Tag Archives: FLO

A fried banana kind of Sunday morning

Dear Friends,

A few weeks ago while there were still several volunteers at FLO, we decided to give the wonderful cook a Sunday morning off. We headed out into the village for a breakfast of fresh fried bananas (and potatoes). After an entertaining show of watching the young chef prepare and cook our breakfast, we packed up the delectable items and ventured forth to the former home of a FLO student (who is now “out in the world” working as an IT operator). His grandmother’s house had been the happy recipient of a Cambodian style makeover (thanks to the generosity of Boo Rob, founder of eGlobal).

Pictures of the makeover will arrive on this glob at some point . . .

Enjoy!

: )

Don’t try this at home!

FLO’s new and beautiful mural . . .

When Dani, a vivacious 22-year old volunteer (and recent college grad), came to assist in teaching a class on environmental issues at FLO, she also brought the bright idea of facilitating the painting of a mural. She donated the funds to purchase the paint, shopped all over Phnom Penh for the materials, gathered the “artistic” students, and gave just the right amount of coaxing to get their creative juices flowing.

Dani felt that the mural should be dedicated to the memory of Rob’s wife, Mei; everyone quickly agreed. Below are some shots of this most appropriate tribute.

Dani showing off her clean hand.
Once the concept was agreed upon, everyone began to paint with gusto.
The peanut gallery.
A ray of sunshine. : )
There are many artists at FLO.
See?
Looking good!
Even Koko the dog got excited about it!
That’s all for now, folks. : )

Volunteers cooking the meals for the FLO kids one Saturday . . .

Then entire event was being taped by Rick, the Aussie/Hawaiian cameraman;
it will air in Hawaii December 2011.
Just about time to dig in.
First, to give thanks.
Yum, Sean’s egg scramble with lots of veggies was pretty darn good!
Lunch was a classic hot dog; the kids were starving by dinner time!
This is the normal ritual.
Line up before grind (i.e. eat : )
Lots of ketchup on my dawg!
Meanwhile, volunteer Pam bought her new foster son a bike!
Next came Sean’s tasty spaghetti bolonaise, heated by a wood (and sometimes plastic : (      fire).
Wok’s are definitely the way to cook for hundreds of people!
Gal pal time while waiting for dinner to be finished. Both Saturday and Sunday afternoons are devoted to karate class for some of the FLO students.
There was also a dance performance this evening.
This cat took a liking to everyone who’d give her a cuddle.
And now for the noodles . . .
This was their favorite meal of the day; the kids asked for second, thirds, and fourths. Fortunately, there was plenty to share.

So many, many more pictures to come . . . when the time is right.

Love to you all,

-sj

Today at FLO . . .

Friday, 9 September 2011

Hi Everyone,

In addition to the other dogs at FLO, there are now two puppies!!!!
Mo-mo, the larger, and Me-me, the smaller.
And, student teacher number one did a great job with the phonetics class!
 
 Yes, I feel so proud of her! She was nervous to do this on her own. “How do I draw this, auntie?” she asked holding up one of her self-made flash cards.
And, as you can see from the whiteboard, she managed perfectly well!
“Remember ‘word chunks.’ Students remember word chunks more easily than single words,” this auntie/teacher added.
And word chunks she created off the *top of her head. Yes, I like it too. Can you spot one?
“smiling face”
: )
And on that note, aloha
*Uh huh, I literally saw them bubbling over out of her head.

Some of My Thoughts about Teaching at FLO . . .

I’m finding that part of living in Cambodia is getting used to constant surprises. Yesterday (Wednesday), when I arrived at the 8 a.m. Gogo Loves English 1 class (after having filled-in for the director in lieu of a fulltime teacher and having taught *4-different classes a day on Monday and Tuesday), I expected to see **ST1 teaching the class.

