I must preface this by saying that the students at my school have been the best part of my PC experience. That being said, I am absolutely appalled by the amount and variety of cheating that takes place during semester exams. It’s an absolute relief that testing is over. I know this isn’t the first time I’ve mentioned cheating in the schools, and it most likely will not be the last, but each day I proctored exams I left completely dumbfounded and with a spinning head. There was always this horrible feeling in my gut, trying to wrap my head around why something so taboo in American schools is so routine here. Part of it’s cultural, but teachers and students both admit that it’s immoral. The vice principal asked me for the ‘solution to the cheating problem’ and all I could think of was “have some sort of punishment for cheating” or “have the teachers actually monitor the exams instead of playing on their laptops and standing outside their rooms chatting” or simply “try to motivate the students to take pride in doing their own work.”
Here’s a brief description of the testing set-up:
• Each room has a combination of students from different grades, who alternate seats in order to hinder cheating (it does absolutely nothing to deter them from doing so)
• Between 2-3 subjects tested each day
• Each test is 90 minutes, separated by a 15 minute break
• There are 30 multiple choice questions and 5 short answer/essay questions
• The students are handed an answer sheet similar to a scantron, and a separate question sheet
• One teacher for every 35 students
At first I thought the students cheated because the exams were too difficult, that maybe there were just too many subjects. I even felt sorry for them to an extent. But after several casual inquiries I found out it’s because a majority of the students simply just don’t study. So my new mission for this upcoming semester is figuring out how to motivate students to study on their own and ‘take pride in doing their own work’- not because a teacher will punish them if they don’t, but because they should get some type of gratification from accomplishing something based on their own hard work. A good life lesson.
I will now end this note with a list of the Top 20 ways (in no particular order) I caught students cheating in just the 3 days that I proctored exams, each of varying degrees of creativity and covertness. And none of which seemed punishable.
1. Directly asking the person next to him/her for the answer
2. Or the person behind him/her
3. Or in front of him/her
4. Or across the room
5. Getting the answer keys from a parent who is a teacher at the school
6. Writing answers on one’s shoe
7. Writing the answers on one’s veil/jilbab
8. Writing the answers on a compact mirror, then constantly checking one’s appearance in said mirror during the exam
9. Writing the answers on the desk the day before the exam
10. Writing all the answers on the back of the test and sliding it over so one’s neighbor can see the list
11. Writing answers on erasers, whiteout, pencil sharpeners, etc, then letting one’s friend borrow the aforementioned object(s)
12. Sliding one’s answer sheet over so one’s neighbor can read it more easily
13. Holding the test in front of one’s face (pretending to read it intently) in order to cover one’s mouth when sharing answers
14. Texting/using cell phones
15. Directly exchanging question sheets with the answers circled
16. Exchanging answer sheets so another student can write the essay answer
17. Using one’s hands to show the number of the question and letter of the answer
18. Having one’s workbook open on the desk
19. Having a friend who’s already finished the exam walk by outside and share answers through the back windows
20. Filling out an answer sheet before the test and switching it with the blank one given by the teacher
Monday, December 20, 2010
Thursday, December 9, 2010
islamic new year and jalan santai
This past Tuesday marked the transition into a new year for Muslims around the world. Happy 1432! In my village that meant no school...and a parade featuring marching bands from the Islamic schools in the area, a group of approximately 50 ten-year old boys who would be circumcised the following day, and members of the local transgendered community in full traditional Javanese drag. The latter completely caught me off guard, but Bu S has promised one of our Sunday morning bike rides to further explore this seemingly paradoxical scenario seeing as how I live in an tremendously conservative community.
Prior to the parade Bu S and I had been offered an invitation to one of her former students’ homes in order to learn how to make klempon, a traditional Javanese snack. Since I’m not really allowed to cook at my homestay, I jumped on the opportunity to get messy in the kitchen and learn about local cuisine.
Part of the Indonesian English curriculum is teaching ‘Procedural Text’. So in tribute to this semester coming to a close, I thought I’d honor those teachings with a photo documentary presented in Procedural Text format.
1. Press the grains of green rice then sift into a fine powder.
2. Preheat the wood fire stove in preparation to boil water. 
3. Knead the green rice, flour, sugar, green food coloring, salt, and coconut milk into dough-like consistency. 
4. Grind the Javanese sugar into a softer, more moldable mound. 
5. Take a clump of dough approximately the size of a teaspoon, roll into a ball, and flatten in the palm of your hand.
6. Take a pea-sized portion of Javanese sugar and place it in the center of your green dough. Fold the dough over, enclosing the sugar and sealing it in the center, again in ball form.
