Hi, Raphaël writing! After over two months spent working in Szkoła Podstawowa nr 24 as an ESC volunteer, it is time for me to share about my experience.
Alba was not here with me in Poland until early March, so this post will mostly be about my personal experience.
But first, what is ESC volunteering? These letters stand for “European Solidarity Corps”. Formerly named “European Voluntary Service”, this programme is open to any European citizen aged from 18 to 30 who wants to volunteer abroad, either on a short (up to 2 months) or long time period (from 2 to 12 months). ESC enables young people to travel and live abroad on a low budget. Volunteers can join many kinds of structures, and perform very diverse tasks: from working in an organic farm, to organizing events in a cultural center, or even promoting the activities of a local charity or association. Anything is possible.
The volunteer receives a free flat (usually shared with other volunteers working in the same city), and about 300€ monthly for food and pocket money, from the European Commission. If you’re interested in knowing more, just click here: https://youth.europa.eu/solidarity_en
I chose SP24 in Bialystok because I wanted to live in a country of which I don’t know the language and that I had never visited, and also because I always wanted to work with young children.
I spend most of my time working in the daycare room of the school, or “świetlica” in Polish. There, I usually play a lot of board games, draw, and make origami with the kids. All the interactions I have with them are super interesting and developing, both for them and for me. Talking with me makes the children deal with language barriers, and pushes them to find new means of communication to make themselves understood. Some children still struggle with the very concept of a foreign language, and don’t understand that I don’t… understand. And that is also the point of me being here!
Most of the time, they get very imaginative and creative when it comes to telling me about their day, explaining game rules, or just casually chatting. We can obviously always use a translating app on my phone to make communication more fluid. And I am amazed about how good some of them can speak English.
We also spend a good amount of time in the sports room, playing different games. These are an opportunity for another kind of interaction that enables us to share different great moments without the need of a language.
All the moments I spend with the children are very fulfilling, because they are hugely affectionate, curious, talkative, and eager to learn and share.
Aside from that, I have my own language workshops for students who want to come. I teach English, Spanish and French to students aged from 8 to 14. These workshops usually take place in the school library, for one hour, with small groups of 5-6 students.
The atmosphere is very casual, as I try to use mostly non-formal education to teach languages (games, conversations…). The way I teach widely depends on the age of the students, of course. I used to hold these classes on my own, but I am not alone anymore! Alba from Spain joined the school two weeks ago, and organizes the workshops with me now!
I also go with teachers to their English lessons. There, I help the students with different exercises. I spend time helping some of them. And soon, I will have private conversation sessions with them during their classes.
I also went to nearly every class at least once to give a presentation about myself, about my country and its culture, and about my region.
Moreover, I go every Friday morning to a class of 1st-graders with their teacher, where I talk about French language, take part in kids’ activities (dancing, crafting…), and play the guitar and have the kids sing along Christmas or traditional children’s songs in French, English and Polish. I always have a great time there!!
Apart from the school work, the project gives plenty of free time to travel across Poland and visit the country! I already went to Warsaw, Gdansk and several times to Krakow.
My experience has been very positive so far. I am eager to open new workshops (magic tricks, origami, maybe?). I’ll be working here until late June this year, so I hope I’ll get to try new things!
See you in the next post!! ;)