And then there was teaching which she chose to forget her pains, and resolve her psycho-social problem. “While I was idle, thoughts of damaged house, shop, studies, mother and brothers always used to come into my mind. Such thoughts adversely affected my health as well,” she recalled. “Wherever I looked at, I found similar plight of many people. Then I decided to deviate my mind to something that would help me forget my troubles. Finally, I decided to teach children.

This is the translated story, that was originally written in Nepali language and published in Kosheli edition of Kantipur Daily.  Click here to read the Nepali story in Kantipur. 

After the monstrous earthquake of April 25 left them devastated, Sarita’s four-member family is now forced to live in a temporary shelter at Tundikhel of Chautara in Sindhupalchowk district. Although five persons can comfortably live in a tarp provided by a foreign aid agency, twenty persons from four families, including hers, are to live together under the tarp awkwardly. Anyone visiting them can easily figure out hardship of their life in a small tent.

Sarita wakes up early in the morning, cooks for her family at a corner of the tent, and leaves for another temporary shelter nearby with a bag of copies and pen at around 9:30 am. By the time she reaches a temporary learning space created by Save Our Soul (SOS), children of quake-hit families from Chautara are already there waiting for her.

Over a hundred children of displaced families living in temporary shelters at Chautara and Tundikhel attend the learning center. Though it is an emergency class, it starts formally with the national anthem ‘Sayaun Thunga Phoolka Hami Eutai Mala Nepali’ from 10 am and ends at 5 pm.  Four volunteer teachers engage children of grades ranging from nursery to five in fun activities like drawing and games. Sarita is one of them.

Sarita is neither a teacher by her profession nor had she wished to be a teacher someday. The student, pursuing her Bachelor of Arts (BA), used to run a grocery before the earthquake. However, the earthquakes of April 25 and May 12 have changed her daily lives.

Following the death of her father some years ago, Sarita, the eldest child in the family, had to bear the responsibility of managing home. Even her mother, after her husband’s death, had to struggle to raise a daughter and two sons and educate them. They possessed the only property ‘house’, where they had starting a shop. The family used to live on a handful income generated from the shop. They lived a simple life and their lives were gradually improving, but the earthquake ruined them all of a sudden.

“The sudden quake left us back to the poor life of early days,” said Sarita, whose eyes filled with tears. She could not utter any word for a while. The only property was a house, while the shop was the only source of income for the family. The earthquake destroyed them.

“Where to go? What to do? How to manage fees for my education and also of my brothers? How to rebuild our houses. Worried over all these problems, my mother fell sick,” she further said. “We could not even brought out the valuables and goods from the shop before our house reduced to rubble in the earthquake.” With the deteriorating health of her mother thereafter, she was also worried over how to cope with the situation. “Later I also felt like a sick person,” she added.

And then there was teaching which she chose to forget her pains, and resolve her psycho-social problem. “While I was idle, thoughts of damaged house, shop, studies, mother and brothers always used to come into my mind. Such thoughts adversely affected my health as well,” she recalled. “Wherever I looked at, I found similar plight of many people. Then I decided to deviate my mind to something that would help me forget my troubles. Finally, I decided to teach children.

She has been teaching quake-affected children since the fourth day of the April 25 earthquake. For her, teaching was not a difficult task because her love for children, she told me.

By the time I was talking to her, the clock had already struck at the noon. Then I saw three of children, approaching to Sarita, told her, “Sarita Miss, Sarita Miss, give us drawing papers.” She handed over a paper and pen to each child. It was the time to draw.

“Miss, which picture should I draw?” said one of the girl children.   Sarita was quick to respond her, “Draw a picture of a house.” Sitting nearby her teacher, she started drawing. First she drew a house that stood intact, then another damaged house. After that, he wrote ‘before’, on the top of the first house, and she wrote ‘after’ on the top of the second. Finally, she showed the pictures to Sarita. The pictures that her student drew and showed to her once again reflected her damaged house in her mind.

