A Visit to a School

Today we visited a school in Chiang Mai called the Ban buakkrognoi Community School, which is a school with 217 students, ages 5-16. This school is partially funded by UNICEF. 

The setting is within the walls of a temple/monks' residence.  Every boy in Thailand completes a Monk's training for about 3 months.

This school offers education to "stateless children"' children of foreign migrant workers from bordering countries.  There are 300,000 "stateless children" in Thailand.  This school was established because Thailand's educational slogan is, "Education for all", meaning the impoverished, disabled, infirm, and all at risk should have equal right to education.

Thailand adopted a core curriculum in 2007 for schools. This school uses that curriculum 70% of the time, and follows a local curriculum for music, dance, religion and social thinking.

Class sizes range from 18 to 38. Classrooms are rather bare, except for the people in them!

All students and adults are expected to take their shoes off before entering the school.

The lessons we saw were 100% teacher lead and whole group.

When it was lunch time classes came outside to be served their lunch. There was one choice, a curried fish stew in a bowl. This little girl showed her appreciation for the meal she was to receive.

Students seemed to eat anywhere, some stayed outside and some went into their classrooms to eat.

When they were done, there were a few wash tubs filled with soapy water and THE STUDENTS WASHED THEIR OWN DISHES!

Some played a game quietly at the base of a 800 year old Buddhist temple.

Most students and staff spoke little to no English.  They had rehearsed a few key phrases for us, one class sang a chant about not understanding us, another recited our alphabet.

These students were adorable, curious, loving and... SIMPLY KIDS!