Week Four

Sunday through to Wednesday we spent in our painting gear singing Michael Jackson songs - the paint fumes clearly went to our heads! Emma was most embarrassed when one teacher; Kumar, caught her singing and wanted to hear more. The library is now looking fresh in a coat of brilliant white gloss and only requires a few touch ups.

Freshly painted Library

Looking forward to getting back into the classrooms on Thursday we realised that it was a school holiday and so set to work finishing some jobs in the computer room. Emma has almost cracked using the laminator, they are becoming better friends and some resources and displays are finally finished.

We were most excited to welcome Colette on Thursday. She is very lovely and we instantly knew that she would be a joy to work with. We spent most of the day introducing her to the school. Fortunately, Colette has no meaning in Nepali and so her introduction at the staff meeting was most civilized – more so than when Guy introduced himself “Mero naam Guy Ho” – everyone falls about laughing because Guy means “cow” in Nepali. We have spent a lot of time sharing ideas and discussing how our time will be best spent. Colette plans to be in Lukla for three weeks, is TEFL trained and would love to get involved with teaching and using the new resources in classes.

We are very pleased to have finished the library catalogue and now all books in the library (including those in Nepali) are listed in an EXCEL spreadsheet.  Colette brought with her the library cards from Kathmandu, so Colette and Emma set to work in the rainy evenings drinking coffee on our balcony and filling them in - which is completed!

Class 2 Students proudly display their drawings

So week five will be a busy one – our first plan is to each spend a day shadowing a teacher.  This will help us to get a good understanding of the structure of teaching here and will also provide a good basis for our project comparing teaching in Nepal to that in England. Colette has with her a video camera and so we hope to be able to gather some great footage of school life in action. Emma and Colette will be getting involved with the classes and using the resources that we have prepared, and Guy will begin painting the computer room this week.

 Nursery Girl enjoying her Classroom in the Clouds