SWIM Hospital School

Of all the places around where we live, it's the hospital that most reminds us that we live in a third world country. It's called "namba naen" as it was the number nine American field hospital in World War Two. You drive in, the ruts in the drive way are so big, you slow to a crawl and still lurch and totter as you make your way to the single line of cars which constitutes the car park. No parking meters here. In fact, very little has changed since the British left in the 70s.

So you tentatively park, making sure you haven't parked next to a mud puddle or a tent peg. They have this big tent outside the entrance, presumably as a waiting room of some sort. You walk up to the entrance, avoiding the red splatters of bettelnut, or blood, and walk up the ramp. Then there's this pharmacy area on your left, crowded with people waiting in line, and I think a waiting area on the right, even more crowded with people, some with drips, some lying down on a bench, some with bags of clothes and food. I guess they're the ones waiting to be admitted into a ward. Walking on through here, there's a long tiled, covered walkway which you need to walk on. When it's wet and rainy and you're wearing jandals (which you always wear here... oh that's right, "thongs" for you Ausies and "slipas" in pijin), you've got to be so careful that you don't slip because it's slippery in your slippers! And believe me, you wouldn't want to be admitted into the emergency ward... well, I wouldn't. When it's slippery, you dodge the tiles and walk on the bits where the tiles have broken away as that part isn't slippery.

As you're walking, you see that you're actually passing different areas. In patient clinic, hmmm, a few doors down they're cooking something (who knows what...) for lunch, ok, and there's the maternity ward with a number of people sitting outside. Then finally it's open now, and you can get a wiff of sea breeze (the sea is so close, I don't know how they cope in storms or a tsunami!!).

As you walk the pathway, you may see (as I did the other day) a patient, fresh from surgery, still knocked out with anethestic, with a sheet covering her being wheeled down the same pathway.

You look to the left and right as you walk this pathway and see the amputee ward, the orthopedic ward, the dental clinic, the pediatric ward. Going in the ward is another story, but you pass by today, unwilling to look at the crowded rooms with little light.

When a person goes to hospital, their family goes too. So in the wards, you'll have a patient on a bed, and their mum, brother, kids, whoever, sitting beside them, sleeping on the floor next to them. If they're from another island, which is very common, they've got a number of personal belongings surrounding them. But in an open room 6m by 12m (but my meter judging isn't the best...) you will find 12 beds, six line each side of the wall, for patients and then there is the family hanging about. So it's pretty squished.

Anyway, you keep walking, entirely skipping walking through the pediatric ward because you don't feel like looking at crying, helpless malnourished babies today. But just after the pediatric ward the path gives you the option of turning left, which you take. This path takes you to the midwifery area, but if you turn left, you see a fence, the ocean and the hospital school - a ray of sunshine in a miserable place. Well, people do get better in the hospital, so maybe it's not so miserable afterall. As you see from the picture, the Hospital School is a little school room, delightfully painted and built by SWIM teams. It doesn't have electricity or modern windows but it does the trick nicely (although, being close to the sea, it does get pretty wet in there when the sea is rough and the water sprays in).

So now that you're here, I'll tell you a bit about what happens here and what I do here (it's Lauretta writing here...). The hospital school has three teachers. Two of them go and teach the students in the pediatric and orthopedic wards, and the other one teaches the students who come into the school room. There are roughly between 1 and 6 students who are up to having tutoring in the wards and about 2-9 kids who come into the school room. The kids who come into the school room are usually the children of patients or patients who are doing fairly well, well enough to come to school.

School runs from about 8:45 (when the kids turn up) till about 12:15 with a short break for them to go and get a drink and go to the toilet back in the ward. They start with devotions and singing. It is absolutely delightful to hear their singing. When they know the songs, they sing with all their might. Parents peer in through the window from the pediatric ward next door to see whose making all the noise. Most of the songs have actions and some of them are little dances which they really enjoy. After that they do any number of different activities, depending on their ability and what the teacher has prepared. The other day when I was observing a teacher, she was doing maths with two boys. It was sad to see that they were both hungry, not having had any breakfast, and so they struggled to concentrate.

On top of that, the kids are all at a range of levels, some never having gone to school at all and some already able to do basic math. So it's certainly a challenge to teach there, but a delightful challenge - the teachers keep telling me that they love the kids they teach.

So I've come in, a fairly new teacher myself, and asked, well what can I do to help the teachers teach better. I'll be honest with you. The education system is, in my opinion, a miracle. I think it's a miracle that anyone comes out reasonably well educated. Teachers don't always turn up; they don't always have qualifications; they don't always teach lessons, much less prepare them.

So my main focus has been these three areas - meeting with the teachers regularly, developing very simple professional development (such as getting them to set and meet goals, having observations and mentoring) and helping them develop units to teach. In a sense, they're lucky because every three months at the most, they've got a different batch of kids (occasionally kids stay for longer or come and go).

So I'm trying to get them to the stage where they've got a couple of really sound units to teach (in different subject areas), they can teach children to read in their own language and they can do basic math (basic because of my abilities not theirs!! ;) I go there a couple days a week to meet with them, work with them and talk with them.

It's hard work with slow progress, but hearing those "pikinini" sing makes it all worth it!