Happy Kids. Happy Drumming.

The Kids
The past two days have been jam packed with new things in Hohoe as we all have started working at our various placements. CCS places its volunteers and interns at different sites around town. In Ghana, most placements are in schools, health clinics, women's empowerment groups or orphanages.  I will be spending my next 8 weeks working at the Happy Kids School with another CCS volunteer. Promptly at 8am Monday morning, we all loaded our trusty van "Big Blue" and began the drive around town to drop everyone at their placements. There was a sense of excitement and anxiousness in the van as we all realized that we had no clue what to expect or what exactly our responsibilities would be once we arrived. I felt comfortable enough helping classroom teachers with any age student and was excited to finally met these 'Happy Kids'.

Happy Kids is a Prep School of about 100 pre-K to 6th grade students and as we turned into the school we saw lots of kids running around the yard and getting their last minute playtime in before class. Apparently, the kids had been awaiting our arrival. As one of the staff members opened the van door for my co-worker and me, tons of the kids ran up to us waving to give us hugs and say "You are welcome!" Look at these kids and just imagine. After the pack of students were done hugging us, we took a quick tour of the 5 room schoolhouse. During the tour, we noticed that the 'P4' classroom seemed to be without a teacher. Long story short... they needed a teacher, we were there, now myself and another volunteer are the teachers for P4.


So there we were, two twenty somethings standing in front of a class of sixteen 10 to 15 year olds in a classroom with no books, no materials and a small language barrier. (The official language in Ghana is English but because most people speak the Ewe dialect, most kids don't learn English until age 4 or 5) We were just supposed to be observing classrooms and getting the feel for things, so I wasn't at all prepared to lead a class and am extremely thankful that the other volunteer (who has had experience teaching English to Japanese students) was with me.


Luckily, this P4 class is unlike any other group of elementary aged kids I have ever seen. After reminding us that we should feel welcome there and doing some brief introductions we went out on a limb and asked them what they wanted to learn. They immediately told us that they wanted to learn more English and hear about America. Some students told us they were really good at math or science, but could use some more practice. The oldest proudly told us he was the best at math. It was amazing and these kids really seemed happy to be at school. They giggled with their friends at their inside jokes, laughed at our American accents and eagerly participated in the name-games and intro activities we could think of on the spot.


This morning, as promised we came prepared with paper, markers, flashcards, dice for multiplication and Uno. We busted out some multiplication tables, spelled animals in English, and by request taught them a few words in Spanish. For tomorrow, they have requested more English and some sort of science. There aren't too many things that make waking up at 7am everyday enjoyable, but I'm looking forward to my mornings with P4 for the next 8 weeks. Expect lots of updates about the class and Happy Kids. Also, I've learned that Happy Kids doesn't have a standard curriculum for each grade, so that's something I hope to work on while I'm here. Any help from the educators out there would be greatly appreciated... (I'm looking at you mom)


The Drumming
Monday evening CCS arranged for us to have a tradition African welcome from the one of the most popular choral/drumming and dancing groups in Ghana. They we fantastic and played us a few traditional celebration songs, songs used for hunting rituals back in the day, and a few contemporary favorites. Their performance was great (it's all about the footwork), but things really got started when they asked us to join in. Be on the lookout for a video!


Some of the volunteers were a little wary about dancing with the group, but most of us had a great time learning the moves. I was obviously all for it... but I guess I've never really been that shy. After the dancing we got a chance to learn how to play some of the drums. I loved it and some of the staff members said I was good enough to get my own drum. One of the younger girls in the choir wasn't as impressed and during our goodbyes came up to me to say that I did a great job, but need to work on getting lower with the dances. Maybe next time.


We're heading to the Wli Waterfall tomorrow! Check back for an update on that and life at the local market.

Much Love!