Back to school!

A short post for this week... we're finishing up class planning, which starts a week from today. In preparation, I have released my inner creative spirit in making new posters for the classroom! Enjoy the art and feel free to critique my work - including my mom, who is an art teacher - though hopefully she will agree that I improved a little from the first semester :)

School's out for summer!

Well, not quite yet. Moroccan schools stay open until mid-June, when students take their year-end exams. I mentioned in a previous post that the biggest of these year-end exams is the one for high school seniors, called the "Baccalaureate," or BAC for short. You can think of this test a bit like the SAT, except that a student's score on the BAC determines his or her entire career prospects - what university or technical school he or she can get into (if any), what job he or she can get, etc. Whereas in the U.S., even with a bad SAT score a person can typically find a community college or a technical school, in Morocco with a bad BAC score, there are few to no options. And if a student fails the BAC exam, he or she must redo the senior year of high school and retake the exam.

So it's a pretty intense test. Subjects vary depending on the student's track in school, but most include English. So, Justin and I decided to end all of our other classes in advance of the end of school so that we can focus on the BAC students. We are doing lots of one-on-one tutoring, grammar classes, practice exams, and review sessions. So far most of the students who have come to the sessions are the ones who are most motivated and less in need of help, but even if our sessions will help these students to increase their score by a point or two, it could make a huge difference.

To celebrate the end of our other classes, we threw small parties in each class. Here are photos from each of the parties:

Our Beginner Kids class - ages range from 12-16 years.

The guys of our Beginner Adults class (one of the guys did not want to
take a photo with girls, I assume for religious reasons, so we did separate
male/female photos)

The girls of our Beginner Adults class.

Our Advanced Speaking class.

  
It has really been an educational experience for me in learning how to teach over the past few months. I have learned how to think about topics in creative ways and to determine the best means of teaching with the students' needs and levels in mind. I have learned how to incorporate multiple learning styles into one lesson. I have learned the importance of continuously reviewing old material, even if it feels repetitive to me. And I have started to learn what students like and what they don't in the classroom (more learning through games and conversation, less lecturing on grammar). Another really interesting part of the experience has been working with Justin - In a way, it has added a new element to our relationship, learning how to plan and work together. We've learned about each other's strengths and weaknesses in the classroom and how to best utilize those to be as successful as possible.

I'm really looking forward to the opportunity to continue teaching in the fall, now that I have a better handle on what I'm doing. We'll be continuing to teach until mid-June, then we'll launch into the summer, which will consist of meetings, visitors, and lots of traveling. I look forward to sharing the adventures as they come along!

Moroccan Travels, Part Two... Meknes

Justin and I recently took a day trip from Tiflet to Meknes, only a few hours away by bus (a bit quicker by taxi, but we are on a Peace Corps budget these days!). Meknes was founded in the 10th century, but did not rise to prominence as one of Morocco's "imperial cities" until the 17th century, when the sultan at that time built beautiful gates, ramparts, palaces, and mosques throughout the city, many of which still stand amongst a beautiful countryside, earning Meknes the nickname "the Versailles of Morocco."

We spent a very short time here and definitely plan to go back, but below are some photo highlights of a busy afternoon.

Entering Meknes from the bus station, through the "Bab el Khemis."

Close-up of some of the beautiful tiles and carvings.

Inside the Musee Dar Jamai, a museum in a beautiful 19th century palace.

Close-up of some of the amazing carvings in the Musee Dar Jamai.

In the Musee Dar Jamai, a beautifully decorated traditional Moroccan room.

Habs Qara, a series of underground cells that was either
a prison for Christian slaves, or a place for
grain storage. Either way, a bit creepy!

The Mausoleum of Moulay Ismail, a sultan from the 17th century.

A beautiful fountain in the Mausoleum complex.

Bab Monsour, one of the most famous gates in Morocco.

Close-up on Bab Monsour.

In other news... it's starting to get HOT here. Which makes me a little nervous, since it's May and only the very beginning of the summer. Should be interesting! 

We are nearing the end of the school year, and Justin and I are helping to prepare some of Tiflet's high school seniors for a huge exam that they will take called the Baccalaureate. The score that they make on this exam largely determines their prospects for careers or future technical/university studies. One section of the exam consists of English language testing, so we're trying to do as much as we can to help them, ranging from grammar review classes, to open tutoring sessions, to weekly practice tests. The exam is about a month away, so we'll see how it goes. More updates to come soon!

Vacation time!

Justin and I have only been teaching for a month, and now with our students' winter break comes a 2-week vacation. If the pace of life in Morocco is wrong, I don't want to be right!! 

We are happy to have the break, though - It's been an adjustment jumping into the role of a teacher. Each night, we scramble to review the lessons from that day and to adjust and create new lesson plans based on the students' progress. We are teaching 7 different kinds of classes: Beginner Adult, Beginner Kids, Beginner High Schooler (Moroccans study English in high school), High School English Exam prep (high schoolers here take a major exam at the end of their last year - like an SAT on steroids - and English is a big part of it), Intermediate, Homework Help, and Advanced Speaking. While some of those classes have similar lesson plans, we have to adjust the content and nature of the lesson for each audience, and of course, make sure we know how to say it in Moroccan Arabic! Needless to say, it's been a little nuts but our students are all very patient and respectful and we are learning just as much (if not more) than they are! 

Other than catching up on lesson plans, I'm trying to spend more time working on new recipes in the kitchen - recent successes have been falafel, tortillas, lentil chili, and cornbread (all fully from scratch!). I'm planning soon to put up a page on the blog detailing my cooking extravaganzas, so keep an eye out for that. 

And next week, we will travel to Mehdiya (northeast of Rabat, just on the coast) for a week of training with the Peace Corps - we'll be reviewing the things that we have learned in the few months in our community, and beginning to talk about future projects that we may want to implement. I'm looking forward to the chance to step back and think a bit more about my goals for the upcoming two years, and a change of scenery for a few days will be nice too!

Those are all the updates for now! Enjoy the below photos, from a recent excursion to the nearby countryside with our Moroccan friends (notice the essentials for any Moroccan picnic - tea (a lot), bread (even more), and don't forget your drums, or a device that can double as a drum). And Justin and I spent an afternoon being tourists in Rabat last week, which was a fun change!

our friends leading us into the countryside..
you can't see it, but at least 3 drums are being carried along!

Surprisingly the area was full of people. We found out that people were trying to hunt
wild boars (not to eat, just to kill). Didn't know that they had them in Morocco, and enjoyed
watching people spending the whole afternoon running back and forth after these guys.

Important Moroccan picnic items: Don't forget your tea glasses, your teapot,
your tajine pot, 10 loaves of bread, and a pound or so of sugar :)

Tajine success! Pretty impressive for cooking over a fire... beats my Girl Scout days!

Justin and I pose in the countryside

And the last important element of the Moroccan picnic is
the drum - any object that you can beat on will do!

Justin and I touring Rabat - this is the door to the Kasbah.
I love having the guy in the photo to get a sense of how big it is!

Inside the Kasbah. To me it looks like pictures I've seen of Santorini in Greece!

the water! Justin looks out in the direction of New York (we think) :)