An Environment All Its Own (Valivalam Hostels)

A few days into my stay, my grandma and I found fifteen minutes free to sit out front and chat about just a few of the things both of us have been doing since last we met. When she asked me about my time spent in Jordan before coming to India, children then became the main focus of the conversation. When I was busy telling her about the Children’s Art and Music Group I helped out with in Amman, slowly her eyes began to grow bigger and brighter. She was shining in this particular way not just because she was proud to hear about me doing such work, but because she had an idea of her own related to children. I don’t want anyone to assume that she doesn’t smile on a daily basis because she certainly does and has one of the most beautiful smiles I know, but there is a certain change in her presence (smile, tone, eyes, etc.) when Krishnammal Jagannathan comes up with a plan. Her idea was as follows. Being that she and I were the only two English-speaking people living and working at LAFTI this summer and she was keenly aware that her work with the various hostels she has established over the years is no longer her main focus as most of her energy is now directed towards issues revolving around land, she decided to make me the extra hands she no longer had the energy to utilize. She would make me the Valivalam LAFTI Hostels English Teacher. Although I was a bit intimidated by the idea when it was first presented, my grandma is a woman of her word and when she says she has a plan she has already envisioned the results of that plan. So, even if I was slightly hesitant in my response because I am someone whose only teaching experience consists of showing children how to play Happy Birthday and the ABC’s on an electric keyboard, I knew that whatever her plan was, she would utilize these “extra hands” and make it happen.

When I first arrived to the LAFTI Girls Hostel in Valivalam about an hour away by bus, I was greeted with coffee and introductions. Although you will find that most people here in India prefer to drink tea rather than coffee in the morning, the children already knew so much about me via Poongodai and Valayrmathi (current and previous “hostel warden”, respectively) that they purchased a small bag of milk and prepared a large cup of coffee for me just to fill my American addiction.

“My name is Sathya and I study 6th standard”. Although different for every child with regards to her name and level of study, this was the foundation as well as the limit to the majority of these students’ English. As I have learned both from academic and practical experience, it is very common for two issues regarding education in a developing nation to come about, one of which I would be facing with much more regularity teaching at the hostel. The first is that children who have only attended school intermittently for whatever reasons (farm work, caring for their families, financial problems, etc.), and then find themselves in a position to return to their studies later on, often end up the victims of severe embarrassment and humiliation. There is a very strong and discouraging stigma that accompanies an 11-year-old girl who goes to school and finds herself sitting and learning beside five and six –year-old students who are at the “normal” age for their grade.

Although I was very aware of this first issue coming into the hostel as I was assigned to teach students ranging in age from three to eighteen, I was a bit surprised to find that the exact opposite environment had been created. This was a very unique group of students to say the least. A good number of these girls were without one of their parents, and most of those parents physically existent in their children’s lives would be referred to by Amma as “useless parents”. When we think of our parents’ insistence that we get up and go to school, whether our education is to be found in our home, at the public high school, or at a private university in the nation’s capital, we are more than privileged. After asking a few questions, Amma went on to explain that “useless parents” are those mothers and fathers who, after facing the reality of being illiterate and uneducated themselves, lack any sort of support for their children’s education when their children need it most. She summarized her feeling on the issue towards the end of our conversation.

“When illiteracy and ignorance are all around you, you must rise above. You must give and support your children in the opportunity for education, to empower them with the possibility for a decent and different way of life”.

The annoyance of our morning alarms that wake us students to walk to class with our hair soaking wet wearing sweat pants and the only clean t-shirt on the floor, is a million times more than most all these students will ever wake up to. This group of girls did not have an issue when it came to the age stigma I mentioned before, but were so unaware of their own educational identities relative to one another that they almost appeared unmotivated. Spanning in age from preschool to college, these students did everything as a family, far different from the type of academic environment and encouragement you and I are acquainted with in the United States. And that which I initially mistook to be a lack of motivation was actually very strong but quite unfocused motivation.

With regards to my actual first teaching experience here at the LAFTI Girls Hostel in Valivalam, I found my way into this 44-student family, and that is enough for one day. Today wasn’t about teaching as much as it was about learning. Learning about my students, enough to understand but not too much to pry, but more importantly allowing them the time and space to learn about me. As the only foreign teacher to have ever entered into their home, trust was key. Although I am not yet a woman of school books and lesson plans, these girls (my new students!) have provided me with the warmest, most loving learning environment a first-time teacher could ever have.