My baby's gone to school: how scary!

I took my son to school today and I must say I’m quite sad and extremely worried. I have conflicting feelings; I’m excited that my little person has grown and can be on his own at school but I have fear of what could go wrong.

I have two children, and when my daughter aged 9 now, started school I wasn’t as paranoid. We took her to school, got the uniform and she changed from there. I asked for a picture to be taken. She then said bye to her dad and I and asked us to leave. My son on the other hand, screamed his head off when getting out of the car but jumped up and down excitedly once he was in the classroom. I said bye to him but he just turned and walked off to join the rest of the class. No, I don’t feel neglected, I’m worried.

When my daughter started school, she could talk, feed herself and communicate quite well for a 2 year old. My son on the other hand is two years two months; he can only say ‘no’, ‘mama’, ‘come’ and won’t sit down for more than 10 minutes (not even on a plane). He’s still in diapers and prefers to pack up building blocks into different boxes than actually building something. My daughter learns best through puzzles and games. She’d rather dance, make art and crafts. She’ll rather do her math using pizza boxes thinking about how many boxes we’d need to cater for so many princesses considering the number of slices in each box. Of course my children are not out-right Einstein’s but they could be, and that’s where the worry of taking them to school comes in.

By second grade, my daughter was bored with school. She told the teacher that she was tired of doing the same things over and over and wanted to learn something different. Culturally, she was rude and the teacher did not hesitate to let me know of this. She also told me that my child could not sit still and got distracted easily. I thought, “of course she won’t sit still, she’s bored and looking for something much more interesting to do”. I told the teacher in as much tact as I could master, that Daisy was only bored because the learning was boring. And that maybe she could accommodate her by varying her teaching techniques. Needless to say I think that went on deaf ears.

So taking my son to school today made me wonder if he’ll come home and be bored too. If the teacher will make him sit down and behave like everyone else, as if he were a clone. If he’ll come home and not be able to stack his favourite toys in the colour codes he wants them to be in. If, he will no longer be interested in examining what’s making his favourite car, not move so quickly. All these worries are very real to me. I know the education system and what good it can do, but I also know the Zambian education system and what damage it can do. In my very strong opinion, I believe most schools and education systems kill creativity. They make it stand in a line and not move; they make it not want to draw how it sees the world. They make it sit in rigid chairs and make it behave in the same way as everything else until it dies and there is nothing else left but a dead clone of what could have been.

With the Zambian school system my fear is also cultural, how questioning is not allowed. How it is “wrong” to ask your teacher questions, especially when the teacher doesn't know the answer. How the teacher is viewed and views themselves as fountains of all knowledge and that the child does not know anything unless told by the teacher. How child centered learning is merely a theory taught in teacher training schools and is a myth in the classroom. Fears and worries very close to home.

This can change of course as creativity can always be revived and but it’s so much better when it’s tendered and encouraged at a young age. When thinking outside the box and using your available resources becomes a fundamental base for all learning, the possibilities of inventions, change, and development are indefinable. Mind you, this can be with any child. I should know; I've seen it in the classroom, in my family, in my community. There is so much potential out there that needs to be harnessed. So much that can be used for future generations and civilisations that can be questioned and put right for the benefit of the majority.

Well it’s only day one and I know I’m being melodramatic about it (with good reason), but the fear and worry is real. I’ll try my level best to encourage creativity at home, teach as many local languages and foreign ones as I can. I don’t hate the school system; I encourage learning through interaction and observation too. I just don’t like what it can do and how bad things can turn out.

Do get a chance to watch this: http://www.ted.com/talks/ken_robinson_says_schools_kill_creativity.html?qshb=1&utm_expid=166907-20&utm_referrer=https%3A%2F%2Fwww.google.co.zm%2F

The Evolution of Priscilla

When I had my second baby, I hadn't yet worked for 2 year at the company where I was and that meant I could not be given the 3 months allowed maternity leave. However I had a wonderful boss and he offered to give me 2 months of paid leave. This left little time for me to spend with my new born or get a nanny and much less to train her to take care of the baby the way I wanted it done.

I asked one of my colleagues at the office if he knew anyone in his neighbourhood who could help. I had a selection of nannies to interview based on work experience, how they talked and yes I was prejudiced to how they dressed and what they generally looked liked. Then came through Priscilla. She had just completed her Grade 12 about 8 months before, she spoke English and Nyanja, lived in the neighbouring compound and had taken care of her sisters children. She seemed stable, young and teachable. By this time I only had a month to get back to work. So Priscilla started work the next day.

She started well, cleaning and sterilizing feeding bottles as required, changing diapers and cleaning all my pans and scraping off the non-stick coating on them with a steel mesh wool scrubber. These have now been discarded due to the amount of dangerous rust they collected after every clean.

So off I went to work and when I got home, I found the baby clean and sleeping and Priscilla watching the local television channels. 4 weeks later Priscilla had switched to African magic and that's all I found her watching. I asked her after 3 months to be sleeping over as I needed to attend some evening classes.  She would cook diner with as much cooking oil as she could pour. Lessons were learned here and we moved on.

About 5 months after she begun spending nights over, her viewing preference changed dramatically. She was now into detective series and comedies, music videos (Trace and MTV) and the occasional Disney Junior channel for my son. I came home one night to be told she had set a reminder for me for a new detective series which she thought might be really good.

A year after being hired she decided she wanted to go back to school and get a diploma in Pre-school teaching. I encouraged her, wondering what would happen to my son who'd just turned a year. So she went on to get some enrollment forms at a school half an hour from the house and decided she'd start 4 months later. A week before her school was to start, she brought Rebecca who she said was her cousin or a relation of that sort. Rebecca spoke very little English but had 2 children of her own. Priscilla went on to further tell me that Rebecca would work for half a day, from Monday to Friday during which time Priscilla would be in school. To my amazement Priscilla said she would also sort out Rebecca's wages from whatever I gave her (this was before the revision of minimum wage). And there I had it, an employee employing in my own house! And of course it only took 6 months for Rebecca to also come up with her own ideas about going to school, which again I encouraged. Sadly, Rebecca is moving to a different town with her family and I now await Priscilla's next move in her evolution process.