According to her, most of children from Sindhupalchowk have similar feeling after the earthquake. “If it is difficult for a 25-year old girl like me to forget such catastrophe, how much has the quake terror traumatized children?,” she questioned.

She complained about the government’s apathy to address the psychosocial impact on children even after a month of the earthquake.

When and how can children in trauma after the earthquake can overcome them?, she questioned, urging the government to understand the need of psychosocial counselling before their classes resumed.

Now she enjoys a new experience of her hobby that has changed due to the earthquake. “I want to pursue my interests in teaching quake-affected children for some time,” she said. “However, there is no destination of our life now. No place to live and go further.”

“I rushed out of home in a pair of clothes at the time of earthquake. I do not have additional dresses to change. I wear the same dirty clothes and go to teach children,” she further said.

She says, whenever she goes near the children, she forgets her dirty clothes that she is wearing and the destroyed house.

I wonder how many generous people like Sarita could be in our society, who devoted herself to teach quake affected children even after losing all her properties in the earthquake.

—

The author is an investigative multimedia journalist. For the investigative reporting in Nepal, she was awarded an investigative reporting prize by International Center for Journalists (ICFJ) in 2014. Currently, she is reporting on investigative reports and news stories with focus on migration or foreign employment of Nepalis, violence against women, and good governance in Nepal to be published in different media.

Recently, she has completed my assignment of producing and presenting radio magazine Nikash for Equal Access Nepal which was focused on transitional justice. Before that, she worked as producer and presenter of Sarangiko Bhalakusari for the BBC Media Action. Sarangiko Bhalakusari is a Nepali radio magazine produced by BBC Media Action.

I am an ESL/EFL teacher with four years of experience teaching in various contexts in Nepal, but these days I am also an academic observing the online organization of earthquake relief efforts. After several weeks of reading, posting, sharing, messaging, and tweeting, I believe that the relief and rebuilding process has uncovered social issues and brought about changes that EFL teachers can play a role in exploring with their students and school communities. As Phyak wrote in a recently published op-ed, “This disaster is no longer just a ‘natural’ phenomenon; it has deep socio-political, cultural, and economic meanings.” (2015) The meanings that he refers to have their source and are reflected in language in ways that can shape what we teach in the post-earthquake classroom. Here, I cite some examples of language choice to highlight what is being said and being left unsaid in order to contextualize some practical pedagogical goals that can be integrated into the EFL curriculum.

Be concerned if someone doesn’t ask your name: Whilst conducting voluntary relief work in Gorkha, a British tourism company owner took a picture of an older gentleman wearing a hardhat sorting rubble into usable and unusable material. She later posted it on Facebook, not indicating the place or the man’s name. One of her contacts asked her if she had been there to take the picture and knew where she had taken it, to which she replied “Yes.” The contact then explained that he was from that village and knew the man in the picture. The company owner could have made the choice to ask the man’s name, and thus give him credit for his work. Instead, her only comment was that “He is a strong man.”

As teachers, we should be aware that this type of carefully selected anonymity allows others to label and define our communities, schools, and students (and even ourselves when fulfilling the public role of “teacher”). What if the photographer had asked the gentleman at least for his name, if not about his own perception about his work of separating out the rubble? The richness and complexity of his life and experience during the earthquake would add value to the photo and appreciation for the individual in it. What we should take away from this is that instead of permitting the photographer telling their story, we can prepare students to tell their own.

