The day we first went on Safari was our first day off in South Africa; it was MUCH needed. For my part, I was exhausted, a common phenomenon when spending time in another culture or amongst speakers of another language. When our brain is forced to work harder to comprehend our surroundings (even little things), we fatigue faster. This is something I remind my international students of, many of whom find themselves sleeping more and tiring faster during their first few months in the U.S. In light of this course, this phenomenon is particularly fascinating because it speaks to some of the very things that Hammond (2015) addresses in Culturally Responsive Teaching and the Brain. What I experienced and what Hammond addresses in her book speak to why our job as educators must be to create an environment in which students see connections to what they already understand about the world and what we aim to show them.
But I have digressed. Back to the safari itself. I suppose that what I want to express is the fact that while I was not really sure what to expect from a safari--it honestly wasn’t high up on my bucket list--it so far exceeded my expectations as to almost dumbfound me. We saw lions, a leopard, giffare, rhinos, springbok, zebra, wildebeest, elephants, warthogs, and other incredible creatures who simply aren’t popping into my head at the moment of this writing. We watched the pink-orange fingers of the sun curl around us. We listened to wild birds. And we laughed, a lot. I think back on it now and find it somewhat surreal. At times, driving through the South African landscape, I felt as if I had been plucked up and dropped back off in one of Alan Paton’s landscape scenes from Cry, the Beloved Country. It was quite nearly perfect. We'll find that water buffalo on 2.0! Hammond, Z. (2015). Culturally responsive teaching and the brain: Promoting authentic engagement and rigor among culturally and linguistically diverse students. Corwin. Paton, A. (1948). Cry, the beloved country. New York, NY: Scribner.
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AuthorI'm Kelly. I teach English as a Second Language, business English, and writing. I eat poems for dinner. Archives
January 2019
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