Teach in Africa

Reignite your passion for teaching with a change of scenery. If a new wall display won’t cut it, how about hopping on a plane to Malawi?

Volunteering in struggling communities provides emotional benefits that are life-changing and character building to anyone who gets involved. But volunteering as a teacher, you can make a difference that others simply cannot. Trained educators are able to provide poverty-stricken communities with a rigorous standard of education. Not only can you impact the world around you in a unique way, but the experience can also transform the way you think and teach.

Confidence

We all know teaching isn’t for the faint of heart. A single child is often taxing enough, a whole room of them is a different story. But in this country you have the backup of teaching assistants, other teachers across the hall and a network of parents, governors and members of the school community. In a typical poverty-stricken school things are very different. More often than not, the school will cater to the surrounding villages and won’t split into years and ability groups like a western school. Instead, there’ll be mishmash of ages and abilities all together in a singular classroom. There’s no backup to help you out, it’s just you, and maybe an assistant or another teacher. There is no network running these establishments.

While this might sound daunting, it is important to remember a few things. The most important is that these kids are there because they want to learn. It’s often an escape from a hard life, and it’s the promise of a better future. These kids are ready to learn, they just need somebody to help them along the way.

You should also remember that unlike back home where there are set teaching regulations, in struggling nations there are usually none. That means you don’t have to hit certain marks over a given period, and you are instead able to experiment with techniques and ideas that benefit everybody. Your teaching style can be much more free-form. As a result of this tough, yet rewarding, scenario, educators often quickly learn how to stand on their own two feet and become a completely self-sufficient teacher. Returning home, you can expect this to impact your ability to problem solve in a big way.

Leadership

In a schooling environment you may have control of your class, but everything else is left to other members of staff, meaning you never get a chance to stretch your leadership muscles. However, out in a world where control is entirely in your hands, you have the power to make important decisions, progress your students in the way you feel they should progress and run the school how you think it should be run. Even if it’s for a short-period of time, you are essentially the acting headteacher. The result is that your leadership skills are allowed to flourish, which will set you apart from other colleagues should an opportunity for promotion ever arise.

Resourcefulness

In locations where communities are struggling to provide a proper education to young learners, you are likely to encounter a very different set of circumstances to what you are used to back home. Good-quality teaching resources are scarce and electronic learning tools hard to come by, so the normal source material you rely on goes out the window. Forced to go back to basics, educators often find themselves using imaginative teaching techniques to inspire children to learn. After weeks or months of teaching this way you’ll be able to apply the best of your new practices when you return to your local classroom.

Newfound Love Of Teaching

Teaching is a tough gig. You might get stick from friends and family for still having summer holidays, but in a job that requires such constant energy and focus, it’s a rest well earned. But, as the years go by it can be easy for routine to set in. Classes come and go, but the system and the teaching stays roughly the same, and the honeymoon phase might seem like a distant memory. Volunteering can change all that.

To get into such a career is no mean feat, and it is likely at some point in your life, you had a strong yearning and passion for teaching. Travelling abroad to teach not only allows you to face new challenges and escape the bureaucracy of the modern-day educational system, but to experience a completely different setup. You touch lives and help people in a way that only you can. It’s no secret that teaching is one of the most rewarding jobs around, so imagine the feeling of satisfaction you’ll receive from educating those who started life with next to nothing. It will make you fall in love with teaching all over again.

If you want to get involved in volunteer teaching, then Naturally Africa Volunteers has a variety of different projects and locations for you to consider such as Tanzania, South Africa and Ghana. Go to volunteerafrica.comto find out more.

Exciting and worthwhile

Rachel Ormrod, a qualified teacher currently educating Year 4 pupils in Brighton, discusses her experience volunteering

“In Malawi I had the privilege of teaching in two quite different primary schools in rural villages. One hadn’t had volunteers before, so the excitement at our arrival was quite overwhelming. They accepted us very quickly as part of the community, and I soon found myself teaching a class of over 70 students ageing from about 12 up to 19. Their eagerness to learn was amazing – crowding into a dusty classroom even during their official summer holidays. It was a striking experience to turn round from the blackboard to find 70 faces patiently and silently waiting for my next word.

“Teaching in Malawi was an eye-opening experience. Observing the younger local teachers I saw elements which mirrored the English system, such as specifying learning objectives and using peer presentations. There were also ideas I hadn’t come across before and really liked, such as the whole class giving one clap in praise every time someone answered a question.

“My trip also gave me the chance to gain a deeper insight into some of the challenges facing schools in Malawi, mainly the significant language barriers. Children are taught many subjects in English, even though this isn’t their first language. In fact, I met very few adults – even teachers – who really spoke it fluently. The difficulty is that their native language, Chichewa, doesn’t map directly onto English. This creates some big hurdles when trying to give students a better command of English grammar, let alone when they’re trying to understanding content in subjects presented to them in English.

These challenges definitely tested my creative thinking and the trip was no walk in the park, but that isn’t to say it wasn’t very exciting and worthwhile. I would recommend this experience to any teacher who wants to give what they can and is ready to be inspired.”