Teaching the Invisibles

Most of my week is spent working with six to sixteen years old. Our classes are by all means a substitute of public school, to provide invisible children with the same basic education first to five graders get. The focus is on teaching Spanish, as to provide them with the very basic tool to interact with the surrounding society. True, half of Ceuta speaks Arab; however institutional, public and working language is Spanish. Without it, a person is seriously handicapped. Classes are divided into two periods, the first always being Spanish, and the second a mixture of all other relevant subjects that will aid the kid's personal growth.

Second period is normally math - unless a special activity comes up and we are able to dedicate some time to the arts. To a person that has abandoned math in high school, having to muster up my limited knowledge and teach in another language was traumatic. When confronted with a complex multiplication during my first period, my heart skipped a beat. The pressure. The kid stared at me asking if what he did was correct, and my head was filled with panic fog. I said yes without even checking; luckily the fog thinned away before the second asked me the same question. Moral: I still can do some math.

Wednesday I give English classes. I have taught English before to non-European kids; yet teaching to beginners having to explain grammar and words in a language that I am barely comfortable with is quite the challenge. But the excitement and joy in these kids' eyes the day the headmaster announced that they'd begin learning English was priceless, and still makes up for all the efforts and very obvious gaffes I make trying to explain English to Arab-natives using Spanish as mediator language.

Funny enough, I also teach them Spanish, a language that I have begun learning only a month and a half ago. To my advantage, Spanish and Italian are very similar; to so I've never really had issues in being a Spanish teacher - despite my obvious lack of knowledge. In a month, I was able to learn enough to actually improve Arab-natives Spanish skills; but even if I were native in any other European language, I would still have an incredible advantage over my pupils: I can read and write in the same alphabet that Spaniards use. We Europeans are never fully aware of the facilitations given by a common alphabet until we meet with people that were either brought up reading and writing another set of symbols or, worst, were never taught at all. For this very single reason, most of my classes are focused on alphabetizing people: repeating vowels and syllables over and over until the connection between symbol and sound is automatic.

It gets frustrating. I have to remind myself daily that when I was six years old I hated my mom for forcing me to sit down and repeat over and over distinct sounds that eventually would put my oral language onto paper. I remember distinctly crying, not wanting to read any of the children's book my parents would put in front of me out of sheer frustration of not being able to link sounds to symbols. Yet here I am, native in two languages, fluent in two more, and somewhat still able to read another alphabet different from my native one. It took my mother's utmost patience to get me here; by reminding myself these particular episodes, I am now able to collect all my patience when aiding children and adult women to achieve the same basic goal I mastered nearly twenty years ago. So I spend my days forcing children to read simple sentences hoping that one day they will come to the same light-bulb moment: that annoying teacher, who forced me to sit down and read, is the reason why written words are a friend now.

It is experiences like this that really make me understand the sheer luck of my birth. It is experiences like this that make me re-evaluate the opportunities I had and the dedication of my parents. It is experiences like this that fire me up to pursue the goal of a fairer society, so that written words are enemies to no one. It is a very simple and innocent goal; it is frustrating and painful to see discrimination and prejudice work against it. But as my mother patiently sat down with me to create an armistice between me and books, I will continue to fight so that we all realise what an incredible privilege it is to be able to read, and how everyone should enjoy it.

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