St. Anthony's Boys School

St. Anthony’s Secondary Boy’s school has almost 1000 students with about 50 teachers on staff. The class size ranges from about 85 in Form one (9th grade) to only 50+ in Form 4 (seniors). The boys wake up at 4:45 in the morning, dress in their uniform and get ready for morning prep (study hall) and breakfast. Class starts at 8:00 and the school day ends at 4:15. This time is broken up into 10 different 40 minute class periods. Students stay in the same classroom and the teachers switch classes. In the evening after supper there is another prep time.

Monday and Friday mornings the boys have parade (an assembly) starting before 7:30. The Kenyan flag is raised, the national anthem is sung, religious songs are sung in Swahili, a Bible verse read, and then a reflection of the verse is given by several boys. Two or three boys will then give national and world news. One boy will give what we would call a pep talk about doing well in school. Next, a couple of teachers will give a pep talk, give names of students who have done well in various areas, plus remind them of things that need to be improved upon. Twice the boys “entertainment committee” has given a skit which helps give some comedic relief. Finally the principal gives his speech about ways to improve and why the boys need to give their best effort. Morning parade lasts for over an hour at which time students are standing at attention.

My form one math class has over 85 students. The two aisles between desks are only about 12 inches wide. There is an art to gliding down the aisle I am trying to perfect without catching my slacks on screws sticking out of the desks. The desks remind me of antique desks with flip up tops. There is only about two feet between the front row and the chalkboard where I stand.

Most of the boys come from the Rift Valley Province, but we have some from other regions of Kenya. Teaching math in Kenya is different from the US. Even though math is a universal language, I have discovered many cultural differences in its lessons and methodology. Students have algebra, geometry, plus basic math in Form One, not an entire year of algebra like in the US. Because of culture, some of the explanations have to be different. The books are boring by State standards and most of the examples are only for the very basic problems. Yet, the good news is that a textbook only cost about 5 to 7 US dollars compared to 60+ dollars back home. I have had to ask another teacher more than once how to use a chart or table as I have never seen a similar one before. Once explained it seems easy and logical. Very few boys have a calculator. Every two or three boys must share a textbook as there are not enough to go around. Also, it is not uncommon for boys to share pencils, pens, rulers, compasses, etc.

Extracurricular act ivies offered after school this term include choir, entertainment (drama), science club (we have boys who have qualified for the National Science Congress in Mombasa), and basketball (on a dirt court so when it rains ….), net ball, hockey, and football (soccer). One huge difference from back home is that ALL form 4 students quit extracurricular activities to focus on their studies for the national exam. In fact they have extra classes and extra studies in Forms 3 and 4th to prepare for this test. This exam, the K.C.S.E., determines not only IF they are allowed to go to college, but also WHAT college they will attend and what their MAJOR will be once they get there.

The following are some things that have happened to me that would seem unique to a teacher in America. I have been asked to counsel a Form 1 Samburu student (like the Masaai) who wants to leave school so he can be like his friends and herd the cattle, goats and camels. I hope I will be making a trip in the next year or so to north central Kenya to visit his family if we can convince him to stay in school. A second is having the class clap for a story I told on how to remember the 9s multiplication facts. This week a student asked me to say a special prayer for him so he can do better in math. A daily occurrence is students catching me as I leave class asking me to mark (grade the work they just completed) to see how well they are doing. A student in Kansas would never ask for extra work let alone ask to have a teacher double check to make sure they are doing it correctly.

I feel so blessed to be working with such bright, willing students. John

Our House

Let me take you on a tour of our house. It is a brand new house. We were able to move in on May 2nd, although many small things weren’t yet complete. Our house is small, but very comfortable and adequate to meet our needs. It is definitely a home built with Westerners in mind. There is no way the majority of Kenyans would be able to live in a house like ours. Most Kenyans live in tiny one or two room houses built of mud, timber, stone or galvanized tin.

