhere (?) and no one seems to know when or if she will return to the village. (Home Care includes Cooking, Sewing, Caring for Babies and Children, Painting, Drawing, etc.). So, teaching the female students has fallen to the RTC Manager’s wife, Iawilam (YAH-Will-Am), and me. Finding out that Willie was expecting me to take on a class with just a week to prepare did not go over very well with me. I do not like feeling unprepared. Seeing as how there is no “set” course to teach or guidelines to follow it can leave you feeling kind of lost and frustrated.

I went to visit Iawilam to talk to her about teaching Home Care. At first, I wanted to ram my head against a wall! We talked for about 20 minutes as I tried to nail down exactly what we were supposed to teach and when. I also tried to explain that teaching at the RTC falls to about #4 on my list of priorities. #1 being our mission work, #2 teaching Kaela and Melia in school, #3 caring for our home, #4 helping with the RTC. For 20 minutes we talked and talked and it became very clear that while there are a couple of people “in charge” of the school, in reality there is no one person to give out directives and thus there are very few teachers taking responsibility for their work in the school…and so I just wanted to ram my head against the wall in exasperation! However, as we talked some more I began to realize that Iawilam is in the very same position I am in in regards to teaching. She didn’t ask to take on teaching the girls. She has her own work to attend to in her home and that takes up most of her time. But, yet, Willie is her husband and therefore, he volunteered her for the task. I felt much better knowing that she wasn’t overly excited about it being thrust in her lap at the last minute either. That was how I felt. But, as there was no one else to take on this task, it has become ours to do with it what we will. So, we agreed that she would teach the course of her choosing on Mondays and I would teach the course of my choosing on Thursdays.

It is at that point that our innate cultural differences became very obvious.

We both were called upon to take on teaching the girls this term. We both, somewhat grudgingly, agreed to do it. We both were responsible for choosing what course we would teach in the coming weeks. However, Monday’s Home Care class came, but Iawilam did not. After a little while Willie showed up and taught the class. And the same happened this week on Monday. No Iawilam.

On the otherhand, because I said I would teach Home Care on Thursday’s that is exactly what I spent the week before my first class preparing to do. I chose “Stitching” (very simple embroidery) as my course to teach. I felt most fortunate to find some embroidery floss in the school’s storage house. It was apparent that it had been abandoned and no one really knew what to do with it. So, I decided to teach the girls how to stitch. A skill they can use to make gifts for family and friends or decorate clothing or tea towels to sell.

I’ve had two classes so far and they are going well. I have 8 students and almost all of the girls seem to really enjoy their newfound skill. They not only practice their stitching in class from 9:30-11:30am on Thursdays, but most have been working on their projects outside of class, as well.

Even though I wasn’t quite ready to take on this new task, I have found that I am enjoying it. I just had to draw some definite lines with the management as to what I was able to do. Teaching two hours in the morning once a week? Yes, okay. Taking on another two hours in the afternoon each week…I had to say, “so sorry”. You have to know your limits. And I know that if I agreed to teach more than that this term, I would find myself with little time to prepare Bible studies and shorting Kaela and Melia on their schooling, which just isn’t right. Now, come May we will see what will happen. I’m scheduled to teach Cooking and Cultural Relations sometime before the end of the year, so we will see how those courses pan out as time goes on!