Teaching as a volunteer

I have found teaching to be one of the most fun, satisfying, productive, and impactful of all the volunteering activities I have tried, even though it is nowhere close to my actual career. So, I am always ready whenever a request comes for teacher volunteers.

At Ganigarapalya government school, I was approached by Hongirana to teach English to the students who are studying in the Kannada medium. As per the government syllabus, English is taught only from the 4th standard onwards. Even though this school had students up to the 7th standard, I took classes mostly for the 4th and 5th standard students after discussing with Headmaster Nanjappa. He was very cooperative in arranging the schedule as per my availability and ensuring the students were free. When I first started, most of the students were already familiar with the language as the lessons had been completed but were not comfortable using it generally. They were prone to just remembering the answers that they are supposed to write for the exam without really understanding the material. Given this situation, I chose to repeat suitable and interesting lessons by making the students read the passages themselves in turn, and then I explained them. I kept the class informal and encouraged them to ask any doubts freely and to converse in English as much as possible. We also did the exercises at the back of each lesson which was excellent to expand the students understanding and use of the language. We usually ended the class by playing age-appropriate games for the English language. Ex, word building, listing objects starting with a particular letter or of certain types ex. vegetables, I spy, finishing a story by adding sentences in turn, etc. The students as expected enjoyed these very much especially when it was played as a competition between groups.

Overall, my only aim during this volunteering stint was to plant a seed in the students to approach the English language a bit more openly and not just as a subject. That is to read and speak English as much as possible while learning more along the way. Personally, I enjoyed interacting with the students, those who were bright as well as those struggling a bit, planning lessons to address the gaps in their learning, and other challenges. It was a memorable experience, indeed.