Working through the storytelling process with students in EFL classrooms has both pedagogical and social benefits. On the broadest level, integrating storytelling into second language instruction fits in nicely with other components of communicative language teaching and reinforces the premise of this method of instruction – that it brings in authentic language and increases personal motivation. Within the sphere of authentic language, the stories that students develop can be used to engage all four language skills of reading, writing, listening, and speaking. (Atta-Alla, 2012)  For example, when simultaneously read out loud and contextualized by illustrations and props, storytelling can help with word recall and be followed-up with further activities to support reading skill development. (Huang, 2006, p. 53) These extra components of the story are all things that students can create in preparation for telling them. Indeed, students are already being prepared for this kind of work through the programs designed to address students’ mental health needs. What occurs during playing, drawing, singing, and dancing now can be revisited with a pedagogical purpose over the coming weeks.

Storytelling also goes beyond simple personal motivation to enabling students to develop an identity within English as their foreign language by giving them to opportunity to communicate with a social purpose. Conversely, students can be made aware of how English can be used to describe their social lives outside of textbooks, exams, and classrooms. There are initiatives already working on eliciting and publishing personal stories, such as Stories of Nepal (www.storiesofnepal.com) and the Book Bus, which is sponsored by the American Embassy. These efforts can serve as a way to publicize selected individual’s stories, yet again the content of what is selected as important is put in the hands of the outside observer. They cannot bring communities together to develop a “whole” story and offer relevant reflection. This type of work can only be done in locally-based social institutions, such as schools.

There are many forms of knowledge: Two recent posts from one of the most vocal Nepali online organizers of volunteer relief efforts have highlighted the further divisions that those providing relief make when deciding what to offer those in need. In one post, he commented that “villagers” are only concerned with food because that is “all they know,” and as such, made the recommendation that volunteer groups should limit the amount of food they provide and instead focus on household, hygiene, and rebuilding supplies. In the second post, which was in reference to the status in Gorkha, Sindhupalchok, Dolakha, and Dhading, the writer reiterated his belief that food supplies should be restricted, this time insisting that only psychological, medical, and educational relief should be provided under the threat that he would take personal action against those who did not follow his advice.

The foundation on which he built his argument was the idea that “local villagers” are those who are uneducated and are thus unreliable sources of information. “Educated people are updating me that local people are being more dependent on to the aid and not doing regular activities like making shelter, agriculture, handicrafts, etc… Note: we are going to develop our country not making rich in slum-dog areas.” The perspective from which these comments come again seeks to lump those in need into one anonymous category – this time, as those with little education. The writer equates this lack of formal education with limited knowledge of survival and planning skills. It is also underpinned by biases against low-income communities who may not have previously been living in conventional housing by labelling them as “slum-dog areas” and implying that they are undeveloped eyesores.

Teachers in any educational context cannot avoid being aware of their students’ lives outside the school gates, even if they do not live in the same locality. After all, we are social creatures interacting in a social institution. We should not, however, allow others to put us in the position of speaking for our students or community members simply because we are affiliated with the field of education, which in turn is affiliated with the notion of being “developed”. If we work in a school in a city where most of the students’ families run businesses or a school in a rural village where everyone is involved in agriculture, we see that schooling is only one form knowledge. It does not give us the experience to know who to hire for a position or how to take care of a pregnant buffalo. Just as we hope to have every student speak up in class, we should hope to create the space for every community member to also speak. Similarly, we are driven by the desire to have every student take in the material that we teach and are disappointed when we don’t reach this goal. Within the community, we should also maintain this type of persistence.

What we say reflects what we believe: The story above highlights the importance of being aware of the words we teach to our students and their meaning. Similarly, another post on Facebook from a young Nepali woman in Kathmandu reported her volunteer trip to a marginalized community. She did not give the exact location, but focused readers’ attention on the social status of the community by commenting, “I don’t know why people call […] people uncivilized. I found they behave so nicely, better than [list of different castes]. They are true Nepalese.” (paraphrased and edited) Personally, it is my sincere hope that the writer could only express her beliefs in this way because of her EFL skills, and not because this is how her worldview has been shaped.

