Wrapping up l'année scolaire 2009-2010 (Part 2)

This morning I just experience my first overt:  "Could you change the grade of a student as a favor to {insert name}?"  It was a fellow teacher asking me to do it and they took an underhanded approach.  They said that Action Social (THE Burkinabé advocacy group for those without a voice) was involved.  Yeah right! I think a group that advocates equality would have better things to involve themselves with.

The end of the school year is fast approaching.  The grades are almost fixed and finished and tomorrow is full of teacher meetings.  Football games are underway, danses have happened and there was even a defilé on Friday evening.  The closest thing in the US would be a beauty contest.  In this case the girls dressed in traditional clothing and walked down the "run way" carrying traditional objects (bowls of milk, spindles, baskets, calabashes etc.).  I was asked by a colleage, Noëlie, to take her place as a judge. 

pre-defilé entertainment

the "husband" of the 1st place girl reading the sands

trying my best to judge the following categories: 1) traditional clothing; 2) expression; and 3) beauty and harmony of traditional clothing

 

Noëli and myself

Wrapping up l'année scolaire 2009-2010 (Part 1)

As of this week I have finished my work as a teacher in Burkina Faso. I've given, graded and handed back my last devoirs (tests) and entered the grades into our computer grading system. The last event of this school year is our conseil (teacher meeting) on June 25^th.

Overall I am happy that things are wrapping up here and I'll be coming home soon. At this point though I now understand why some volunteers choose to extend their service a third year. Everything becomes so much easier the second year (except the insane heat!).

Here are some of the events and happenings since my last post in February.

Potato Festival in Titao 

The Ouahigouya area is known for potatoes.  We were literally over flowing with them in March!  To celebrate the farmers and the potatoes the city of Titao has a Potato Festival.  The festival includes a lot of speeches and stalls upon stalls of potatoes.

Making Soap

This year I did my very best to incorporate experiments and "real worl" applications in my physics/chemistry classes.  The most interesting was a soap competition in my 1ère class.  In this class we started organic chemistry and the last subject covered is saponification (the reaction for making soap).  So I divided my class in half; forming two "teams" of 35 students.  The students chose the soap recipe and then I bought the supplies in Ouaga at Faso Chimie (see below).  I also made them write lab reports.  Unfortunately, quite a few of the cheated by copying each other or plagiarizing books/internet.  My last act as a teacher was giving out around 15 zeroes for cheating.

Outside the store - perfume bottles

Chemical storage

dyes

plastic bags filled with buerre de karité (shea butter)

Recipe used:

• 1 kg NaOH
• 2 liters palm oil; 2 liters shea butter; 2 liters coco oil   
• ~ 200 g  sodium carbonate
• 250 ml sodium silicate
• perfume

Both groups used the same recipe, but their results were different.  The first group didn't stir the soap well enough and as a result there were little white spots of sodium carbonate in the soap.

mixing the soap

pouring the soap in a mold

cutting the soap