First, I set my materials in the back on a desk and pulled out a storybook that I had with me. While I was waiting for ST1 to arrive, I read to the handful of Ss: reading it several times and asking all kinds of questions.
After several minutes, the best student in the class said, “Gogo Loves English One.” “Yes, Sokleap will be  coming to teach.” “No, no Sokleap.” “No?” “No, she’s school.” “She’s at school?” “Yes, she’s school.” “Okay,” I thought, “It looks like I’m teaching today.”
I pointed to the textbook and elicited the responses I wanted to discover where they were in the book. It was time for the 4th section, I gathered, the review. I conducted the review speaking as little as possible so that the students were the ones to talk and tell me, “What’s this?” “It’s an eraser.” “Can you fly?” “No, I can’t.” “I’m Susan Jane. What’s your name?” “I’m . . .”
Later in the day, when it was time for ST2’s class, I half expected that he wouldn’t show up either, but he did. (As he taught, I wrote quite a long list of suggestions and praises to him regarding his teaching. I’ll include them in a future glob entry. All in all, I think he’s doing quite well.) When I asked him about ST1, I said that I needed to know their schedule. “Oh, we have a schedule,” he said. “Yes, but no one told me the schedule.” “Oh,” he said as his face showed his understanding.
Only a few minutes later, ST1 showed up. “Sorry auntie!!!!! I had to go to school.” “Okay, will you be here to teach tomorrow?” I asked. “No,” she replied. “And on Friday?” I asked. “Yes,” she replied.
After some more back and forths, I surmised that she had to go to school (to register for next year’s classes) on Wednesday and Thursday. She assured me that she’d be present next week.
Okay, so this morning I was thinking to myself, “Should I go to the next section: Who’s she? Who’s he? (as in she’s my sister, she’s my mother, he’s my father, he’s my brother, etc.) or should I review the first 3 sections more?” I felt that I should review more. The 8 a.m. class is technically comprised of the “slower” learners. For the past few weeks, I’ve been working with a few of the Ss after ST1 teaches the official class. I started first with one darling girl who I wasn’t sure could read. She definitely knew the alphabet, but how to say the word that was formed using the alphabet? Hmm, I didn’t think so.
So one-by-one I went through the words on her “alphabet” page. First, I would simply point at the letters in the alphabet that comprised the word (which she knew only because she recognized the picture representing it, not because she could read it). She would say the letter. I would ask again. I did simple progressions until I hoped she was starting to see how the letters, when combined, formed the word. After several sessions of this, I could see that she was really starting to get it.
The word got out and my little “mini-class” grew.
: ) So it goes.
And now, to bring us back to today, “Hmm,” I thought, “How much have they really learned, and how much are they simply parroting, hoping that the word they yell out is in fact the word on the page?”
“Hi. I’m Susan Jane. What’s your name?” I said as I went around the room in a random pattern eliciting the appropriate responses. I continued going through the different “marker sentences” they’d learned: What’s this? It’s an eraser. What’s this? It’s an apple. What’s this? It’s a pencil.
I had a feeling that when the student teachers were teaching this section (and showing how nouns that start with a vowel use an rather than a), the students hadn’t really learned the vowels.
“What are vowels” I asked. Lots and lots of rumpled brows filled the room.
I wrote “vowels” on the whiteboard. “Oh . . .” I could see some of the Ss thinking.
“A!” one called out. “Yes, a,” I replied as I wrote an a on the WB. “And . . . ?”
And not too long later, the list was filled in: a, e, i, o, u.
I went around the room randomly asking the Ss to say the vowels (and deliberately leaving them written on the WB). After everyone confidently answered my question, I erased them from the WB.
Shocked expressions filled the room.
