Brazil – Day 4

So to Day 4.  Day 4 was much more touristy in flavour, but finished on a really motivational note.  We got to see some beautiful mountain views, experienced pain at Sao Paulo market and saw the Portugese language museum.  We finished the day with dinner preceded by a really amazing visit to an organisation called Eletrocooperativa … you want to know what I saw in the morning don’t you?  Well, when we woke up (roused by the gentle neighing of the horses next door), we went outside, and saw …

   

Cool huh?  As I've mentioned before, we were so lucky!! We then had a lovely breakfast at Paulo’s house, followed by a coach ride back to Sao Paulo.  Paulo also gave us T-Shirts for our FC Schwanke team photo (also below).  I haven’t told you what that’s all about yet.  We were messing around giving ourselves Brazilian footballer’s names.  I am Smitinho for example.  We then set about sorting an entire Brazilian football team including all the people on the quest in various guises.  At breakfast Tooteldinho was stripped of the captaincy and I gratefully accepted the responsibility.  Where did we get the name from I hear you cry??  It was the name of a company on a crane in the Embraer plant.  Anyway, we took the photograph in matching T-shirts.  As you can see, we were flanked by the 2 young pianists from the night before.

 

On the way home we were treated to something else special.  As well as a much needed toilet stop in Campos do Jordão (something I really needed as a result of an unwelcome clogging up brought about by lovely Brazilian cuisine – I needed fibre), we were driving down the mountain and our debrief was interrupted by this …

  

Stunning … On arrival back at the hotel we rechecked in, I discovered that I’d forgotten to repack my underwear and was the cause of much hilarity in efforts to get it back.  I am more grateful to Ella than she might realise for her help in that area.  My underwear was eventually returned I’m pleased to say.  Anyway, after that unnecessary episode, we went to Sao Paulo market and ate lunch.  In midst of which we were curious as to the little chilli things on the table.  See if you can see what’s happening here …

 

After lunch and a visit to the Portugese language museum, we visited an organisation called Eletrocooperativa.  This is an organisation that is aimed at encouraging people in using technology to give themselves more opportunity.  This can be through sound, video etc.  An amazing place where we got to think in a variety of ways and express ourselves.  The organisation describes itself as an education social network for sustainable development, cultural production and income distribution.  It provides an online platform where videos, songs and radio shows can be published.  This can encourage people to buy and pay for these songs and generate a ‘self-sustainability’ using the Internet as a platform.  Here are a couple of videos …

We got to share our thoughts about past, present and future of education (again, in a variety of ways) before a debrief session where we all shared thoughts via the microphone, to a background of Bob Marley and repetition of the words “We are the future” thanks to Darren and Reinaldo Pamplona (from Eletrocooperativa).  A somewhat surreal, but amazing experience.  So, what did I get out of it?  Mainly – I was intrigued by the need for variety and giving people a voice.  I need to make sure that’s apparent in all my lessons.  Students should be able to use all the technology available and use it to express themselves.  It was a seriously moving experience, and people were able to express a number of different feelings.  it’s not the sort of thing I’m normally that comfortable with, but I relaxed a bit and said what I thought.  This was largely about the need to get that heart and enthusiasm back in teaching (maybe just for me personally, but it’s certainly something I was starting to get a handle on in my adventures)!

 

We went for dinner after that, and I then discovered that replacing the word meerkat with other words (as in comparetheBATHROOM.com) was more funny that it should be!!

Most important thing from Day 4 – Continued reminders about the need for heart, and also the need for relevance and use of technology – to allow students to express themselves.  Being publicly vulnerable and open was also an interesting feeling – not one that I’m used to!!

Brazil – Day 3

I’ve only got five more days to write about, so will have to get a move on!! I’m back in the UK now, so obviously much of what I write now will be reflective!! (Gene would be so proud). Day 3 gave me the most fantastic opportunities to experience a part of Brazilian culture (the High Life to be exact), and also the chance to look at planes being made. I got a chance to see how planes were made, and also looked at a school in a town called Campos do Jordão.

