Test Questions

In 6th grade at the end of the unit on plants, we talked about the importance of plants and why we should protect them. The kids at Lycee Departemental de Tougouri are HORRIBLE students. In part because they dont see the benefit or value of education . . . because they are majorly unsupervised at home . . . because they dont speak french . . . myriad reasons.

ANYWAY, hardly any student studies at all. Just to give you an idea of the absurdity i submit to every time i sit down to grade papers here is one question i asked and some of the funnier responses. The question is taken from a test I wrote on the above subject - the importance and protection of plants in burkina. Obviously not a difficult subject - mostly common sense etc. So here you go:

Question (roughly translated):
Give a strategy on how to fight against deforestation and cutting down too many trees.

Answers:
You must avoid a lot of trees.

To fight against abusive tree cutting we must have a better knowledge in our lives

Imprisonment

It allows animals to live

Bush fires

Wood allows us to light fires

When men cut trunks the tree our country must to be the desert

Dry wood to cut for selling

One can create life

Cut wood with a machete

When people cut the trees the rain doesn't rain anymore and when the rain rains the seeds grow the animals eat

When people cut the trees the rain doesn't rain anymore when the rain doesn't rain anymore the people will die at the also the animals

Vertebrates and Invertebrates


Oh my!! God bless those children. Hmmm... I don't think they understood. Vertebrates and Invertebrates???? What does that have to do with deforrestation?? BUSH FIRES??? Umm . . . kinda the opposite?? Geez - on the one hand its stuff like this that makes me want to stay because its so freakin funny and on the other hand its stuff like this that makes me want to go home. But for now I'm laughing and I hope you are too.

Spectator Sports

I've never really been one for spectator sports. There's too many rules to follow and i don't like crowds. Considering my level of boredom in Burkina I have put aside my prejudices and have become a watcher of spectator sports. Well . . . kind of. One sport. And really, I can only stand to watch some of it.

The sport i am talking about is none other than "cat and mouse" or . . . lizard . . . or bat . . . or other unwelcome creature in my house. Lke the proverbial car wreck, when eloise brings in her kill, no matter how disturbing, i just can't not watch. She maims the little meal just enough to impair its ability to run away easily - takes a foot or bites its head etc. Then she plays with it swatting it and jumping on it while i jump around the house crying out "Oh!" "Oh my God oh my God!" "Eloise!!" "Just eat it!! Oh!!" When its been still for awhile and unresponsive to her whacks she lays down near it pretending to be bored hoping it will make a run for it which it invariably does. "Oh Eloise!! There it goes! get it get it!!" After about 40 minutes of all this she finally eats it and goes out for another one. Im half disgusted and half entertained. One can only stare at the wall for so many hours a day.