Two hours in a Primary classroom - Personal rapport as key to learning

 Kandarpa Kalita

Professionally I am not a teacher, but involved in education in different capacities. My father was a teacher of a primary school, my wife and one of my brothers also teaches in government schools. I used to visit my wife’s school on Saturdays and occasionally get chances to have some interactions with the children. Recently I got a chance to have a two-hour session with the children. I always look forward to such occasion and see what can be done to assess them quickly and provide support.

The school building is divided into two rooms. The other room housed the class one, four and five. The regular teachers were with them. In this room, children were sitting on desks in two rows according to their class.  That day being a Saturday, the attendance was poor, only six were there, three in each class. 

 As I entered the classroom, the children greeted me as usually they do to their teacher, but their eyes could not hide the overwhelming confusion and bewilderment. “Who is this guy and what is he up to here?”- maybe in their mind, I thought, so I started with simply asking them “Guess who am I ?”. Their faces shining up just trying to figure out.  As I was looking intensely on them so they could not confide to each other, but one girl seems to have some inkling, so she bent on to the boy sitting by her and whispered something to his ear. As no one was responding, I asked the boy what was told to him. His face reddened and he did not utter a word.  Waiting for some moments, I asked him to tell others if not to me the hidden secret about me.  Suddenly, the environment in the room just got easier and the children came out from their sitting closet, ran to each other’s place and started whispering to each other’s ear.  One is literally into other’s ears just trying to prevent me hearing. The scene amused me. So I started asking again -What was told about me. Finally a boy of class two told me smilingly “Cow doctor”. That the girl assumed me a veterinarian- was funny but strange to me.  May be some veterinarian visiting her village recently resembles me. I did not explore the reasons further but wanted to lead them towards the truth. Unsure to explain the relation wife-husband, I thought of bringing  in my daughter at this point. She also visited the school earlier and the children are likely to remember her better than me. I showed the photograph of my daughter in my phone. They could identify her and informed that “Yes”, she indeed visited their school and rehearsed some rhymes with them. “She is our ma’am’s daughter”. Feeling relaxed I told “See I am her father”.  To confirm my position I again asked them “Do you know well now who am I?”  But again they were silent but all were smiling.  Giving the cue I asked how I am related to their Ma’am .  After some cajoling one boy told me “Mota”. Mota means male in formal Assamese, it is also used as slang substitute of husband.  I accepted his version and tried to draw their attention to the formal substitute of the slang. I asked the boys to write Lora (Boy) and the girls Chowalee (girl). One girl could not even start writing the first letter. Others got their words correct. Then I proceeded to explain the formal Assamese word for husband and wife. I told them about their mother and father and how they are related to each other. One girl informed about a couple in her village who used to quarrel among themselves and finally got separated. I was surprised how she quickly related the concept of relationship.

From the first assignment I have given to them , it became clear that one girl among the group require maximum support , she even do not know the letters, one boy knew the letters but could not use the vowel sign, remaining of them can write simple words . In class two and three all children need to have the competency of writing words with all vowel signs. They should also have the knowledge of using joint letter.

This time I asked them to tell a name of a bird, one by one. After, all finished saying bird names I asked them to write it in their notebook. As the assignment was specific to each student no one could copy from others.  Again, the same girl is unable to write it. In all these activities I asked other children to help her finish the task and two or three children volunteered each time, of which I allowed one to go to the girl and help her. I ensured that finally she should feel that the task is done. Similar assignments were given for animals and fruits name too. First I asked them to write whatever they already told and in successive occasion, I altered the scheme, formed a pair and asked to write each other’s responses.  I did this  because,  I got an idea that gradually they assumed that it is better to say easier name. Hence focus transferred from the topic  and clever one started looking for simpler words to make it easy to write.

As I found the word cards are being placed in a pocket board  of cloths near the blackboard, I took out some of it. These are basically words with vowel signs. No joint letter I found. I took out a card and loudly read it before them and asked them to write it in their notebook.  After they finished writing , I handed them over the card and asked them to check it. They enthusiastically discussed the word, errors and why that happened. After giving 3 /4 words, I asked one child to come forward and take out a card. Now she reads it out and remaining children is to write it down. Some have difficulties in reading the card, requiring my support. This time the challenges in reading also coming out before me. The children liked to play “teacher”. Even the girl who has difficulties in recognizing letter enthusiastically participated. It was interesting to see when other children brought in their note book to show her, and she authoritatively checked their notebook resembling the word written with that one in the card at her hand!  No children ignored her during the task. Power matters, even if it is on the hand of someone who apparently doesn’t deserve it!

 At some point one boy volunteers to recite a poem, I encourage him. I could not follow at all what he was uttering.  Without waiting for my instruction, he was followed by another girl, thus all of them recited poems. As in almost all cases I could not follow their poem. The voices were not clear to me.  I just pretended to listen and follow their recitation.  Immediately after that I asked them to write the name of the poem in their notebook and show me.  Most of them could not complete the name of the poems. I asked them to open the textbook and check the name of their poems.  It became evident that the boy reciting at first was actually recited a prose lesson with some sentences.   I asked all of them to correct the names taking help from textbook.

At this moment one teacher entered the class room. I requested him to take a chair and told “One girl needs special support, she cannot identify letters”. He already knew it and expressed dismay over it. It seems she was detained at class two due to her poor performance, otherwise she would have been in grade three. I assured that she is good and can learn all these, if someone supports her in doing practice.

 At around 12, one child from the other room came and informed about the school dismissal. Oh great, no one was listening to me now! They all started packing up their bags. I thought my rapport built up during last two hours in the classroom was not strong enough.

The children here are facing difficulties in official first language. All of them speak a different language at home whereas they study in Assamese as the medium of instruction followed in the school.  One boy is from Bodo community and rest are from Karbi community. Hence the challenge before them is obvious. They used to speak Assamese outside home but still their language resembles a local dialect of Assamese which is a bit different from the formal language. Proper diagnosis of their condition, specially determining their state of ability in different learning areas might help the teacher in devising suitable activities for them. The key point remaining developing a good personal rapport with them over time.