After another breakfast of cake, we made a fairly long trip to the headquarters of Embraer, a company that makes aeroplanes, and what aeroplanes … after a brief presentation during which we all decided we wanted an executive jet we had a moment of realisation that they were probably out of our price range (but look at what they look like)! After that moment of realisation, we learnt about how the company was sponsoring and running a school called the Colegio Eng Juavez Wanderley. This is a school with three guiding principles – academic excellence, cultural, social and environmental education and professional guidance. The school selects students from an entrance exam and then sponsors them through their school life. Their aim seems to me to be raising the aspirations of people from poorer communities. They provide transport, food and uniforms for the students, as well as books. Students are only allowed to apply if they have attended public schools for the previous 4 years.

As people will know, I’m a little sceptical of selection by any means, but my perspective has shifted slightly – in a country where an opportunity to attend a good school is so limited, should we stand in the way of offering one to the few?? I guess while I’d like every student to have the Juavez Wanderley experience, I should be pleased that those that have it embrace it and make what seems to be outstanding progress. Thanks to swine flu (it’s everywhere), we weren’t able to visit the school, and that was a shame.

However, this did mean that we could visit the aeroplane factory. We were like kids in a sweet shop!! The size and appearance of planes in their ‘mint’ form was just amazing! Unfortunately we weren’t allowed to take any pictures, (so that we didn’t sell any secrets to MI5 I suppose), but it was tremendous fun. The trip to Embraer also yielded something else – something very exciting that I’m quite proud of, and of which you will hear more later in the diaries (Embraer, Brazil is the birthplace of FC Schwanke) …

Here are some views we got on the way up to Campos do Jordão … (which is apparently a city on a par with Aspen in terms of tourism). The city is very high up in the mountains, and Paulo (as we shall see) has a home even higher up!

After another mammoth lunch (Brazilians know how to eat), we met Paulo Bilyk, who is one of the founders of a company called Rio Bravo Investments. He also has involvement in several more altrustic projects, one of which is Ame Campos, community project which works on social and cultural advancement in the city. When I was looking at links, I notice that they have written a report on our visit to the school. I wish I could understand it – I have decided to learn Portugese! Anyway, we visited the school and had the opportunity to ask questions of Brazilian teachers. The school is called Escola Estadual Theodoro Corrêa Cintra but is known more simply (and preferably for those of that don’t speak Portugese) TCC. The school is supported by Ame Campos as well as an organisation called Parceiros da Educacao (Partners with Education). This partnership has enabled the school to start addressing some of their performance issues as well as consolidating and improving their infrastructure. We were shown some pictures of the improvements that they had made and I was particularly struck by a slide that highlighted the progress that was being made, and also a target board (read more later)! The scheme aims to involve 400 schools by 2015.

Here are some pictures of the school environment, including the computer room and library. This includes a picture of me demonstrating my school’s virtual learning environment to a gentleman called Rodrigo (who runs the computer room) and two students. Notice how Darren is also looking in to steal information for his school in Grimsby ;). We were all really struck by how bare the school was, there’s nothing on the walls. Can you imagine that in the UK? I was also made aware of just how much we take for granted. At my school, we have nearly 400 computers. At this school they have a room of about 20, that students can use when they wish. They don’t teach discrete ICT, and only around 150 students made access to the room (out of 2500). I think we probably don’t appreciate how much we’ve got and maybe it’s time for us to start focussing on the student experience rather than measuring and ticking everything! Don’t get me wrong, I know we need to measure and have targets, but I wonder whether or not or focus has shifted away from the heart of teaching to the cold matter of statistics and league tables. As people will know, I’m big on targets and I’d never lose them, I’d just like to see more heart around school’s motivation.