Again, I asked, “What are the vowels?”
And by golly, if they all didn’t manage to say them. By now, they’d heard “a, e, i, o, u” umpteen times. Yes, the real test will be when I ask them tomorrow. I’ll keep you posted.
I continued the review and decided to give them a little “test.” So often, the stronger Ss yell out the answers and don’t give the other Ss a chance to respond on their own.
“Sounds like you’re not controlling your class well, Susan Jane,” I can hear you say. Yes, at times it’s that, but most often it’s the culture of how the classes are run here. The Ss seem to really get excited when I mime, “Shhhh,” and show how I want them to be quiet so that the other student answers alone. They get quiet and look at me expectantly. “Will she/he be able to answer correctly?” I can see them thinking.
But to create that setting takes a conscious effort on my part.
Also, very often the Ss are mumbling the words that they’re learning; some mumble more loudly than others. This is a behavior I want to encourage; they’re practicing saying the words; they want to say the words correctly. They really do want to learn; it’s written all over their faces and even manifests itself in their bodies when they leave the class and bow to me as they return a pencil and say, “Thank you, teacher.”
I realized that I wanted to really know if they were learning this or not.
To ensure that they didn’t speak to one another and look at their books, I mimed putting their books in the desk. Next, I moved them around the room so that they were far apart from one another.
I then asked them to write 12 different somethings on the blank piece of paper that I’d given them. (I say somethings because it was partly single words and partly full sentences.) Of the 12 Ss, only one was able to write the sentence, “Can you sing” Yes, he left off the question mark. Seven were able to write, “I’m Gogo” yes, no period (or point, dot, stop, etc. as it is also called here). Seven did reasonably well. Five did not.
Okay, to be fair, I have to ask, “How would they have done if I had been able to mime the word (rather than simply say it and ask them to write it)? Would they have known the words then?” I’m not sure of the answer. That will take another session when I can be with them one-one-one.
And, maybe it’s not very important for them to be able to write the sentences: What’s your name?, Can you sing?, and Nice to meet you? Maybe it’s more important to simply be able to say them and use them with others. But now I know more clearly what they can and can’t do.
As I think about it now, I also wonder, “Why go through the book so quickly if most of the Ss aren’t really getting it? And, do they really need to ‘get’ it 100%, or do they simply need to get the ‘idea’ of it?” I’m not sure of the answers; I’m thinking out loud (and in print : ).
The questions (for the staff at FLO to ask themselves) are: “Do we want to simply go through the books for the sake of going through them? Or do we actually want to teach the Ss? Do we actually want the Ss to learn? And if we do want the Ss to learn, what’s the best way to assist them in their learning?”
Personally, I think the students at FLO could really benefit from taking classes taught by 2 to 3 ESL trained teachers who would work at FLO full-time.
Also, I think it would be much better for the teachers to go through the different sections more slowly. What to do about the few Ss who are faster learners and get it more quickly? Have supplemental material for them to do; they can continue to learn on their own at their own pace.
Or, if that isn’t an option, and FLO feels that it needs to keep to some kind of a schedule, enlist the help of older and more proficient FLO Ss to tutor the “slower” learners. I really think that the “slower” learners can learn if they’re given the special attention that they need. Just today, when I got the rest of the class to be quiet and listen, the first little girl that I began to work with one-on-one was able to answer and write the correct answer. She just needed a little more time.
Aloha for now,
-sj
*in addition to the two I teach in the afternoon
** student teacher one

