Working with rug rats

Working with the school system here in Peru has its advantages and disadvantages, but regardless it’s part of the job description of a Peace Corps Volunteer. As a Community Health Volunteer, one of my principal work goals is to work with youth between the ages of 12-17 and provide them with the knowledge and skills needed to prevent sexually transmitted infections, including HIV/AIDS, teen pregnancy, and to make healthier choices. Unfortunately for me, my Peru 20 group was sent to their sites right as the school year was ending and the rainy season was beginning. That doesn’t leave much time to begin working with and forming relationships with teens. Luckily, most Peruvian schools employ a vacacciones útiles, or “useful vacations,” program. When school is out and kids enjoy vacations from January-February, they have the option to attend extra classes. Sometimes they have to take these classes because their grades were too poor; other times they take them in order to prepare for further academic study; sometimes they take them just for fun. The Peace Corps highly encourages its volunteers to participate in the useful vacations program and, in the case of the Community Health Program, it’s required.

Unfortunately for me, my town doesn’t have a useful vacations program. Instead of staying in town, all of Aurahua’s teens head straight for the coast. They stay with their families in Ica and Lima and either work or attend preparatory academies. Younger kids, however, are not old enough to do serious work or study and so normally stay put for the rainy season. Now, just because there are no teens to teach and no useful vacations program to work with doesn’t mean I get a “get out of jail free” card. Even if I could somehow skip out on the program, I wouldn’t have wanted to. Over half of my town had migrated to the coast to escape the rain, and I was desperate for something to do. So, I had to adapt.

Shortly before school was let out, I had the opportunity to talk to the elementary school principal during the Día de Logras (“Day of Accomplishments”). During this academic fair, all the elementary school students presented their major accomplishments of the school year and professors showcased specific skills they had taught them. However, the principal ended the event with a sobering speech and explained that, despite everything, most of the students were behind in math and reading. Now, I’m not exactly a math wiz, but I am an avid bookworm. So, after the event I approached the principal asking how I could help.

I implemented my own version of useful vacations program by designing a literature club. My goal was to help raise the students’ reading abilities, promote reading and a love for books amongst young kids, and encourage kids to use their libraries. Here in Peru, there’s not much of a reading culture. Reading is seen as a tedious chore, and few people have access to books. I’m fortunate that there are libraries in the high school, elementary school, and technical institute here in Aurahua. However, after inspecting the libraries I found that 80-90% of the “books” are training manuals, government documents, and textbooks. Is it any wonder that kids avoid libraries and don’t enjoy reading? Even so, I wanted to encourage kids to frequent the libraries more often.

So, how did I design my program? Well, first I insisted on receiving formal permission from the school principal and the parent teacher’s association, APAFA. Next, I created permission slips to distribute amongst the kids. I decided not to keep a strict attendance, so really it didn’t matter to me what kids were officially signed up to participate or not. However, I did want to know approximately how many kids were interested and intended on attending class. Based on the returned permission slips, I realized that about 25-30 kids wanted to be involved. So, I decided to teach two different classes in order to maintain order and discipline as well as accommodate different reading levels. On Mondays I taught kids between 6-8-years old and on Thursdays I taught 9-11-year old kids. In order to avoid the rain and give kids time to help their families in the afternoon, I taught in the mornings for about 1.5-2 hours. In addition, I insisted that all classes be held in the elementary school library. I wanted to get kids used to using the library and teach them that it could be a fun space. For each class, I would choose one book from the library that was appropriate for the age group’s reading level. I’d start the class by reading it out loud, and then the kids would read it again. They would be assigned a certain amount of paragraphs or pages, and I’d monitor them and correct their pronunciation if need be. We’d also stop to go over tricky vocab if some of the words were unfamiliar. Once the story was read, I always had a game that tested the kids’ comprehension of the story. Then, because everyone wanted to learn English, we’d spend some time learning English vocab words. If the story dealt with animals, we’d learn the English names for common animals. If the story dealt with seasons, we’d learn the English words “winter,” “fall,” “spring,” and “summer.” You get the idea. Finally, we’d finish with an arts and crafts activity.

Every class was it’s own form of adventure and chaos. On average, I had anywhere between 12-20 kids per class. Do you have any idea how hard it is to control 12-20 6-8-year olds? Let’s just say I now have a newfound respect for elementary school teachers. The 9-11-year old group was a lot calmer, and they were definitely more manageable. Attendance was irregular, and I never really kept track of who came regularly and who didn’t. For me, I was thrilled if a kid showed up even one time. What was more important for me was that the kids learned to like reading, not how many times they came to class. Eventually, the popularity of the class spread and I had kids from neighboring towns coming to participate. Some kids walked over an hour just to come. It was touching. Of course, popularity can also be a downfall. I had kids harassing me constantly, wanting to go to class even on days when no class was scheduled. One day when I was especially tired and decided to take a nap, I was woken up to my roof and door being bombarded by a shower of rocks. Now remember, I have a metal roof. The sound was deafening and resembled cannon fire. When I stepped outside, I expected to see a hailstorm. Instead I found a group of 3-4 kids, bouncing up and down in the street: “Professor Lyndsey! Professor Lyndsey! We’re ready for class!!!” Sometimes it was worse with the parents. Every day I’d get asked at least once, “Professor Lyndsey, when are you going to start your classes again?” It was maddening. I had put posters all over town, made announcements in the APAFA meetings, and did regular weekly radio announcements to convey the class schedule. Sometimes I had people ask me about the class when I was literally standing right next to a poster with all of the information clearly stated.

Overall, it was an exhausting experience. Due to my personality, I do much better with older children and teenagers. Working with young kids is always difficult for me, and I’d always leave class a tired, haggard mess. However, it was an overall very rewarding and fun way to spend the rainy season. I loved teaching the kids the English words for seasons and then making paper snowflakes and popsicle stick flowers. I loved playing musical chairs, hot potato, and UNO with all of them. Also, do you know how adorable it is to be mobbed by a group of kids calling you “professor?” I loved the day my Peace Corps health program directors came and visited me and helped out in my class. We read a story about a mouse living in the city, made maps of the community with the kids, and then we formed two teams for a scavenger hunt. The previous day, I had gone around to the most popular stores, the police station, and the health center to solicit their help. Then I had drawn dozens of maps with routes that the kids had to follow. The first group to return back to the library and finish the scavenger hunt got candy. Of course, when it was all over my directors wanted candy too.

With any luck, I’ll be able to continue my literature club in the future as well. My doctor and the high school math teacher want to create a real library on the town square full of books kids actually want to read. We also want to start a yearly literary and cultural festival and start a youth reading club. Will any of this actually happen? I have no idea. But my inner bookworm couldn’t be happier.