Having just moaned about targets, one thing I am convinced of is the need for Brazil to use targets in its public schools. As they form a more coherent education system, they MUST measure to raise those standards. This is a picture of Paulo translating the ‘target’ board at TCC – they measure things like ICT access etc. Also, lessons taught by teachers who are supposed to teach the class. Staff absenteeism is a big issue in Brazil. We moan when we have to cover a lesson – in Brazil loads of lessons don’t have teachers as they simply don’t turn up!

I should mention, that this day was my opportunity to be ‘co-leader.’ Leaders’ Quest have a thing where participants have to help lead a visit. I had to co-lead the visit to TCC and then to Paulo’s house. I quite liked being translated in Portugese for the teachers at the school!

Then, after we’d finished at the school, we went up to Paulo Bilyk’s house – and up is the word! The house was at the end of a twisty, turny mountain path. It was amazing. We really enjoyed the hospitality, the surroundings, the generosity. We were treated to a traditional Brazilian feast, together with local beer. Here’s something interesting … I don’t really like beer, but the beer in Brazil tasted much lighter, and I found myself getting more of a taste for it! Maybe there’s hope for me yet … The house was amazing too, aesthetically pleasing and really sensitively designed. After the dinner, we had a piano recital from two young men - Lucas Thomazinho and Flávio Lago. It was really beautiful, and I spent so much of the night reflecting on just how lucky I was to be there!!

Paulo accepting a gift from Leader’s Quest

After dinner we went to bed – no small feat. We were staying in the stable area away from the house (in fact, it was a bus ride away!!). There was a little confusion, but we ended up staying in a room at one end of the stable. There was a picture on the wall that kept us chuckling for hours, and I mean hours … See if you can tell what it is …

In the morning, we woke up and saw … (I’ll tell you on Day 4)

Most important thing from Day 3 – Appreciating Brazilian hospitality and having the chance to think about how well resourced and lucky we are in the UK education system. Also, the realisation that we need heart as well as numbers in the UK!

Brazil – Day 2

As if day 1 wasn’t enough fun, Day 2 was even better!  The conversations we had were genuinely inspiring.  I’m so lucky to be having this experience!    It’s really giving me a feeling of how the other half live – being treated like royalty, but also being able to learn from and observe something I’d never otherwise observe.  On Day 2 we started off by visiting the Fabricas da Cultura, followed by a real life ‘business lunch’ with an entrepreneur and then having another business chat with Francisco Itzaina.  We finished off with a reception at the British Council residence in Sao Paulo.  We got to meet lots of Prime Ministers’ Fellows – 30 18 year olds spending 6 weeks in Brazil and learning about the culture.

First though, a quick mention of the most important discovery I’ve made in Brazil!!  They eat cake for breakfast!!  This was where my intentions to be sensible food wise have failed 100%!!  They’re really small cakes too, so they appear to be quite harmless, but I suspect that my waistline will record a different story on my return to the UK!

After we’d had breakfast, we made our way to the home of the Fabricas da Cultura.  This is a social action project that is designed to give kids the opportunity to experience something different and to give them skills that they need to get themselves out of the difficult areas in which they may find themselves.  They have nine centres across the city of Sao Paulo, and they are having brand new buildings built to make sure this work can take place.  The kids take part in the centres for one year initially, and are given a theme.  Last year the theme was based around Petrushka by Stravinsky and the story attached.  This year they are working with the Brazilian Composer Villa-Lobos (incidentally, I seem to remember doing a piece by him for my grade 5 exam)?  The centres then use the four disciplines – drama, art, music and theatre to help students prepare a show for their neighbourhood.  I was disappointed we only got to see a snippet of one of these shows.  It looked amazing – the quality can only be described as 100% professional.  What struck some of us was the concept they had about raising a child’s self awareness – they talked about helping them understand the areas of “me”, “you and me”, “how I relate to you” etc.  This was all about emotional intelligence.  This seems to me something that we don’t really take seriously in the UK – having the odd lesson on it, is simply not enough (writing this four days late means that you will see more about how I arrived at this opinion later)!!