Friday Morning at the Market in Phnom Penh, Cambodia

A few weeks ago a group of us went shopping at the market. Why? Because we were to make the FLO kids’ meals the next day.

The menu? Egg scramble with lots of veggies and a baguette for breakfast (and some fruit, I think).

Lunch: hot dog with ketchup, homemade chips, and some fruit. (It didn’t satisfy them for long; they were all ravenous by dinnertime.)

Dinner: spaghetti Bolonaise. Now this one was a hit, and there was plenty for second helpings.

And now for a tour of what it’s like to shop at the local’s market in Phnom Penh; yes, thank goodness we had a local who was the one who really did the shopping.

No explanation needed.
Those are eggs.
That’s about $33 for 300 eggs.
Don’t try this at home.
That should do me for a bit.
They were moving.
And not just because she was stirring them.
Ze market.
Ze transaction.
Yep, those buggers’ll burn your socks off.
It looked so pretty to me.
Have we gotten everything?  . . . This dragon fruit is yummy!
Ze market take 2.
That’s our stuff on the cart.
And in the car. Next stop: FLO.

Next . . . the cooking for the kids . . .

The power goes out almost every day at FLO . . .

Hi Everyone,
We just had class outside because the power was off . . . it goes off a lot. Normally, we just ignore it (the staff usually goes outside and takes a break), but today in the 5:45 p.m. class, we couldn’t see! It was getting dark, and the lesson I’d planned relied heavily on using the whiteboard. (They were going to rewrite their stories using the correction guide; it went really well with the 3 p.m. Intermediate level class. While the Ss were writing, I was writing many of their errors, which I’d “collected” while marking their stories, on the WB. We then went through them one-by-one and made the corrections. It was a really good class because they were all very attentive; I think using their errors really helped. I could tell that they wanted to know WHY it was wrong? And how do we correct it? The question was written, almost literally, all over their faces. : ) Yes, that’s what we’ll do tomorrow in the 5:45 p.m. class. Or ?
“Hmm, what to do?” I thought to myself as I dropped my many *accoutrement on my desk.
“Grab your chair and let’s go outside,” I said within seconds. What were we going to do? Honestly, at that moment, I had no idea, but I knew it would come to me. And come to me it did.
It ended up that I had booklets for each of the Ss with exercises on homonyms. I’d given the original to the director last week asking if I could pretty-please-with-ice-cream-on-top have copies of the first three exercises. But . . . I also told him that I’d really love it if he could copy the entire book. So when he delivered a box to me yesterday, and I opened it to find enough copies of the ENTIRE book for ALL my Ss in the afternoon classes, he had the biggest grin on his face.
Uh huh, simple pleasures really do bring the most satisfaction. : )
And, this 5:45 p.m. class really gets beat up with all the “changes” that happen now and then. Changes as in people coming and going, some of whom need to be sent off in style (Kai and Sean yesterday, imagine 200+ Ss forming two lines, hugging K & S, waving goodbye . . . yes, crying . . .and of course, we needed to be there too ! ), students who need to rehearse for a dance concert for a very important someone, the power going off and it’s just too dark to have class, etcetera, etcetera. So I’ve already been adjusting my lessons for this particular class quite frequently. I do my best to cover what I really want to cover with them.
Today’s lesson was really fun because the kids were into doing something “different.” And by golly if those homonym booklets didn’t come in handy!
I used the backside of a piece of scrap paper for my impromptu “whiteboard.” One-by-one I wrote word pairs like week/weak, ate/eight, read/red, reed/read.
Ahhhh, I can hear the collective gasp from many of you (around the world) as you remember what a homonym is. : )
Yes, homonyms are words that sound the same but have different meanings.
We went through the pairs. Yes, CELTA followers, I used CCQs. It was quite fun to jump up and growl like a big animal that can walk on its hind legs, take a sock off to show my naked foot, etcetera, etcetera. (*)
And as class ended and they left, I received too many “Thank you teacher!”s to count. : ) And the hugs? Also, too many to count.
Sigh. I’ve fallen in love with these kids.
And I leave FLO in 2-weeks and 4-days . . . the wheel of time seems to be gathering speed. I can literally see it bumping and rolling down the calendar hill.
Yes, I’m savoring every moment that remains.
And with that, it’s time to say goodbye. I’m quite late for din-din.
Love and light to you all,
-sj

p.s. and yes, as soon as the Ss left, the lights came back on : )
and that’s how I was able to do the post . . .

* backpack, bag of the Ss notebooks, box of gift homonym booklets . . .
Mahalo Glenn for the real definition. : )
(*) Twenty points to whoever guesses first what those two words are. ; )

More Scavenger Hunt Pixs . . .

Green team “Even Better than the Best!” The winners!
With their fearless leader . . . yep, moi!
And more teams came running in to finish.
The Yellow team, the Yellow Butterfly Dragon
Orange team, Success.
Blue team, Blue Dragon.
Everyone!
Yahoo! That was fun!

and that’s all for now folks  . . .

