The Garifuna People and Culture

As one of our group activities, we all visited the Black and White Cultural Center. This center in San Pedro has been created by the Garifuna people of Belize. With a rich cultural history, this center serves to keep their culture, language, food, spirituality, music, and dance alive. One really interesting part of their culture is traditional healing.  Traditional healing, and healers, are fascinating, and increasing rare in a world of prescription drugs. Traditional healing is also a part of Appalachia culture, and sometimes is associated with witchcraft by outsiders. In the presentation, they mentioned that the Garifuna have been pointed to and accused of witchcraft. In actuality, traditional medicine is about connecting healing to spirituality and takes a holistic approach to healing.

For me, I thought it was interesting that the Garifuna who settled in Belize came to place where many strong cultures already existed, including the Kriol and the Mayans. The Garifuna people had to fight to have a place in Belize, and for their culture to continue, distinct from but respected by other Belizians. Through sheer determination, their culture continues to have a strong presence in Belize. 

We had a wonderful time learning about the Garifuna people, hearing their drums, and trying their dances. They make the dances, especially the punta dance, seem so smooth and effortless. However, when I tried the dance, it was quite tiresome, especially when trying to stay in rhythm. 

 

One final takeaway is a quote the said several times, which I had never heard before:

"It is in the length of our journey that we we rearrange the weight of our burden." What a beautiful thought, that the long difficult journey of the Garifuna people has allowed them time to make peace with their lives and find faith and hope along the way. 

Poetry and Artists

Today was Poetry Day at the library! We started with one of the librarians reciting a poem to the kids, which I thought was really cool, as memorizing poetry is sort of a lost art.

I read 6 poems to the kids, including a couple of my favorites by Shel Silverstein.  I read a variety of poems, and we had a discussion about how there can be all kinds of poems, including silly or serious, sweet or scary. 

Then we used our journals to write a poem of our own. Some of the kids wrote their own, and others used a formula I provided. As the kids wrote, the students walked around, helping them to spell words, think of rhyming words, and come up with ideas about what to write. After all the kids finished their poems in their journal, they rewrote their poems on construction papermand drew illustrations on them. Students helped the kids to build a stand, so that their poems could be displayed. 

Each student shared their poem with the group, and we were all impressed with the poems. One girl wrote about her new friends at camp, and another girl wrote about all the things her mother does for her.

Of all of the things we have done so far, poetry was something I was the most nervous about. Without any formal language arts training with kids, I really did not know what expect from asking the kids to write poems. Poetry was always difficult for me a student, as I was always too hung up on symmetry and rhyming. To try to ease these fears with these kids, I repeatly told them that their poems could look or sound any way that they wanted-- that is the beauty of poetry. I am so glad that I conquered my fear of poetry, and shared this experience with the children of Belize. 

Folktales and Lessons Learned

On our second day of library camp, we focused on folktales. First, one of the librarians told a local folktales called La Llorona, also called "The Whispering Woman." This scary folktale serves a lesson to teach children not to travel alone at night or to venture near water alone. The kids loved the story and they told their own versions of it that had been told to them by parents or grandparents. I was surprised at how many variations they knew about the folktale.

 

After that, we had children write their own folktale. They could write it out in sentences, jot down ideas about their story, or draw it in pictures.  We took about 30 minutes to allow students to work on their folktales, focusing on the lesson that they wanted children to learn from their story. We were all so impressed with the stories they created. Even the student who drew pictures instead of writing words told an elaborate tale. 

 After each student shared their folktale, it was craft time! Today we made "shak shaks," also known as maracas. We read a story, In the Land of the Shak Shak Tree. Each time we came across a shak shak tree in the story, everybody shook their shak shaks. We had a ball doing this. 

After a short break, we read one-on-one. The boy, Thomas, that I worked with yesterday during reading time, came up to me, and wanted help re-reading two of the books from yesterday. This time, he recognized more of the words in the story, which was awesome! He told me that he had told his mom all about one of the books when he got home last night, and when she came to pick him up today, he brought her over the table to show her the book.  This made my day, as I felt I had accomplished just want I came to do-- spark excitement about reading.  

Alice in Wonderland and Fantasy Fiction

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Today began week 2 of literacy camp at the library.  This week, we are working with kids ranging in age from 8- 12. I worked with the librarian to develop the plan for the week, and we are focusing on a different kind of literature each day. For our first day, we looked at fantasy fiction. 