In order to address situations like these, we can explore the suitability of the target language in different social contexts when using English as a Foreign Language in addition to teaching meaning and form (Nagy, p. 8). We can engage students in projects to map out synonyms and antonyms based not only on the target language’s definition, but also their correlating contexts. This can facilitate clearer communication in storytelling and also broaden students’ emotional expressiveness in English. They can be empowered to create language that is not only factual, but also reflects their underlying beliefs.

Two Nepali academics have published op-eds related to language choice in media and public discourse with regards to post-earthquake Nepal. Tamang warns that by describing Nepali citizens as “resilient,” the onus is put on volunteers and those in need to rebuild. This leaves the government unaccountable for its part in relief efforts (Tamang, 2015) Phyak, a NELTA member, highlights the socio-cultural and political effects that words like “victim,” “poor,” and “helpless” can have, cutting those who are in need down into “beggars.” (Phyak, 2015). Just as we can conscious about when we speak and who we speak for, we can also model for our students various choices in what to speak.

A recent post from a friend described how when he was a student, he learned about the unification of Nepal, the geography of the country, and its natural resources. What was missing from his textbook was the history of earthquakes in the country. Similarly, students have not been prepared to talk to INGO workers, volunteers, engineering assessors, or local government officials. Just as social science classes will integrate the history of Nepal’s earthquakes, science classes will discuss tectonic plates. Health classes will reaffirm the need to run or drop, hide, and hold. To do our part as ELF teachers, we must prepare our students to communicate in the post-earthquake world.

—

Charlotte ‘Sangita’ Benham recently received her M.S.Ed. in TESOL from the University of Pennsylvania. Prior to her graduate-level work, she taught Academic English and essay writing to high school and graduate students in Kathmandu, Nepal for three years. She also served as a Fulbright English Teaching Assistant in Nepal, working with local English teachers to provide EFL lessons at a rural, government-funded secondary school in Kavre District. Charlotte received her B.A. in History from Brandeis University in 2007 after writing her thesis on the historical roots of the political ideology of the Maoist insurgency in Nepal. She grew up in Massachusetts and is now based in Philadelphia

References

Atta-Alla, M. (2012). Integrating Language Skills through Storytelling. English Language Teaching, 5(12).

Huang, H. (2006). The Effects of Storytelling on EFL Young Learners’ Reading Comprehension and Word Recall. English Teaching & Learning, 30(3), 51-74.

Nagy, W. (1995). On the Role of Context in First- and Second-Language Vocabulary Learning. Champaign, Illinois: Center for the Study of Reading, University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign.

Phyak, P. (4 June, 2015). Survivors, not victims. The Kathmandu Post. Retrieved on 7 June, 2015 from: http://www.ekantipur.com/the-kathmandu-post/2015/06/04/oped/survivors-not-victims/276991.html.

Tamang, S. (25 May, 2015) Dangers of Resilience. eKantipur.com. Retrieved on 7 June, 2015 from: http://www.ekantipur.com/2015/05/25/oped/dangers-of-resilience/405651.html.

I was worried about the thousands of children who no longer have the protection of their parents and comfort of life after the historic disaster. And as someone who has been advocating for increasing opportunities for Nepalese children to read, I was now left with an almost debilitating set of questions: read what? read how? read when and where? When food and shelter, pain and fear, and the care and perhaps presence of parents have disappeared for so many children across the country, how can I talk about reading and writing? And to add to the misery, we hear cases of rape, sexual harassment and theft. I may only be able to add a drop in the bucket, but I wanted to add that drop. I could not stay in my tent while it shook and return to my house when it stopped. I wanted to go where homes had collapsed, lives were shattered, children’s tender minds were shaken.

‘Finish your food, or I will call the police,” said a mother in our neighborhood to her four-year-old son on the first night in the shelter after the first earthquake. In the next couple of days, the traditional bogeyman of police, ghost, and teacher would be replaced by ‘earthquake’!

