Today we went to go observe a "Networking" class and I got to see an Electrical Engineering class who were using arduinos. They just started working with Arduinos and were doing the basic "blinking light" lab that I do with my students too. It was so interesting to see the students doing the same thing I did with my students in the same language. The commands "delay" or "digitalWrite" are still in English. It was also nice to be able to talk with students in the class and be helpful with the content too. There was one student who had very strong English that I got a chance to talk with a bit.
I also took it upon myself to talk to the 3-4 girls in each of these computer classes and asked them why they decided they wanted to work with computers. Many of them had family members, like brothers, who worked with computers. One girl said she read a book about a girl who worked with computers and was interested in computers for that reason.
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| These were two of the girls I was talking with about their interest in computer science. I also passed out some Code stickers too which is why I am wearing one - they weren't really sure what they were for so I demo-ed the sticker. |
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| Familiar picture around the world... trouble shooting arduinos. |
By far, the most interactive learning was the Electrical Engineering class, which makes sense because it was small - only 15 kids, which I would LOVE in the US. Managing 36 with arduinos is... taxing.
In the other classes, the teaching was pretty traditional. In networking, students copied down 3 paragraphs of text from the projector defining Input, Output and a few other vocabulary terms. It made me think about the work we do to put vocabulary in student friendly language. Then the teacher passed out copies from the textbook with some multiple choice questions on that students copied down. Apparently they have NO copy budget, so any copies the teacher pays for themselves and typically students don't keep the copies - it is just a temporary way to distribute things to students.
After that, we went to the American Corner at the local university. The story behind the American Corner was interesting. Apparently a professor was interested in getting more technology in the school and then learned that an American Corner would provide the technology.
Inside the room, there were some large tables, and about 10 computers. They also had a 3D printer which apparently was given to them without asking. Also, on the shelves they had a bunch of English books and movies. When we got there, Robie was going through the new magazines they had to sensor them, which I was immediately interested in. There were two Rolling Stone magazines pulled to the side that were in the "no" category for some pretty revealing images. We "helped" by going through some magazines too - I would ask them about some images, but none of mine went to the "no" category. They said there was no real rule for it, just that if there were large images that were too revealing, they got put aside. Also, in the "movies" section, I went to find a good RomCom for Yulia and really couldnt find many RomComs at all! I am wondering if the embassy sensors the films they send to the American Corners a bit too... there are just too many good RomComs for this place to have NONE. The closest one I could find was La La Land. That's suspicious.
Then, Robie said, "let's play a board game!" I about lost it. Earlier this summer, my new coworker from New Orleans laughed that she had never heard so many people talk about board games until she visited Minnesota. And now, we were hearing about board games in Indonesia's "American Corner". I asked Robie about board games and he said it is NOT something they do in Indonesia, this is a US thing (or, maybe just a midwest thing, Jem didn't play board games in California either).
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| We played 10 Days in USA which was actually really fun. |
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| Screening magazines. |
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| Here's part of the gang. |
I wish I would have taken a picture of their "event calendar". They had things like "American of the Day" featuring AOC, Ilhan Omar, Neil deGrasse Tyson, and Spike Lee. They also had "tour the USA" days featuring "tourist attractions" in the US. I use quotes because they had "North Dakota" as a tourist attraction and I don't know how accurate it is to say ND is a place people go to "sight see". They also had a "What is is it like to be a person with a disability?" day where they invited people with disabilities into the space to talk about it and then practiced navigating the city with that disability. They also had movie nights with american movies and game nights with board games.
From there we headed to the Great Mosque in town. It was only built in 2014 so it was not that old but it was still quite beautiful.
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| This is the best view of it from our hotel. |
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| This was just a view from the mosque to another building on the property - still beautiful! |
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| Getting artistic with some pics. There were so many pretty angles here. |
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| This is the dome inside. In each of the triangle spaces on the wall you can see some artful Arabic lettering which includes the 99 names for "Allah" in Arabic. |
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| We got inside just in time to see the space before evening prayers. While Ronol, Ayu, and Yulia went inside to pray, we took a spin outside... still beautiful! |
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