7. Once you have finished with all of the dough, place the balls in boiling water. Transfer into cooler water.
8. Remove balls and place them on a ‘cooling rack’.
9. Roll in shredded coconut.
I know it’s kind of vague, and this is probably the closest I’ll get to holiday baking, but I still enjoyed every minute of it…despite the occasional difficulties (i.e. uneven sized balls, sugar centers being exposed prematurely, green dye being splashed about). But most importantly, the end product was quite delicious, and I spent the morning with a wonderful family. A family who does this every day- without fail- in order to keep food on the table.
That house and family were more of how I pictured my PC experience. Being involved in traditional cooking, using a wood fire stove, sitting around laughing rather than silent in front of a TV, meeting the neighbors and feeling immediately like a part of the community. At least I am fortunate enough to experience days like this when I go on weekly adventures with Bu S.
Semester exams were postponed the following day so that the teachers could participate in Jalan Santai. That morning I met my fellow teachers at the school so we could carpool to Mojokerto. Low and behold, a brand new sports uniform was waiting for me! The importance of this may be difficult to communicate with mere words, but I’m undoubtedly still going to try. Sports uniforms in Indonesia are not only unflattering, long sleeved, and made of material that doesn’t breathe, but they always come in the most vibrant colors- neon green or orange, bright pink, etc. Most of the other volunteers already have their school’s sports uniform, and I’ve fancied one of these coveted treasures since the first day I started teaching. Looks like the new year brought me luck: mustard yellow top, black pants with bright yellow racing stripes, and everything trimmed in red. When we walked together, we kind of resembled the German flag.
This particular Jalan Santai is a once-a-year walking event where all of the Islamic schools in Mojokerto are represented…each in their own, unique, pulsating sports clothes. It was great! It was really nice to spend time with the teachers outside of school. Afterwards I went ‘out to lunch’ and shopping with some of the teachers…still in our mustard uniforms. It was nice to be reminded that I’m a normal person capable of having a regular social life. But today it’s back to school and the start of exams. Good luck to all of the students at MAN!
Friday, December 3, 2010
idul adha, mini hajj and thanksgiving
Some interesting things have happened over the past few weeks, so I’ll try my best to remember and summarize the most important as best as possible.
On the 17th most of Indonesia celebrated Idul Adha, the second largest Muslim holiday after Idul Fitri (the end of the fasting month of Ramadhan). This meant that instead of class, everyone gathered at the school (amazingly all of the teachers/students were not only on time, but early and ready by 6 am!) for a special prayer. I embarrassedly strolled in at 5:50 while everyone watched the unveiled teacher make my way back to the group of women who couldn’t participate in prayer because they were menstruating. I am teased on a daily basis for my promptness, so I was shocked by everyone else’s punctuality on this sole occasion. Since I don’t pray, I took this opportunity to observe the masses of students and faculty simultaneously going through the prayer motions- a wave of white. It was an amazing sight; beautiful in a very spiritual way. One of the male teachers led prayer, which to me sounds like singing in Arabic. It’s definitely different than the preachy tone of Catholic mass that I grew up with. All of the women were dressed in their prayer robes and were-as religion dictates- clustered behind the men who wore sarongs and their kopia or traditional Islamic hats. After observing prayer and meeting countless returned alumni, I joined the teachers in the office to eat (because food is central to Javanese culture, and there is always some excuse to devour large amounts of it) before heading to the back field for Part II: Cow Sacrifice.
I wasn’t sure I could stomach watching the same cows that I had walked by earlier that same morning be slaughtered in public. But seeing as how I’m trying to participate in every new cultural experience, I opted to walk over with another teacher and stand in the back. Luckily I missed the execution of the first cow, and only had to bare witness to the second killing. More than enough cow blood for me for a lifetime. I think I’ll be skipping next year’s viewing. Then members of OSIS (a type of student council) as well as some of the male faculty proceeded to skin it, chop off the head and put it in a bag, cut off the limbs, take out the intestines (have you ever seen a cow’s stomach? It’s huge! And the smell when they were cleaning it out made everyone gag for meters), and carry the smaller parts into an empty classroom to be portioned and packaged for the poor. Although I had offers to be more hands-on, I politely declined and watched from afar. That was enough involvement for me for my first ever sacrifice.