What I also liked, was the fact that the students were not abandoned at the end of the year!  They were given opportunities to continue developing their chosen discipline, and they can also (should they wish) carry on into year 3 and 4 where they have opportunities to work with formal partners to use their skills in the marketplace.

After this I had one of those experiences that kind of blows you away!  We were taken to a restaurant called Kaa – it had a pool and trees (see below) … Posh isn’t the word.  We were to have a business lunch with a gentleman called Daniel Heise – Daniel is the founder of a group called Grupo Direct – a company that supports small start ups and entrepreneurs.  The Brazilian marketplace is a somewhere where it’s difficult to get started … they are expected to pay over 100% tax for each employee.  This means ambitious people have overheads that are ridiculous to start with.  He also talked about something called Hacking Education – something set up by a VC called Fred Wilson.  This is about using technology to impact schools (quite close to my heart)!!  This splits the concept up into a few areas:

1. Produce the content
2. Make the content available to students
3. Get it accredited

We them talked about public/private partnerships.  What’s interesting is that in Brazil, these are absolutely necessary.  The education system in Brazil is not good!  They need money if they are to move forward.  There is not enough government money to make the improvements that they need.  Not sure how this relates the UK yet, but I’m being challenged, and that has to be a good thing!!

Daniel also told us about his blog - Aprendendo Empreendendo – this means Learning how to be an entrepreneur.  That’s his passion (you won’t be able to understand it though, unless you know Portugese)!  He’s trying to get people to understand and learn how to be an entrepreneur.  Then, he’s helping them get started!  Awesome …

He also said something that hit me - “try twelve ideas – only two will work” … Don’t be afraid to take risks!

Then we had a brief meeting with Francisco Itzaina – a man with a CBE (apparently for heading up the British trade group in Sao Paulo).  A lovely, genial man with a genuine smile and passion for Brazil and the UK.  He talked to us about the economic position of Brazil and opened our eyes to the wealth of opportunity that the country has.  He works for Rolls Royce in Brazil.  We also enjoyed some chat in the arena of politics (something I’m quite enthusiastic for)!  He also talked about seeing Ed Miliband the day before – just think, Ed Miliband one day, Graeme Smith the next – what heady circles!! ;)

When we got back we used a couple of hours of free time to mooch around the shops – one or two pictures that amused me!

A Birmingham City top for £50 … ($R140)

Tee-hee - (I shouldn’t find this kind of thing funny)!

After we got back and freshened up, we went for a reception at the British Council residence in Sao Paulo – here’s one or two pics from the evening.  Something lavish and really quite fun!  We met some of the Prime Ministers fellows – 30 students who have just finished A Levels, and now experiencing 6 weeks in another culture.  What an opportunity!  Met the most enthusiastic boy in the world … and he was from Market Harborough!  Anything I said was greeted by “yeah, brilliant, yeah” – you could see he was loving every minute … so am I!

Most important thing from Day 2 – The small snippet from the Fabrica da Cultura DVD.  Seeing the students from poorer backgrounds  produce some work so professional and to know that it’s helped give them a better chance was an amazing feeling!  The message that came through from Daniel Heise was one of go for it – don’t be afraid to try new things!

Brazil – Day 1

How excited am I??  I’m about halfway through the first day of the Global Teacher’s Quest in Brazil – I’ll finish blogging this later, so by the end I will have finished blogging the first day. 

This morning, got up early – had breakfast (which included cakes).  Anyone that knows me will appreciate that I really like cakes … I’m something of a cake addict.  Brazilians seem to eat a lot of little cakes at almost every meal – this is something I approve of!

We then had a tour of Sao Paulo – looking at some parts of the city and learning a little of the way the city developed.  The city grew from some 50,000 inhabitants to over 10,000,000 in around 100 years.  This is something to do with the AC/BC effect apparently (before and after coffee)!!  The tour was really interesting, and we got to have a coffee in a pleasant café attached to a museum – I say coffee, I still haven’t got up the courage to drink one – I will, by the end of the week!