We had 5 kids on our first day. They were mostly 7 and 8 years old. I had 3 students from UMSL assisting. Our icebreaker for the day was telling our names and what superpower we would have if we could choose one. 

Then, I read a children's version of Alice in Wonderland. It was new book that the library just received, and the librarian was really excited about introducing it to the kids. They loved the Story, and wanted to top an talk about the pictures as we went long. After the story, I explained that we were going to watch  a short, 12 minute video of Alice in Wonderland. I told them that were going to be differences between the book and movie and for be them to be the lookout for the difference in characters and plot. They were really excited about watching the short movie, and they laughed a lot while watching it. After the movie, we had a lively discussion about the differences between the book and movie. They pointed out differences in the character's clothes, plot points, and character actions. I was really impressed with their critical thinking in this activity. 

Next, we worked as group to complete a character map of Alice. In each category, we defined the category name (e.g. What does behavior mean, what are examples of behaviors) and then we filled in each category in relation to Alice. The kids wowed me with their ideas about Alice. At the end, I explained that it was important to always think about the characters in the stories they read, to try to better understand the characters and the story.  

After the character map, it was time for a craft! We made a Alice in Wondeland style hat, and the kids seemed to enjoy this craft, although it was pretty tricky to assemble. Pinterest made this craft look a lot easier than it really was, but we were successful in the end.

After a short break, we spent the rest of the day reading individually. Because of the ratio of students to children, we are able to work with them one-on-one. The stronger readers read a chapter book aloud, to their student partner, and the weaker readers were read to, and asked to read words on pages that had been read to them.  Each afternoon this week, we will spend 30 minutes reading one-on-one, and I hope this will allow them slight gains in their reading abilities by the end of the week.

The Gruffalo and other library adventures

Thursday was my first day leading reading activities at the San Pedro Library, and what a day it was! We had 22 children attend, ranging in age from 4-9. The majority of the group consisted of local children, with a few American and British children whose families are currently residing here. I knew that modifying each reading activity for such a wide range of ages was going to be challenging, and I was a bit nervous about how this would go.

I have no formal training with teaching children under the age of 14, so working with kids ranging in age from 4-9 is  a totally new experience for me. In one way, it is daunting, because I do not have much experience being around children, and certainly do not have any experience working with children on their reading and writing skills. However, it is also exciting, because these kids seem so excited and eager to be here. Working with college students, I don't witness them being excited about reading and books very often, so already, it is very refreshing to witness the children being so excited about camp at the library.

To open the day, I read the book Rainy Day, which was fitting, because it poured rain all morning. After we got through the book, which was a challenge because we were trying to get everyone settled in, two UNCW students lead the children in a group story telling. Each child told one thing they would do a rainy day, and we put together a story. This worked well for the most part, as a lot of the kids were anxious to say what they had done that rainy morning. However, a couple of the youngest kids were hesistant to offer up a suggestion of what to add to the story.

Our next book was The Gruffalo, by Julia Donaldson.  Two children cheered at the announcement that we were reading The Gruffalo, and these were British children. I wasn't surprised that they knew the popular book, as the book was published in England. I gave each child a map of the woods where the story takes place. As we read the story, they were to draw the characters that appeared in the story. As we worked our way through the story, they drew a mouse, a fox, an owl, a snake, and finally, the Gruffalo.  I am so pleased about how well this activity went. The kids were really excited about the story, and the activity.  After the program, one American parent, who stayed to observe, said how impressed she was with that activity, which made me feel good. In the future, I think would further develop this activity for the younger students by giving them a more elaborate map to draw the animals on and asking them to draw the scenery. For the older kids, I would use a worksheet to ask them to explain the mouse's actions throughout the story.

After a snack break, we returned to The Gruffalo, and a did a word search puzzle for words from The Gruffalo. I knew this was going to be challenge for children who were too young to read. The UNCW   and UMSL students sat with the younger students, and they searched for letters rather than words, and that worked pretty well. I was surprised by how enthustic the older kids were about this activity, and they were determined to complete the entire puzzle before moving onto the final activity.

Lastly, we practiced read aloud in small groups. The librarian told me that students do not get get much practice with reading aloud, and she wanted to incorporate that into the day's activities. We divided students up by age, and the kids between 6-9 took turns reading outloud, and the children between 4-5 were read to by UNCW and UMSL students, as well as the library staff. I observed that a couple of students were quite nervous to read aloud, but with encouragement and some help with bigger words, and lots of praise, they were smiling when they finished reading. 

Looking forward to see what next week's library camp brings.