Click here to see pictures. One of the first things you might want to know is that there is no heating or air conditioning in homes here. The temperatures have been averaging in mid 70s during the daytime and at nights in the mid 50s, so there really is no need. You’ll notice on the picture of the outside of the house that the two outside sections of windows open outward to let it air. This works really well. Open them in the morning after breakfast to air the house during the day. Then about 6:00 you’ll need to close them as it starts to cool off. You’ll also notice the metal inside the glass. This is a safety precaution that all homes have. It adds a nice decorative touch to our house.

We had our couch, armchairs, coffee table, dining room table, four chairs and two end tables made by a carpentry shop by another ministry, FPFK. You can see that they did a great job. They used cyprus wood to create simple, strong and functional furniture. The chairs are very comfortable.

The floors are all tile as are the kitchen and bathroom walls. There is a fireplace in a corner of the living room. We understand we will be lighting fires in it in the next few weeks as June and July are the two coldest months. Area rugs help to add warmth and color.

The dining room is separate from the kitchen. You’ll notice a small window on the left side of the dining room. It is to the kitchen. I’ve put my plates and silverware in the sideboard at the end of the dining room. It is really handy to set the prepared food on the kitchen counter just below the window and then once in the dining room reach in and put them on the table.

You’ll notice that the kitchen has plenty of counter space and cabinets. We have to filter our water before we can drink it. There isn’t room in the kitchen for the refrigerator; it is in the hallway off the living room. This is a great little area as it has access to the bedroom, bathrooms, and our study.

Our bedrooms have tons of storage space. They each have a full length mirror in the little recess you can see in front of the rug. We don't have hot water. Attached to the top of the shower is a little hot water heater. Before you get in the shower you flip the switch and magic, you have hot water coming out of the tap! We are using the second bedroom as a study. We each have our own desk and plenty of space to spread out without getting in one another's way.

There is a large cement patio area in front of our house. In a few weeks it will have a nice table with an umbrella, table and chairs. You can see the pots that we’ve planted that will be scattered around. In all that dirt will be a flower bed. It’s silly to plant it now because they are still doing construction on a house next door. Soon there will be a hibiscus hedge between our house and the newest house.

Between our house and Russ’s is a new banda. The old one was leaning and fell over last week. We were excited to come home one day and see that they are building a new one with a raised floor. It is even going to have electricity! It will be great to use in the evenings or for Saturday morning coffee. I think we’re going to initiate it next weekend with a Memorial Day barbecue with Russ and Kathy.

Our compound has five houses in it. Missionaries live in three of the houses and the fourth is the owner of the compound, a business man and his wife. The fifth house is not yet complete. It will probably be rented to missionaries in some point in the future. It is necessary to live in a compound for security reasons. We have someone on the grounds twenty-four hours a day. During the day they are groundskeepers as well as security. At night they are the watchman. We are a two honk compound. When we arrive home our signal to Ocheng or his son, John, is two honks of the horn. That lets them know that it is someone who belongs on the compound so they can unlock and open the gate for us.

Again, our house is in no way a typical Kenyan home. It would be considered to be extravagant and out of the reach of most Kenyans.

First Impressions of School

We are getting a quick introduction to Kenyan education through real life experience! The staff members in our schools have been extremely helpful as we are continuing to adjusting to new procedures and ways of doing things.

The official school day starts at 8:00 and runs until 4:00. Classes are forty minutes in duration. Due to limited space, students remain in one classroom all day and the teachers move from room to room, not the other way around as happens in America. Our students are lucky in that each student has their own desk and chair. The desks are large enough that their books fit inside and don’t have to be piled on the floor. Although our schools have excellent reputations, students must still share textbooks, only two students to a book though. The classes are much larger than what we are used to. Cindy has 47 – 52 in her classes while John has 82!

Assignments are done in exercise books rather than on loose sheets of paper. That makes collecting work to mark (grade) more difficult and much more cumbersome. The good thing is that the teacher doesn’t actually collect the work. Each class has a class prefect that is similar to a class monitor. These prefects are nominated by their classmates, but the final selection is determined by the teaching staff. Among their duties are the actual collection of work and then they and a friend carry the exercise books to the staff room for the teacher. Once the teacher has them graded they call the prefects to come and pick them up and pass them back to the students. That sure beats trying to carry a stack of notebooks over a foot high to another building.