While my knowledge of child psychology is only based on experience and interest, I could see a contradiction in this situation. We were faced with the most traumatizing situation of our lifetime, but our society doesn’t seem to have a culture, tradition, of profession for dealing with psychological trauma and stress. What if we have a generation of psychologically impacted children? How is the disaster going to affect the education and careers of the next generation? What are the local resources and practices that we can build upon in order to mitigate trauma in children? How can we turn the disaster into a turning point, to recover and rebuild, and to inspire this traumatized generation to do great things?

I was worried about the thousands of children who no longer have the protection of their parents and comfort of life after the historic disaster. And as someone who has been advocating for increasing opportunities for Nepalese children to read, I was now left with an almost debilitating set of questions: read what? read how? read when and where? When food and shelter, pain and fear, and the care and perhaps presence of parents have disappeared for so many children across the country, how can I talk about reading and writing? And to add to the misery, we hear cases of rape, sexual harassment and theft. I may only be able to add a drop in the bucket, but I wanted to add that drop. I could not stay in my tent while it shook and return to my house when it stopped. I wanted to go where homes had collapsed, lives were shattered, children’s tender minds were shaken.

So, as soon as I had access to the internet and after informing friends and families about my safety, I set about researching material on what I believed was a blind spot in my society, the Post Traumatic Stress Disorder (PTSD). Meanwhile, I also wrote to friends in my close network, and shared some preliminary ideas for a possible project. I spent the first week finding out what organizations, experts and resources are available and who I could partner with. Also, with the help of my teacher/ friend/ mentor Shyam Sharma, who is currently a professor at an American university, I started a Facebook page named Saarathi (connotation: friend, from Sanskrit “charioteer”). Saarathi was able to successfully raise close to $1500 (our current goal is $2000) in less than a week!

After the Nepal government announced that all schools should resume from the first week of June, the schools were anxious about how to deal with students once they come back to school and how to deal with the questions that the students are likely to ask. Over 16,000 schools have been impacted. Save the Children estimates that 90% of schools have been flattened to the ground in Gorkha (the epicenter of the quake). The Government of Nepal mandated that schools reopen on May 30, 2015. There was an immediate need to train teachers and provide them with earthquake focused lesson plans to address the trauma that teachers and students carry into the classrooms before regular lessons resume. Therefore, Naulo Margha prepared a package of lesson plans that help schools ease students back into regular activities even as they resource them to cope with the inevitable trauma resulting from the earthquake. Around 100 trainers were trained to train another 2400 teachers in Kathmandu valley in just a week. Under the project, ‘Post Earthquake Relief Through Education: Training of Teachers’, we were then able to provide one day training to teachers and equip them with a five days’ lesson plan that they could use in their classes. It is wonderful to see many of the schools around Nepal have resumed and children are going to school even though they have to sit under tents all day since the school buildings no more exist.

This is challenging work but I feel very strongly that it must be done — children deserve to be brought back to normal routine life and they must be protected.

I am hopeful. I am already smiling with the children day after day.

—-

About the Author:

Anuradha Sharma, a graduate from the University of Central Lancashire, UK in Intercultural Business Communications, is a children’s story writer, and is currently working towards helping mitigate psychological trauma in children.

I had to deal with small kids and it was comparatively easy in some ways. I played the music, gave them sports equipment, asked them to sing and tell jokes. They enjoyed, and did not make any mention of earthquakes meanwhile. So, that’s all we focused in initial days of school reopening. It diverted the minds of the students who cried while coming to school, and had smiles on their faces while returning back home. Slowly the number of students coming school started to increase.

Earthquakes and their effects

Earthquakes are movements of the earth’s surface, often as a result of a fault or fracture in the crust that can be violent enough to destroy major buildings and kill thousands of people. The severity of the shaking can range from barely felt to violent enough to toss people around. They happen more often in some parts of the world than others.

