A Ghanaian Exchange

As a teacher, I always strive to expand my students’ thinking about the world we live in. While working at a residential school for high school students with severe social, emotional, and behavioral disabilities, I discovered a website called ePals where teachers can create profiles and connect with other teachers from all over the globe. You can read other teachers’ profiles, which include a description of the school they work in, the age of their students, how long they’ve been teaching, and what languages they speak.

A teacher from Bolgatanga, Ghana expressed an interest in connecting his classroom with mine. He is a technology teacher who seeks to show his students the positive role technology can play. My goal was to excite my students about the opportunity to practice their social skills with new people outside of our small school, and develop an understanding of a new culture. I messaged him through ePals and eventually we exchanged Skype information. The teacher and I video chatted and discussed the plan for how we were going to bridge the gap between our two classrooms and countries. We shared some information about each other and I spoke to my students about the possibility of this connection happening.

To prepare my students, I showed them where Ghana was on the map and gave them a little context regarding the environment there.  So often we get a singular view of Africa and I thought this would be a great opportunity to break down those stereotypes and meet real people from a country in Africa. As the Special Education Teacher, I was responsible for teaching every subject to this group of seven students. I used it as an opportunity for interdisciplinary work. For reading and writing class, we read a short story by a Ghanaian author. In history class, we read current events articles about Ghana and for science, we read a blog post from a traveler who went there and visited the region in which Bolgatanga is located (Upper East). The blog writer described a great deal about the warm climate and the technological resources available in Bolgatanga. In math, we imagined ourselves preparing for a trip to Ghana and considered all the costs that would go into making such a trip using real airfare prices and tour costs. We had to take the exchange rate into account as well: US $1 = 5.43 Ghanaian Cedis.

After a little over a month of preparing, we were finally able to set up our first Skype call. My students huddled around the computer and eagerly introduced themselves to the students from Ghana. They sat with their hands folded quietly awaiting for the Ghanaian students to pick up the call. We were fortunate that there is only a four hour time difference and the students there are attending a public residential school, which is common for secondary students who have passed the exam and wish to go on with their education. In fact, Ghana prides itself on having a strong education system compared to some of the surrounding countries in Western Africa.

Finally, the Bolgatanga students answered the call. They asked each other questions about their schools and the weather and what kinds of sports they play. There were moments of laughter and enthusiasm that really transformed the atmosphere in the classroom for those 40 minutes while we were talking. In the second half of the call, the students connected over music and sang songs to each other. After each song, the other group of students applauded and cheered for them! Given that the majority of my students at that school were students of color, it was special for them to meet Africans who looked like them and took an interest in them. They realized that they have quite a bit in common with each other - particularly when it comes to their musical interests. They were not being judged for being in a special school or for their work ethic, but instead, were being celebrated for their social abilities.

When meeting separately with their teacher later on over Skype, we discussed topics to cover for our next meeting and decided on music – given the strong interest the students demonstrated. Both the teacher from Ghana and I asked our respective students what their favorite songs and artists were and shared that with each other. We listened through the songs and made comments about what we thought of them. We planned to have a second meeting and had scheduled a time to do so, but unfortunately, government circumstances in Ghana prevented it. I learned much later from the teacher that students had to be sent home for a few months because of the lack of food. Given that it was a public school, the government was responsible for providing not just a quality education, but also nutritional value, and it turns out they were in debt. The leader had gotten behind on payments for the food leaving the school with no other choice. It was hard for me as an American educator to fathom such a circumstance in which students would be deprived of an education because the government couldn’t afford to feed them. I wondered if there was a way to continue the learning from home for these students. This was definitely a teachable moment for me and for my students to truly value the education we have. I imagine the students there were grateful when they were able to return to the school again.