To rewind a few thousand years, a bit of background info about this most important day. Please be warned, this is based on my not-so-great translation skills, a little help from Wikipedia, and my less than stellar knowledge about biblical times, so please excuse my ignorance in trying to explain this. Here it goes, in very abbreviated form: Muslims celebrate Idul Adha as a commemoration of when God (Allah) asked Abraham to sacrifice his only son as a sign of devotion. With honest intentions, both Abraham and Ishmael prepared for the sacrifice. But before the deed could be carried out, God intervened, commanding that Ishmael be replaced by a ram. So, once a year Muslims commemorate this act of faithfulness by sacrificing cows, goats, sheep, camels, etc (only animals approved by Sharia law). There are various rules about how the animal should be sacrificed and certain criteria that the animal and the person sacrificing must meet. But I, unfortunately, will not be the one to enlighten you with all of those details.
There was no class again the following day. Instead the school was set up as a miniature Mecca, and all of the grade 10 students dressed as if they were going on their holy pilgrimage (one of the five pillars of Islam). The students pretended to take different group flights into Saudi Arabia, and went through all of the motions of an actual hajj or pilgrimage. They said the special prayers, walked the loop several times (I think 7), collected and threw stones at various pillars to symbolize chasing Satan away, and they had even built a mini version kaaba, the place where Muslims go to strengthen their faith. It was yet another surreal experience in my time here; the boys walking around in their Islamic togas and 300 students and teachers dressed from head to toe in white chanting in Arabic and showing their devotion to God.
Although wonderful to share in, all of these surreal cultural experiences unfortunately cut into class time, and semester exams are next week. I’m frustrated because I didn’t get to help write/edit the English exam, and when I stole a peak at it, it was riddled with grammatical mistakes and irrelevant, impossible texts. No wonder the students feel the need to constantly cheat on exams! Why wouldn’t you have the ‘native speaker’ look over the test before printing and distributing it to 17 other schools?!? I realize that the Indonesian teachers understand the curriculum better, but some of the mistakes that I saw were imperative to the students’ comprehension. With all of the frustrations, disappointments, confusing moments, and days I wanted to fly straight home to Colorado over the last few months, I’ve learned a lot and am looking forward to a new year and a new semester. I better understand the significance of having a 2-year commitment in Peace Corps; it takes a long time to figure everything out, and 8 months in, I’m still perplexed most days. I feel that 2011 will be infinitely better. I have new ideas, a better understanding of how things work both as a teacher and with the Indonesian system, and a more optimistic attitude about this whole experience.
One final note: it doesn’t feel like the holidays. I wish there was snow and 24-hour Christmas music. Mom’s baked treats and real pine trees. Menorahs and latkes. Midnight sledding and snowball fights. Hot chocolate and the chaos of buying and wrapping the perfect present for those you love. Here, it’s just another day, another month. We celebrated Thanksgiving on Saturday at the Consulate’s home, but it’s just not the same when you’re not with family. So, I wish everyone back home Happy Holidays and don’t forget to take time to appreciate the time you do have with family, as crazy as it may feel sometimes.
Lots of Love from Indo!
The Women Praying on Idul Adha
The Women behind the Men at Prayer
The Skinned Cow
Dividing the Meat for the Poor
Students Walking Around the Mini Kaaba
Collecting Stones to Throw at the Pillars
English Club Hand Turkeys for Thanksgiving
On the 17th most of Indonesia celebrated Idul Adha, the second largest Muslim holiday after Idul Fitri (the end of the fasting month of Ramadhan). This meant that instead of class, everyone gathered at the school (amazingly all of the teachers/students were not only on time, but early and ready by 6 am!) for a special prayer. I embarrassedly strolled in at 5:50 while everyone watched the unveiled teacher make my way back to the group of women who couldn’t participate in prayer because they were menstruating. I am teased on a daily basis for my promptness, so I was shocked by everyone else’s punctuality on this sole occasion. Since I don’t pray, I took this opportunity to observe the masses of students and faculty simultaneously going through the prayer motions- a wave of white. It was an amazing sight; beautiful in a very spiritual way. One of the male teachers led prayer, which to me sounds like singing in Arabic. It’s definitely different than the preachy tone of Catholic mass that I grew up with. All of the women were dressed in their prayer robes and were-as religion dictates- clustered behind the men who wore sarongs and their kopia or traditional Islamic hats. After observing prayer and meeting countless returned alumni, I joined the teachers in the office to eat (because food is central to Javanese culture, and there is always some excuse to devour large amounts of it) before heading to the back field for Part II: Cow Sacrifice.
