I'm a mathteacher in Finland and I had been looking for a chance to get to know the Bolivian schoolsystem, but because of the long summerholiday it wasn't possible to get to know any school so far. Finally the schoolyear started on 6th of February and next Monday I walked into a one secandaryschool to inquire if I could assist the Englishteachers. The principle was friendly and asked me to come back next day when the Englishteachers are present. I went back, but they had only classes of Quechua on that day. It was interesting to observe for the first time the actual classroom situation eventhough I coudn't help in any way. I tried to learn the numbers with the students, but it wasn't easy.

On Wednesday I could finally start assisting the English classes. I started to work with the 4th, 5th and the 6th graders (15-18 years old teenagers). The level of English in the public schools is very low, because of the lack of English culture and the motivation. The students don't have many chances to hear or use the language and one lesson a week is definitely not enough. From the beginning the teacher gave me a lot of space and responsibility. Most of the time she was present in the classroom, but sometimes she left me alone with the kids. I talked to the students about my country and showed them some pictures. The rest of the time I explained them different things about grammar and the excersices they had to make.That was also a good practise for me to speak Spanish in front of the class.

There are 35-45 students in each class which make it difficult to get to know all of them and help them individually. Luckily they are behaving quite well eventhough for some of them it is difficult to concentrate on the topic and listen to the teacher. This week I also taught the 1st and the 2nd graders. Especially the 1st graders were noisy and couldn't behave well. They were nice kids, but 45 of them in one classroom is just too many.

Interesting facts about the education in Bolivia:

http://www.boliviabella.com/education.html