Blind Leading The Blind
Jul 6th, 2008 by Don Ray
I met with Dario yesterday to talk about my assisting him with another English class exercise next Tuesday.
When I arrived at his office, I met a man, that Dario had invited for me to help him with a class assignment. He was attending an English class in some local university in this area. His class assignment to interview an English speaking North American and had contacted Dario for help. Since I had an appointment to meet with Dario, Dario had told him to come when I was there.
He was an interesting individual. I would guess that he was in his late forties or early fifties. I am a bad judge of age. He had traveled in Russia, Poland and several other countries working as a mechanic.
He had a tape recorder and a script of questions to use as an interview guide. We went through his questions. He seemed to understand most of what I said. After completing his questions, he and I and Dario just chatted for a while.
Now we get to the part I thought was interesting. He is an instructor in San Felix in a school that teaches mechanics, and electronics. It sounded like a trade school to me. Here is the part that got me. Since he spoke and read some English, the school told him that he also had to act as the English instructor for the school. Even Dario was amazed.
In no way of speaking was he qualified to teach others English. He was still taking English classes himself and his English was marginal at best. I personally thought that several in Dario’s class spoke better English than he did. What this shows is that there is a tremendous need for English teachers in Panama, even to the point that they have people teaching that are not qualified. This is really the blind leading the blind.
Hi Don:
Even though there is a deficit of English teachers in Panama, the salaries are so low that many are not attracted.
The Panama Education Minister wanted to include Mandarin as a third language to be taught in Panama public schools.
Mandarin, for heaven sake. What was he thinking? We can barely speak Spanish!
Regards,
Omar.-
Hi Omar. I can understand them wanting to offer Mandarin. However, if you are going to offer something you have to set criteria to measure if it is being taught right. If you can’t teach it correctly, then it shouldn’t be offered.
It is sort of like seeing a person that can count to 100 and saying, ” I think I will make you my mathematics teacher. Here is a book on calculus.
What shall I say? I could tell about similar observations and as well what I do personally to “fix it” on a very small scale for my own business interests. Unfortunately I run the risk of being labelled as interfering with internal affairs and pointing fingers, if I go into too much detail. Still education is the key to success in any form and it will probably never stop striking me how little education is valued and how little is invested into it. On a bad day one might wonder whether some benefit from keeping the people at a low educational level.
Don,
This is as good a place as any to let you know how appreciative I am that you’ve taken so much time and care to post cogent comments. I’ve been married for 20 years to a beautiful Panamanian girl and we look forward to having a residence in Chiriquí . I love Panama for Panama, if I have the opportunity to help others with my English I’ll take every advantage to continue to improve my Spanish.
Semper Fi,
Hank
Hi Stephen. Thanks for dropping in and taking the time to leave a comment. I hope that the little bit of participation I do with the students in panama helps in some way.
Hi Hank. Thanks for dropping in. I am sure you will enjoy Chiriqui as much as I do.