I was always a terrible speller when I was in grade school. I can remember the girl that sat across from me would fake yawn and exclaim how easy the words were as we were taking a spelling test. Meanwhile I would be struggling through the whole thing. It frustrated me. Now I am trying to teach second graders how to spell words in both English and Bangla. The first week I was trying to see what the kids knew. The previous teacher had told me that the book I was going to go through was “review” so I could go through it a little faster. It turned out to be an epic fail where most of the kids didn’t pass the spelling test at the end of the week.. so much for a “review” they spelt the word egg=Ak.
This week I have been determined to spend half of the class time on the spelling words so that they will all get 100 percent. I’ve been creatively thinking of ways to have fun while teaching them how to spell words. Today we had a spelling bee. We had two teams: The Penguins and The Polar Bears. Each of them lined up behind two desks and whoever hit the desk first and spelled the word correctly would get a point. It was really fun at first and the kids were enjoying it because the teams were pretty even. Then Brittany’s turn came up on the Penguin’s side and she just sat there; she didn’t even try. I tried to get members from her team to help her out but that didn’t help because by that time they were losing so all of the team members lost their excitement. All of a sudden Hannah burst into tears because her team was losing. Determined to save the game, I switched the teams up moving Kakoli and Joshua over to the losing team and Kara over to the winning team. This made the game a little more even but when it came to the last point the Polar Bears won. About half of team Penguin began to cry. Fail.
After the horrid spelling bee accident we went to an Eid dinner. Eid is that holiday where the Muslims kill the cows. Apparently the Hindu’s in India send over all their old cows (because they can’t eat them.. because then they would be eating their god) and the Muslims killed them all on Monday. After that the poor people go from house to house with a bag and the rich people put a chunk of meat in their bag (it is a twisted version of trick or treating.. I prefer candy). We drove 45 minutes to the house of Siddigue who is an Adventist man in the area. His wife cooked us a huge meal; all of it was vegetarian and Bengali. There was curry, egg pudding, fried peppers, Pomegranates, oranges, cucumbers, fried boiled eggs, and a bunch of other things that I’m not a hundred percent sure what it was. It all tasted good but I wasn’t brave enough to try the fried boiled egg… it just sounded gross. Lauren, Heather, and I ate the Bengali way and only used our fingers. It is an art form and I think I’ve almost got it down!
The Bengali way of “having someone over to your house” is way different than the American. Bengali’s let you sit in the living room by yourselves while they fix the food and then when it is finally time to eat you sit there while they watch you and make sure you are taken care of. They just stood there watching us eat the whole time and we all felt very awkward. They don’t sit down and visit with you and they don’t even eat until you leave. As soon as we were done eating we left without saying more than 5 sentences to the people who had cooked our food. We left full and very much confused.
On the way back Kerri mentioned something to Ponwell about how I had said at one time that I would like a few eucalyptus leaves and then Ponwell said something to our driver in Bangla. Before I knew it Joseph had pulled over and was climbing on the roof of our car getting some for me. He brought a whole branch from the tree in for me. The people here are so kind hahah. It just made me chuckle.
Got to love the Bengali culture even with its quirks.
This week I have been determined to spend half of the class time on the spelling words so that they will all get 100 percent. I’ve been creatively thinking of ways to have fun while teaching them how to spell words. Today we had a spelling bee. We had two teams: The Penguins and The Polar Bears. Each of them lined up behind two desks and whoever hit the desk first and spelled the word correctly would get a point. It was really fun at first and the kids were enjoying it because the teams were pretty even. Then Brittany’s turn came up on the Penguin’s side and she just sat there; she didn’t even try. I tried to get members from her team to help her out but that didn’t help because by that time they were losing so all of the team members lost their excitement. All of a sudden Hannah burst into tears because her team was losing. Determined to save the game, I switched the teams up moving Kakoli and Joshua over to the losing team and Kara over to the winning team. This made the game a little more even but when it came to the last point the Polar Bears won. About half of team Penguin began to cry. Fail.
After the horrid spelling bee accident we went to an Eid dinner. Eid is that holiday where the Muslims kill the cows. Apparently the Hindu’s in India send over all their old cows (because they can’t eat them.. because then they would be eating their god) and the Muslims killed them all on Monday. After that the poor people go from house to house with a bag and the rich people put a chunk of meat in their bag (it is a twisted version of trick or treating.. I prefer candy). We drove 45 minutes to the house of Siddigue who is an Adventist man in the area. His wife cooked us a huge meal; all of it was vegetarian and Bengali. There was curry, egg pudding, fried peppers, Pomegranates, oranges, cucumbers, fried boiled eggs, and a bunch of other things that I’m not a hundred percent sure what it was. It all tasted good but I wasn’t brave enough to try the fried boiled egg… it just sounded gross. Lauren, Heather, and I ate the Bengali way and only used our fingers. It is an art form and I think I’ve almost got it down!
The Bengali way of “having someone over to your house” is way different than the American. Bengali’s let you sit in the living room by yourselves while they fix the food and then when it is finally time to eat you sit there while they watch you and make sure you are taken care of. They just stood there watching us eat the whole time and we all felt very awkward. They don’t sit down and visit with you and they don’t even eat until you leave. As soon as we were done eating we left without saying more than 5 sentences to the people who had cooked our food. We left full and very much confused.
On the way back Kerri mentioned something to Ponwell about how I had said at one time that I would like a few eucalyptus leaves and then Ponwell said something to our driver in Bangla. Before I knew it Joseph had pulled over and was climbing on the roof of our car getting some for me. He brought a whole branch from the tree in for me. The people here are so kind hahah. It just made me chuckle.
Got to love the Bengali culture even with its quirks.
Don't you mean fried boiled aks ;) I'm glad that someone spells just like me.
ReplyDeleteJust read this, thought you might like it:
Even youths grow tired and weary, and young men stumble and fall; but those who hope in the LORD will renew their strength. They will soar on wings like eagles; they will run and not grow weary, they will walk and not be faint.
Isaiah 40:30-31