The head of each department has their own office where they can work in quiet. However, most of us do our work in the Staff Room. It is a large room that contains at least 24 large desks. Desks are assigned on a seniority basis. Some teachers must share desks. Cindy is lucky enough to have a desk of her own. She was told it is because she teaches English and has the most marking to do. John is doing his work in the library because there isn’t a place for him to work.

Each morning at 10:00 the students and teachers are served chai. It is tea made out of milk and sweetened with sugar. We both like it very much. The British call it milk tea. Teachers are served white bread with their tea. Most make a bread and butter sandwich that has four to six slices of bread in it. As a rule Kenyans don’t eat breakfast, so it is understandable that they are hungry by 10:00. It’s during chai and lunch that the staff room is the most crowded and the noisiest as almost everyone comes for these.

Lunch is also served for the teachers. We have decided that we will eat the school lunch provided. They are already concerned because we don’t take bread with our chai. In their opinion we don’t eat nearly enough to keep from starving. Lunches are typically Kenyan food: sukumawiki with ugali, githeri, or beans and rice. Githeri is a mixture of red beans and maize (corn). Their version of corn is what we would call field corn in Kansas. It is large kernels of hard, tough corn. It’s not our favorite meal. Ugali according to the dictionary is stiff porridge. It is made out of corn flour (similar to corn meal) and boiling water. It is stiffer than mashed potatoes or even corn bread. To eat it you use your thumb and first two fingers to pinch off a piece. Then you pick up a little bit of sukumawiki to go with it. Sukuma is kale that is finely shredded and cooked with onion for seasoning.


Although Kenyan schools are very different from what we are used to, students are the same all over the world. We are glad to be back in the classroom and enjoying getting to know our newest classes.

Bananas

Bananas are bright yellow fruits about 8 inches long, right? Yes, in the United States. They come complete with a Dole, Del Monte or Chiquita sticker. However that is not true in the rest of the world. Bananas come in four colors: yellow, red, purple and green. Someone told me there are 42 different varieties of bananas, but I haven’t been able to confirm that. We have seen several different types of bananas in Kitale.

Russ, another MKLM, runs a program for street children. They have their own banana plantation at Don Bosco. I’m guessing there are at least 30 banana trees in their grove producing bananas for their children. Not only did we get to see the trees, but actually taste some of the fruit.

Joseph, the groundskeeper, is probably about six feet tall. See how small he looks standing next to the plants? They can grow to a height of twenty to twenty-five feet. Now look at the ground. There is maize (corn) planted between the trees. In another section of the plantation, there are pumpkins. Both are food staples. Not only is the pumpkin eaten, but the leaves are cooked as greens and the flowers and seeds are also used for food.

Here is a short lesson about bananas. First of all, they don’t actually grow on trees. Instead, they are the largest herbaceous flowering plant known. The trunk is hollow and doesn’t have any wood in it at all. That’s why the trees blow over so easily during a storm. The trunk is basically a stem that supports the fruit. After the tree has produced the banana crop, that stem is dead and needs to be cut down. Once cut, another sucker will start growing to produce another crop in a years time.

Do you see the bright purple flower at the base of the bunch of bananas? It’s called the banana heart and is also edible. At first it is a tight cone, but as the bananas ripen, the flowers open from the bottom upwards. When all the petals have opened, the fruit is ripe and it’s time to cut the bunch from the tree.

Each banana is called a finger. Depending on the variety of banana, the finger could be anywhere from three inches long to about twelve inches. The sweetness and starch content of the fruit also varies.

Another member of the banana family is the plantain. They are a starch and need to be prepared like potatoes, boiled, baked, or fried.

Bananas and plantains are important as a food source for Eastern Africa as well as Southwest Asia. It has been estimated that the annual consumption is 99 pounds a year in East Africa, most being produced on small farms. They are especially valuable because they produce fruit year-round, not just once a year as most crops. India, not Brazil, is the largest producer of bananas in the world.

Banana fiber from the trunk and leaves are also used to make beautiful artwork, paper and even clothing. We’ve already bought several to decorate our house.