The next part of the day was a quick minibus ride to another hotel for lunch and conversations about the quest and thinking of ways that we can interact and put ourselves in the shoes of other people.  A really valuable time where we got to gel as a group.  It may just be me, but I reckon we were really open to this as teachers particularly.  I don’t know.  Learnt some interesting ideas and introduced to the concept of celebration assemblies – I like this – Something I’d like to see us try at school.  We also did some exercises in sharing with one another – people commented on how they’d like to try something similar in lessons, and it occurs to me that we use something similar in our school – the Kagan Co-operative Learning Strategies.  I must make sure I pass on some details to other people.

In the evening, we got to dress up (!) and had a meal accompanied with a speech from Paulo Renato Souza who is currently the Minister of Education in the State of Sao Paulo and was formerly the Minister for Education for the whole of Brazil!!!  Particularly challenged by the fact that he is very much on the other side of the political spectrum to me, yet I liked some of the things that he was saying about his approach to education.  I’ve never been great at listening to those from the ‘other side’ with an open mind, so it was a good experience to try and do that.  Brazil clearly needs some quite dramatic and quick changes for education to improve, and he does seem committed to doing that – I liked his ideas about distributing funding for schools and education.  He also talked about the problems faced by Brazil and in a balanced way.  Had the opportunity to share a little about the way education works in the UK too.

Incidentally, the food was pretty good too – a genuine Brazilian selection, and loads of it (check out the menu below) - I’d filled up on the snacks before the entrées came out – I shall be running at some point tomorrow!!

Continuing to get to know my fellow questees – all seem really nice, and I think I’ve fallen on my feet!!  Really looking forward to the next few days getting to know them more and see how I can continue to be challenged!

Most important thing from Day 1 – Being challenged to leave my political views outside!! (probably best demonstrated by the fact, I felt the need to explain my views to people on the way back in the bus)!!

Twittering ...

Other than the fact it sounds like an RAF base a bit near where I grew up (Wittering in case you were wondering), I've started to become something of a Twitter fan ...

I'm on twitter - I can update it from home via a rather nifty piece of software that allows me to update both twitter and facebook simultaneously - something called tweetdeck, on my phone via text, or even just on the twitter site! I know there's not many people that are particularly interested in what I get up to, but it's nice to know that it's out there!

So, I like the technology aspect - I'm thinking about ways that I can use it to enhance my teaching. Students now are so internet and technology savvy that there must be a potential application for it. This is despite a teenager recently completing a study stating that twitter isn't for teens. I reckon there's a novelty value that would make it make a difference (it's my new project for the summer I suspect)!!!

However, why am really interested in using twitter? If I'm honest, at the moment it's the ability to follow David Lloyd (@bumblecricket) ... he makes it worthwhile! I reckon he's got completely the right idea about using twitter - his tweets seem to consist of pointing out the 'posh' tendencies of Messrs Hussain and Atherton, while extolling his own working class credentials. Love the cricket comments too. Also, who could fail to be amused by the tweet he presented us with this morning "Sir Beef stuck in lift last night for 45 mins.....tee hee!" My tweet of the series so far? From @tomfordyce - BBC's text commentator towards the end of the Cardiff test when Monty and Anderson were bravely snatching a draw from the jaws of defeat ...

"Someone put an arm around Monty - he's shaking like a trifle in a tornado" ...

I like my local MP ...

Went out with Andy Reed and others in Sileby yesterday talking to voters. Intrigued by the response of people I spoke to. Largely supportive of Andy, but hacked off with politics in general.

What does this show? I think it shows that when local associations choose local people as their candidate who have a genuine background and care for the area it can only be a good thing. I like Andy - it was largely because of him I joined the Labour party in the first place. He cares about Loughborough, he likes sport (never a bad thing), he's not afraid to vote against the party line, he's nice, he's a Christian. Sometimes maybe too nice, but I respect him and pleased that he's prepared to stand up and be counted.

Of course, the fact that he has come through the expenses thing unscathed also helps. ;)