Literally, earthquakes and its devastating effects on the people is very complicated. Most people are affected by it and fear it yet there are few who are not at all sacred. The recent earthquake in Nepal has also killed thousands of people, and has resulted in psychological effects on people- perhaps more on children. If we consider the children of the age group (5-8), they also have different thoughts towards earthquakes. They actually do not know what exactly earthquake is and what all differences does it bring to one’s life. Therefore, they are more likely to make false assumptions and eventually bring more fear in themselves.

What I experienced in my classroom  

Being a teacher of this age group, I was initially much tensed how I would be handling the students after this massive earthquake and how I was going to deal with my students. At the same time, I was curious as what all questions my students might raise to me. This had triggered a lot of interrogations in my head, and, as a result, I prepared a set of answers to the possible questions in my mind if I was asked.  But to my surprise, my students didn’t even raise a single question. On the contrary, they were very much pleased and happy to meet their friends and teachers after a long gap. They had pleasing smiles on their faces. Yet, there were few who wear crying and scared when their parents dropped them to the school. It might have happened because of two reasons, either reporting to the school after a long time, or they had an awful experience during earthquakes. Generic assumptions can therefore not be made about the way children may respond to such disasters. It is very much individual situations. This has suggested me exploring and understanding each child in my classroom that is very challenging, but demanding.

Parents, in addition, can play a significant part in handling kids especially after such calamities. If parents keep themselves calm and strong- with shaken heart however- and handle situation wisely then children can also act accordingly. The stronger the parents are the more mentally stronger children become.  Eventually because of those parents who handled their kids wisely we, teachers, didn’t face much difficulty in dealing with the children.

Yes- nevertheless, there are few children who are badly traumatized. The aftershocks, cracks in the wall, rumbling noises, destroyed buildings, smell of fire and smoke, the places where they experienced the earthquakes, seeing people with disabilities, funerals can get them traumatized again. These kind of students can be given time for  counselling  from the ones they get along with, from the ones they feel comfortable to talk to or love spending time with or the ones who can be a better counsellor.

While conversing with my students, I asked them a simple question what an earthquake is. One of them simply answered that moving of the ground is an earthquake, during which buildings come down, people die, we live outside our home, etc.  Then, I asked a next question, “What should we do when an earthquake takes place? Almost everyone answered this question since they had been told by their parents about the earthquake and what one is meant to do while it occurs. This is an example of children from the capital city where the majority of parents are well educated. However, I would wonder this might be a different case in remote locations where parents are themselves not aware of the all these ideas. It would therefore require different concerned agencies to look at this issue.

What the school planned

Before the school actually started, we were called for a meeting where we discussed what we intended to do as far as classroom activities were concerned in terms of abating children’s fear and bring them to normal learning environment. We also focused on safety measures in order to keep the students outside on the ground level to avoid any accidents in case of any aftershocks. We were advised not to talk about earthquakes and not to ask experiences of students what they had. This was thought for building positive environment it, therefore children can get out of the trauma.

I had to deal with small kids and it was comparatively easy in some ways. I played the music, gave them sports equipment, asked them to sing and tell jokes. They enjoyed, and did not make any mention of earthquakes meanwhile. So, that’s all we focused in initial days of school reopening. It diverted the minds of the students who cried while coming to school, and had smiles on their faces while returning back home. Slowly the number of students coming school started to increase.

Conclusion

Finally, resuming the school after the earthquake was a very good decision; it was boon for the student as well as parents. We should, by no means, shop children from learning. We should rather create opportunities to continue learning even in emergencies, as stated, however with precautions. It was difficult for the parents to leave their kids at school but when they saw the children’s happy faces at home time, they thought of sending them to school is a wise decision. It is still challenging, but we are strong and careful for our lovely kids.

—
The author, a graduate in Business Studies, teaches in Ideal Model Higher Secondary School, Kathmandu.

