Week 5

I taught my first class in the primary (elementary) school to 5th graders on diarrhea. It went well and I think the students understood everything. It’s a simpler topic so that helps. I noticed an interesting difference between the public elementary school in San Isidro and the private evangelical school. I will be delivering my first class at the private school on the same topic of diarrhea this coming Tuesday. But as I did with the public elementary school I observed the class and the professor before I gave a class to get a feeling for the conditions of the classrooms and the behavior of the students. It was interesting to see that the students in 6th grade in the private school were a lot more disciplined and well-behaved than the students in 5th grade in the public school. This could be attributed to the slight age difference of one year, but I highly doubt it. I will know for sure, when I start teaching the same grade level at both schools.

I don’t want to generalize but perhaps this trend of better disciplined, more serious students in the private, Christian schools versus the public schools is something to take not of. I am not a teacher but it would be interesting to hear the opinions of teachers in the United States to see if they think there is a difference in discipline between private/parochial and public school students.

My next class at the public elementary school will be next Thursday to a different group of 5th graders. I talked to the professor to see what topic she would like me to deliver on and she told me HIV/AIDS. I asked her if she was sure and she seemed quite determined that her 5th grades learn about Sexually Transmitted Diseases especially HIV. So, I will be diving into this topic and preparing for it in the coming days.