Laharepipal

Laharepipal School

Most of the children at the school , some are still away for the festival period.

I have spent the last two days (well two half days, as due to only half attendance the school has been closing early), teaching at Laharepipal school. It is a great school, the children are some of the happiest I’ve ever seen. It was mostly destroyed three years ago due to a water disaster but has been in the progress of being rebuilt by Mahendra and MCWFN ever since. The new building work involves building a Library/afternoon childcare room (which should be finished in a month), installing draining to stop flooding and mould growth, and the construction of a new toilet block for the children. Mahendra said that this is his flagship school and along with Pippaldanda will become centres of excellence. The Government tried to take control of the school recently but the case was referred to courts and the Government lost the battle.  Consequently, the school is staffed by volunteers from Tansen, only one of which has been fortunate to receive education training.  It is hoped that in the next year funds can be raised to train three more teachers.
The level of English here is good (I think based on my experience so far), partially I feel due to the enthusiasm of the head teacher who is definitely an aficionado for an English nursery rhyme/ children’s song. I could only remember three that the children didn’t know. After getting the twinning programme sorted there has only been time for one lesson, in which we learnt English names for expressions and acted them out. It worked very well on the whole I think due to the lack of English instruction needed, most information was conveyed thorough drama.
There was also a small welcoming ceremony for me, where the children sang some songs they knew, one of

A small dancing show that was laid on.

which was adapted to include my name which was quite funny. There was only a small dancing show by some of the children and the usual garlands and flowers, but thankfully for my clothes’ sake no tikka.
The structure of the school is not in bad nick, but the resources are extremely lacking, we had to send out for paper just to write the letters and I lost my entire collection of pens and pencils which were given to the children. The blackboards here are extremely bad; it was like writing on wood that had been painted with normal matt paint. I am definitely going to have to invest into some blackboard paint before my next visit, which I am very much looking forward too.

Me teaching some song, I can't remember what though.