Aloha!

-sj

Scavenger Hunt at FLO !

For “Game Day Friday” with the older kids, I decided to do a Scavenger Hunt. I specifically chose this day because it’s Dani, Sean, and Kai’s last Friday here (they’ve been here for 3-weeks teaching two classes a day on natural science and environmental issues). The four of us accompanied each team as it ran around FLO looking for the envelopes that showed they had guessed right (and that also contained the next clue).
I dreamt up four clues that were (I think) just right for the Ss skill level–challenging enough but not impossible to solve. The clues lead them all over the grounds of FLO. There were 4-teams: green, yellow, orange, and blue. Each team had two captains (one each from my afternoon classes with the older kids) and Ss from both classes. I found some groovy nametag holders at an office supply store here in the aforementioned colors and with a happy smiley face. “Perfect!” I thought for showing the team colors. They even created team names: Yellow Butterfly Dragon, Blue Dragon, Success (orange), Even Better than the Best (green, and the winners, I might add : ).
“What were the clues like?” (that was our topic this week, btw, using “like” as a preposition, as well as a verb)
-When you’re coming and going, you pass through my side; sometimes, you even see me slide.
-Come rain come shine, I’m a cool place to be. And on some days, there’s a Japanese theme.
-Fill me with air, and I’ll take you everywhere.  What am I like? I’m helpful and nice!
-All FLO kids come from near and far when a certain sound rings a happy bar.
They go with either the front gate area, the gazebo, the bike storage area, or the kids’ dining area. I think you can figure them out. Hint: there’s a karate class by the gazebo every Saturday and Sunday.
 For prizes, each student received a pencil.
“That’s all?” you ask, “a pencil?”
Yes, a pencil. I found some fun ones with colorful designs on the side in the appropriate color. The “winners” (the green team) also got a lollipop.
And now . . . the pictures!
Where’s my name? (He was one of the captains : )
Reading the first clue.
What do you think?
Each team took this very seriously.
Lots of running!
We found it!
The winners, the green team, “Even better than the best.” First to the flag pole.
 More pix to come when I have a faster link to internet access . . .
-out
sj

Be an Email Foster Parent!

I’m sitting in the office at FLO right now where they’re interviewing about 15-children who do n o t have email foster parents. I have gotten to know many of them; they’re
w o n d e r f u l human beings.
What does it mean to be an email foster parent?
You can read here for more information: http://emailfosterparents.org/FLO.htm.
But I do know that it means making a fiscal commitment to donate $360 a year, which goes to their education. You are also required (yes, required!) to write to the child at least once a month via email. They children love receiving emails!
Even more, they soak up any love that you can share with them. Mostly what they need (and want) is you’re a t t e n t i o n.
“But how can I give them my attention when I live so far away?”
You can write to them. You can *occasionally send them very, very small gifts like practical clothing.
When they get older and are ready to leave FLO for some type of higher education, you can buy some important items that will help them. “Like what?” A telephone. Some clothing. Paper and pens.
You can also come to FLO and visit them! Yes, you can come to Cambodia and get to know them in the flesh. Believe me, I’ve seen the children who have email foster parents who actually came to visit with them. The children were absolutely g l o w i n g in their foster parent’s presence. I also witnessed a new foster parent with their child right after they went on a shopping trip for a bike! Yes, I know you can imagine that child’s excitement to have his own bike.
How to proceed? Go to the website above and read further. You can contact Future Light Orphanage. How? Go to their website and proceed to their contact information.
Think about it. I expect it will be a decision that you will be happy to have made. Making a real difference in a person’s life is nothing to sneeze about. Can’t do it by yourself? Maybe a team of you can be team foster parents?
Looking forward to hearing about who steps up to the plate and shares their already generous heart. : )
With warm aloha,
-sj
*I say occasionally and very small because giving them too much creates discord here at FLO. What they really want and n e e d according to Rob Hail, founder of eGlobal, is you’re a t t e n t i o n.