We tried our best to convince the students to share their personal experiences with us. We teachers involved in group activities and students stayed as audience. Some of us shared our bitter realities of the existing world such as moral disaster, earthquake, landslide, flood and their effects, the rest of the teachers shared our morality. We shared them that the earthquake treats millionaire and the beggar equally and they are on the equal status at the disaster. Hence, we told them to love people and feel pride to be a human being. We also made them aware of what should be done if the disaster re-occurs.

Following the devastating earthquake, it is challenging to resume schools and continue usual teaching in the affected areas like Kathmandu. People who survived in the earthquake feel that they have been granted with their rebirth. The recent earthquake has made thousands of people homeless, and they lost their family and relatives and properties. Thousands of public and private schools were collapsed and damaged. A large number of children became orphans, homeless and also schoolless. The earthquake has brought not only disastrous effects, but it also created many opportunities for us to rebuild better and quake resilient Nepal. We teachers, students, and concerned people have to actively involve in rebuilding process.

The school I teach ‘Shree Ratna Rajya Higher Secondary School, located at Mid-Baneshwor’, one of large public schools of Kathmandu valley has been heavily damaged in the earthquake and subsequent aftershocks. Consequently, teaching students in the damage structure has been unsafe. However, the meeting of school management committee held on May 24 decided to follow the decisions of the government of Nepal and Ministry of Education. Thereafter, another meeting of the teachers and staff that was held immediately on May 26, discussed on different issues in terms of reopening the schools and continuing teaching. Following the meeting, some teachers of the school attended workshop on counseling classes for school children jointly organized by the Ministry of Education and the District Education Office, Kathmandu. Then, the teachers and staffs again held discussions on how to deal the quake affected students at post earthquake situation.

Finally, around one month and a half, schools were resumed from May 31. However, many challenges before us included how to start the classes, how to manage the classrooms, how to get rid of fear of the students, how to deal with the psychological aspects of the students, and so on. Both the teachers and the students seemed to be in a dilemma. They both were still in psychological trauma of the earthquake and aftershocks. Despite challenges, it was important for the teachers to seek solutions and strengthen themselves for continuing their daily routines. I planned to deal with the students by sharing some of my experiences and creating some fun and friendly situations. For this, I planned the activities as my habitual actions.

The first day, the school seemed to be a junction. Students were present in the school with their guardians. The teachers were in a dilemma, what to do in that situation,  and how to deal with the students. The temporary classroom building process was continued. There were not enough classrooms to manage the students. There was a silence, but the crowd. I was feeling that the place and the situation was for meditation. One big building with 27 rooms had already cracked so that red sticker was placed in it. It was quite challenging job to manage all the classes from nursery to higher secondary level.

After a long silence and confusion, as an icebreaker, our teacher staffs were engaged in placing the students. First, we started from staff rooms. We placed all the chairs and tables of two rooms. Then we separated one class to one room by merging each four sections of each class. Out of 1500 students almost 400 students were present that day. We encouraged the students to share their experiences about the mega earthquake. At the very moment, almost all the students were so sad that they were not from the fear of such a natural disaster. Some of the students were not interested to share their panic experiences. Fortunately, we had no bad news of our school family. There was again a silence. To break the silence, we teachers shared our feelings and experiences with some motivating ideas. I also shared some of my experiences during rescue and relief process. I had involved in rescuing people in different places of Kathmandu valley such as at Madhyapur Thimi, Bhimsen tower, Gongabu bus park area, etc. After we shared our experiences, the students started sharing their experiences. The reason behind it could be the similarity between teacher and students’ experiences. However, they were sad that they were about to cry frequently.

We did not teach the students’ course books and nor did we talk about them. But we engaged the students in different activities such as telling stories, jokes, reciting poems, singing songs and different games. They were happier after these activities. We also conducted group teachings. Students were happier that multiple teachers were teaching in the same class at the same time. We ended our classes at 1 PM. Then, we had a staff meeting. We shared our experiences. We had a discussion on how to deal with the students the next day in such a panic situation. We decided to take classes with games and jokes being optimistic.

