About testing and evaluation

Something that imediately jumped into our eyes is how the South African schoolsystem – both at the university and in the township schools – tests everything. It all comes down to marking your work and testing your knowledge in factual stuff. E.g. in the township school, where the learners made assignments almost everyday and the teachers marked them with a signature, without even looking at the actual work. We had the same experience today in our english language lecture, where we had prepared an assigment – spending a long time, wanting to do it well. But the lecturere didn’t even look at it. It felt wierd spending so much time on something that, when it came down to it, didn’t even matter. The teachers and lectureres use a lot of time explaining examns, test, assignments and marking – underlining the importance of it and handing it in on time. In another lecture we had a test, even before we had had any actual lessons or teaching in this subject.

The funny thing is that even though they make a big deal out of the importance of testing, when it comes down to it, it seems as though it’s more of a formal thing than the actual substance.

Testing and results are also becomming more and more a part of the danish school system. Not in the same way as in South Africa, but it seems like it’s going in that direction. The reason why we test in Denmark - thats what the politicians say anyway – is so that we can compete and compare internationally.

We’re left wondering why testing is becomming so common, and why it is necessary? Might the testing block some of the students ability to reflect individualiy, in order to fulfill these exact tests and demands?

We’re not only negative towards testing, because it can also be a motivating factor, we acknowledge that. But in Denmark we talk a lot about teaching the students individually, because their learning styles are different.  So the question remains: Can a test capture the more than just right or wrong answers? Is a test able to capture the abtract and creative thinking of the individual learner/student?

Dorte and Sabine

Thoughts on the practise in theTownship (Lungisa)

The first experiences with the South African people have been very positive. They are welcoming, and are always talking friendly to us, asking us how we are doing, and are sincerely interested in listening to us – and most importantly to tell us about themselves and their stories, which often are a lot different from the ones we know from Denmark.

We often don’t think about how lucky we are, being born in a country that has the resources and power to help its people. Instead of being happy about we tend to discuss stupid things and bitch about the luxury we can’t have because of our “lack” of money. But here, they feel lucky – they feel happy, even though they don’t have anything. As long as they’ve got food on the table, as the kids are able to go to school, as they have hot water and they have the feeling of being free they are happy, or at least it seems that way.

The school system works a lot different than ours. The children are much more disciplined than Danish kids are, and the teachers seem to distance themselves more from their students. The teaching is based on monologs instead of dialog – for example, if a teacher asks a question, he or she always knows the answer up front – no open questions are asked. It seems clear to us that kids in these schools are not at all used to be reflective, only to find the one right answer.

Morten and Stine who are at Lingisa High School, taught a class in Life Orientation for three hours, where we told the kids to make books about their dreams and life in general – where do they want to be in ten years to come? What where the thoughts about this class? => Our primary thought was to get underneath the learners skin, so to speak - to get to know them a bit better. What their dreams are and where they come from. We sorted it out so we had three consecutive hours in which we introduced the task, had the kids doing it, evaluated and collected the books they made.

Our initial thoughts on how we wanted to teach, was to give the learners the opportunity to be a bit more chaotic than usual. We didn’t want them just sitting on their chairs and feeling uncomfortable staring at the blackboard all day; it don’t seem like an inspiring or motivating way to learn at all. We initiated the progress and allowed the learners to wear hats, sunglasses, sit wherever, even outside in the sun, listen to music and to talk to each other. They didn’t call us by Mr. and Miss. – but as we are called in Denmark, by our first names. They shouldn’t stand up when they where answering a question, and where allowed to ask all the silly questions they wanted.

First of all – the physical properties of the classroom were poor. It was cold inside, 38 learners situated in a classroom of a not fitting size (way too small, they couldn’t even get around – but then again, they aren’t supposed to do that – they are supposed to sit on their chairs and take in whatever the teacher says. – what would Dunn & Dunn say to that, or Vygotski and Gardner for that sake?)

What happened was, that they actually sat still on their chairs, even though we created a somehow chaotic classroom. They work pretty quietly and music was organized by the learners only. It was easier doing group work and make them do the assignment with 38 South African kids compared to 15 Danish kids. Discipline and respect are good things – but where do that come from. How do we form kids to be the way we like? 

Morten and Stine

First time blogging

First of all ... Welcome to anyone who might be interested in following this blog. We might start off with an explanation of the blog - this blog will be a communal blog between the danish exchange students in South Africa, Port Elizabeth. The group is made up by the following persons:

Martin Foged, Michael Yde Hansen, Sabine Forrest, Dorte Kølbæk, Morten Husted, Stine Olsen & Anne Madsen.

It will consist of reflections on how South Africa is regarding on how to live in a country that is vastly different from Denmark, on how it is studying at a different university, how the teachers education differs - reflections on our teaching experiences in SA, assignments that we are given. But it will also consist of photos, posts in danish, videos and serve as a general form of communication back to friends and family in Denmark.

You can follow the blog by entering your e-mail on the top of the site, and you will then receive an email when there are updates, posts, comments or whatever.

Enjoy the posts and feel free to comment and make suggestions on what the blog should contain!