Public Schools

During my time in Sayulita I have been student teaching at Costa Verde International School. CVIS is a private school, which means students have to either pay admission or be on a scholarship. However, CVIS is not the only school in Sayulita. There are also public schools. We all wanted to visit a public school during our time here. So, on Wednesday, Jessica took us to Sayulita’s public kindergarten and primary school.

The teachers and administrators were very welcoming to us. We all toured the kindergarten together, going from room to room. At the primary school, we split into groups. Cynhia and I observed Emmanuel’s 5^th grade classroom, of about 30 students. The classroom was large, but dark. Although there was sunlight coming in through the windows, it was minimal. Cynhia and I both noticed that there were no decorations on the walls. I think that had more to do with the material the walls are made of, because Jen and Joel have the same problem in their classrooms. They will try to hang things up and it just falls down. Tape just doesn’t stick to the walls. As a result, we end up taping things to the windows, doors, and cabinets!

Emmanuel’s students were working on independent research projects in science. As a result, we didn’t really get to see him teach the class as a whole. Instead, he checked in with individual students, while the rest worked independently. I noticed some students were off-task, but considering how large the class was I was impressed at how well students were able to engage in independent study. Although there were a lot of students, Emmanuel, seemed to have a good handle on his classroom. When he addressed the class they seemed to respect and pay attention to him. There were some students wandering around the room, but all it took was for him to count to 3 and they were in their seats ready to learn.

Before we left, Emmanuel also told us about some of the difficulties at the school. He seemed most frustrated with the large class sizes. Mexican schools, including CVIS, all operate under SEP (Secreatriat of Public Education). SEP outlines the standards the schools need to be teaching to, provide workbooks and curriculum, and check in with individual schools and teachers on a regular basis. Emmanuel explained that the SEP curriculum he is expected to teach was designed for about 25 students. This is a problem because at this particular school most class sizes have closer to 30-40 students. This affects teachers’ abilities to teach the SEP curriculum, because a lot of time lessons and units take longer due to the larger class sizes. This whole discussion was very fascinating to me. Now I am thinking more about standards, pre-packaged curriculum, and the expectations teachers are supposed to meet. I don’t think standards or high expectations are a bad thing by any means, but I do think it is important to give teachers more credit and control when it comes to making curricular decisions than SEP seems to be giving them.  

Afterwards, we walked around the school grounds. I was amazed when I walked past the first grade classroom. It had about 35 students. I could hardly believe my eyes! The kids were packed into the classroom like sardines, sitting in rows of desks. I know that I am spoiled in Madison, because most schools have a grant that keeps class sizes under 18 students until 4^th grade. Even still, 35 students in a FIRST grade classroom is unheard of in the U.S. I cannot imagine teaching that many students that young at once. They need so much attention, especially because going to school is new for them, and they are building all of the basic literacy, mathematic, and social skills. The first grade teacher was also male. I found that very interesting. In the U.S. most elementary school teachers are female. Jessica said that is also the case in Mexico. But, most of the teachers we saw at the primary school were male. I wonder why…

Another thing I noticed was that there were not a lot of resources at the school. Jessica brought boxes of pencils and markers, but was disappointed that she couldn’t bring more because she knows how badly the public schools need resources. I was surprised by this because I thought CVIS had a problem with resources. After all, whenever visitors come and bring materials for the school, CVIS is overjoyed and finds a fair way to distribute them throughout the school. But in comparison to the public school, CVIS is doing great.

One of the major highlights of the school visit was seeing the boys that live near us. Almost every day on our way to school we walk a little ahead or a little behind of a group of about 5 boys. If I had to guess I would say they are in 3^rd-5^th grade. For most of our time here we have just walked near each other without saying much. Maybe we’ve said hi once or twice. But, in the last couple of weeks the boys have started shouting, “I love you.”  I think they find it funny because we all always end up giggling. They’ve even started running ahead of us, hiding by a building and the jumping out at us and shouting it when we get close. Anyway, they are students at the primary school. When we got there, we immediately saw one of them as we passed his classroom. Later, we saw him again with some of his friends and they started shouting it at us again. It’s definitely something I will never forget!