Second day, one of our main focuses was music. It was played for 10/12 minutes before school assembly. Some students added in the classes. The students were happier than the first day. Newcomers, after getting enrollment, were increasing. We involved the students not only in sharing their experiences, but we had asked them to write about it in a few sentences. We divided the classes into different groups engaged them in group activities. Newcomers, from the other different public and private schools, were more active than those of the same schools. That day, we could manage two/two sections to each classroom. We could also manage other classrooms. The lower classes were taught as a Multigrade teaching. The tents were hung so that we could manage Nursery, KG and class one together. We sat together with the students and involved in different group work activities which gave us much satisfaction and pleasure. That day, we found that the students were happier than the day before. With better preparation, we took classes with new ideas and experiences about how to face unforeseen problems. We also encouraged the students to share their new ideas and experiences; we encouraged them to participate in a game with much more entertainment.

We tried our best to convince the students to share their personal experiences with us. We teachers involved in group activities and students stayed as audience. Some of us shared our bitter realities of the existing world such as moral disaster, earthquake, landslide, flood and their effects, the rest of the teachers shared our morality. We shared them that the earthquake treats millionaire and the beggar equally and they are on the equal status at the disaster. Hence, we told them to love people and feel pride to be a human being. We also made them aware of what should be done if the disaster re-occurs.

We needed to know our students personally as they were traumatized by the disaster. We tried our best to know psychological effects on students and treat them accordingly as we found some students were still not feeling safe and comfortable. We involved them in personal counseling. As a positive response, upper classes, especially class 8, 9 and 10 were curious about their new courses in the very beginning of the academic session. We ended our classes at 2 pm. We had also a staff meeting that day. After sharing the new experiences, we discussed about new ideas regarding how to prepare students in the teaching-learning process psychologically. We did not have enough space to have school assembly and morning prayer. The temporary classrooms covered the ground. Then we made a decision to give short break time thrice, a 10 minute break after 2 each period. The long break was cut off then. We also decided to run class routine wise next day. However, teachers should have to teach with their own plans indirectly based on the curriculum.

The third day was happier and much more comfortable than the previous two classes. Most students were in a happy mood. We took classes routine wise. I had better planning and preparation about how to deal with the students in English language teaching practices. I had already planned to teach strip story. Therefore, I prepared the strips of papers and wrote something that needs to be done in the classroom. The class started with the national anthem and Morning Prayer. The school administration had better preparation for managing the classrooms. I had two classrooms when our sections were merged into two. Therefore, we two teachers took the 1st period. First, we started the class with a language game based on yes/no question. Then we engaged them in learning strip story. The activity was continued until the period ended.

Finally, I would like to conclude this blog entry sharing effects on school children following the earthquake and some suggestions to overcome the effects. Negative effects on school children include loss of concentration power, short sleep, fear of different objects, frequent change of mood, headache, lack of interests in sharing anything and studies, anger and short temperedness and feeling of loneliness. Likewise, following the earthquake, children have developed sense of help and cooperation with each other, curiosity to know about the natural calamities, awareness of the environment, natural disaster and its effects in daily lives, and frankly sharing their experiences.

We can help and facilitate the quake affected children in the following ways based on what we practiced at our school. I personally believe that these activities can play significant roles in healing the pain of the students affected by the earthquake.

•         Proper psycho-social counseling and motivation classes should be provided at a regular basis.
•         Teacher talking time should be short and simple while dealing with the problems.
•         Teachers should play the role of a good listener. A good listener can be a good counselor.
•         More demonstrative and participative activities should be prepared.
•         Encouragement to every classroom activities should be provided to the students.
•         Share real life experiences and contextualize it so that students can better learn the behavioural aspects.
•         Temporary classrooms should be managed as far as possible.

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The author teaches in Shree Ratna Rajya H. S. School, situated at Baneshwor, Kathmandu.