Well, I have officially been in the Peace Corps for over 14 months now. The time has certainly flown by and so much has happened. There have been big traumatic moments that have humbled me and made me rethink if being here was the right decision. And there are the small daily things that put a smile on my face and warm my heart. One of those small daily moments is when little Emran climbs onto the bus and the first thing he does is look for me and then smiles and give me a hug and a kiss. Yes, that is definitely the highlight of each day and some days it makes all the difference with my attitude for that day.
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| Me and my little Emran |
The first 6 months I was really just getting my feet wet and trying to understand the Jordanian culture, the culture of my special education center and how I fit into it all. I won't exaggerate...it was a very rough 6 months. There were a lot of miscommunications, misunderstandings and....tears. But things slowly got better and by the end of the first 6 months, I was glad I stayed.
I've seen the most development at my center, and the most growth with myself, this past semester. I've already written about the rough start to this last semester in previous entries, so I won't repeat it all. Although it started out very rough, it ended very well. Almost better than expected, Ahumdulilah! I had this beautiful, idealistic dream of starting an Autism program and it would just be so perfect and successful. Well, it didn't exactly turn out as expected. We had students, but not teachers, the first two weeks which was just utter chaos. Then when a teacher was hired and assigned to the class I wanted to co-teach, the teacher and I did not get along. She had never had a job before, and had no experience with children. And due to lack of exposure to children with disabilities, she had a very difficult time understanding how to interact with these special children. I tried my best to convince her that these kids were teachable, had potential, but just needed time and adaptations. Needless to say, we didn't agree on much and we didn't get along that well. The Mudeera and Director of my center respected my experience and expertise and, after 4 very long weeks, the teacher was fired and a new teacher was hired upon my recommendation.
So, after 6 weeks into the semester, a wonderful woman from my community, Maysoon, was hired to be my co-teacher. We were great friends before and she has endless amounts of energy and optimism. A perfect combination to work in special education. I told her of my plan to start an Autism program with the young children and she was enthusiastic…at first. It definitely was difficult at first to get our Autism program going and she was not particularly buying to my idea of the same daily routine and structure that I assured her would help improve the kids behavior and learning. But because the children hadn’t had any routine or structure for the first 6 weeks of school, their behavior was very poor and it was quite difficult to work with these kids. Maysoon became easily frustrated and wanted to know when my “Autism Program” would work. I kept reassuring her that it would take time and that when the children understood the daily routines and expectations then their behaviors would get better and they would start to absorb the information and learn.
Sometime around the end of November, I had left for about 3 days to do some training with some new volunteers. It was the first time I had left Maysoon unsupervised with the children. I fully expected to come back to a chaotic classroom. Instead I was blown away with how smoothly everything went. Maysoon had command of the classroom and the children were well behaved. Maysoon was using all the resources and techniques I had shown her. I complimented and congratulated Maysoon for sticking with it and being patient with the process. I let her know how wonderful she was with the children and how good they were doing with their behavior and learning. She then turned to me and said “Natalie, you were right. Your program worked but it just took time. I don’t believe it, but I am happy.”
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| Miss Maysoon teaching the kiddos |
In the entire year I have been at my center, and all the projects that I have been involved with in Peace Corps in general, that one comment from Maysoon was the most satisfying and brought me the most joy. I had teacher “buy-in” and she was actually implementing what I had taught her. That’s rare that it happens and rarer that it lasts, as any Peace Corps volunteer will tell you. Maysoon continued throughout the rest of the semester doing what she’d been doing and having great success. Since then she has gained momentum and has visited each of the children’s families, given the families progress reports about their children and is coming up with a plan for next semester on how help with children with academics and social skills. I am so proud of her and so thankful that things actually turned out better than I ever expected.
My Mudeera even did a disability awareness meeting this past month in order to educate the community about how to treat people that have a disability. I am really thankful for all her enthusiasm and passion.
Overall, this semester and the year has been great. We had our playground installed and the children love it. Their undesirable behaviors haven’t gone away, but they’ve decreased. The Autism program is up and running successfully and hopefully with continue to be successful next semester. I started a hygiene program with the students. Soap, toothpaste, toothbrushes, combs and hand towels were all donated and I gave training to the teachers on how to have the students become independent with their hygiene.
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| Miss Maysoon teaching Hela how to brush her teeth |
And then, to top off the end of the semester, my teachers threw me a surprise birthday party. It was really thoughtful and kind. Especially since they don't really celebrate birthday's here, but they know that Americans do and they wanted me to feel special. Life is good and I couldn’t be happier.
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| All the teachers and Mudeera at my center. A group effort to make me a birthday cake! |
The contents of this blog are mine personally and do not reflect any position of the U.S. Government or the Peace Corps
