Planning in Delhi

As mentioned earlier, I spend the first half of my day teaching English in the slum at Mayapuri. I usually finish up at about 1pm, then catch an auto-rickshaw back to the main Asha office at RK Puram. I then spend the next 4-5 hours writing lesson plans for the use of current and future English Teaching Volunteers (ETVs).

ETVs arrive at Asha with a wide array of skills and experience. For some, the only qualification they possess is that they are native English speakers. Others are experienced in TESOL (Teaching English to Speakers of Other Languages) and have a really good idea how to adapt their previous training and experience to the situation in the slums. However, each ETV has taught as an independent unit and in the past there has rarely been any continuity of learning.

This is all about to change and Asha have employed Anjuli, a qualified and experienced English teacher , for a full year to set up an agreed curriculum and write lesson plans for the ETVs.

To kick things off, I was asked to design a curriculum for Asha, under the guidance of Anjuli. I once taught English to Vietnamese migrants in the Melbourne, Australia and had received TESOL training prior to taking that on. In June 2010 I had completed the ANU tertiary teacher training program called Pinnacle. So I combined my previous experience and training in teaching Vietnamese migrants with my recent training and experience in tertiary teaching, and designed a curriculum for slum dwellers in Delhi. Only time will tell if that was successful or not!

After drawing up the curriculum, I was asked to begin writing lesson plans. This is no small task, as the plans have to be really detailed so that the more inexperienced ETVs could just pick up the lesson plans and resources then start to teach. I gave each lesson myself to my own boys in Mayapuri, and then Jess gave the lessons to her classes at Zhakira. Following feedback from Jess and my own thoughts, the lesson plans were then suitably modified.

It’s not yet certain who will continue the lesson planning after my departure from Delhi, so we’ll just leave that in the hands of the Lord and keep ploughing on. Maybe I will have to come back to Delhi to finish that task!