I wasn’t sure I could stomach watching the same cows that I had walked by earlier that same morning be slaughtered in public. But seeing as how I’m trying to participate in every new cultural experience, I opted to walk over with another teacher and stand in the back. Luckily I missed the execution of the first cow, and only had to bare witness to the second killing. More than enough cow blood for me for a lifetime. I think I’ll be skipping next year’s viewing. Then members of OSIS (a type of student council) as well as some of the male faculty proceeded to skin it, chop off the head and put it in a bag, cut off the limbs, take out the intestines (have you ever seen a cow’s stomach? It’s huge! And the smell when they were cleaning it out made everyone gag for meters), and carry the smaller parts into an empty classroom to be portioned and packaged for the poor. Although I had offers to be more hands-on, I politely declined and watched from afar. That was enough involvement for me for my first ever sacrifice.
To rewind a few thousand years, a bit of background info about this most important day. Please be warned, this is based on my not-so-great translation skills, a little help from Wikipedia, and my less than stellar knowledge about biblical times, so please excuse my ignorance in trying to explain this. Here it goes, in very abbreviated form: Muslims celebrate Idul Adha as a commemoration of when God (Allah) asked Abraham to sacrifice his only son as a sign of devotion. With honest intentions, both Abraham and Ishmael prepared for the sacrifice. But before the deed could be carried out, God intervened, commanding that Ishmael be replaced by a ram. So, once a year Muslims commemorate this act of faithfulness by sacrificing cows, goats, sheep, camels, etc (only animals approved by Sharia law). There are various rules about how the animal should be sacrificed and certain criteria that the animal and the person sacrificing must meet. But I, unfortunately, will not be the one to enlighten you with all of those details.
There was no class again the following day. Instead the school was set up as a miniature Mecca, and all of the grade 10 students dressed as if they were going on their holy pilgrimage (one of the five pillars of Islam). The students pretended to take different group flights into Saudi Arabia, and went through all of the motions of an actual hajj or pilgrimage. They said the special prayers, walked the loop several times (I think 7), collected and threw stones at various pillars to symbolize chasing Satan away, and they had even built a mini version kaaba, the place where Muslims go to strengthen their faith. It was yet another surreal experience in my time here; the boys walking around in their Islamic togas and 300 students and teachers dressed from head to toe in white chanting in Arabic and showing their devotion to God.
Although wonderful to share in, all of these surreal cultural experiences unfortunately cut into class time, and semester exams are next week. I’m frustrated because I didn’t get to help write/edit the English exam, and when I stole a peak at it, it was riddled with grammatical mistakes and irrelevant, impossible texts. No wonder the students feel the need to constantly cheat on exams! Why wouldn’t you have the ‘native speaker’ look over the test before printing and distributing it to 17 other schools?!? I realize that the Indonesian teachers understand the curriculum better, but some of the mistakes that I saw were imperative to the students’ comprehension. With all of the frustrations, disappointments, confusing moments, and days I wanted to fly straight home to Colorado over the last few months, I’ve learned a lot and am looking forward to a new year and a new semester. I better understand the significance of having a 2-year commitment in Peace Corps; it takes a long time to figure everything out, and 8 months in, I’m still perplexed most days. I feel that 2011 will be infinitely better. I have new ideas, a better understanding of how things work both as a teacher and with the Indonesian system, and a more optimistic attitude about this whole experience.
One final note: it doesn’t feel like the holidays. I wish there was snow and 24-hour Christmas music. Mom’s baked treats and real pine trees. Menorahs and latkes. Midnight sledding and snowball fights. Hot chocolate and the chaos of buying and wrapping the perfect present for those you love. Here, it’s just another day, another month. We celebrated Thanksgiving on Saturday at the Consulate’s home, but it’s just not the same when you’re not with family. So, I wish everyone back home Happy Holidays and don’t forget to take time to appreciate the time you do have with family, as crazy as it may feel sometimes.
Lots of Love from Indo!
The Women Praying on Idul Adha
The Women behind the Men at Prayer
The Skinned Cow
Dividing the Meat for the Poor
Students Walking Around the Mini Kaaba
Collecting Stones to Throw at the Pillars
English Club Hand Turkeys for Thanksgiving
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