ELST
Workshop 2003
CONTENTS
1.
Summary
and recommendations for future workshops
1.1
The
workshop
1.2
Recommendations
1.3
Workshop
report
2.
Introduction (Bill Papworth, Chairman ELST)
3.
Pre-workshop preparation
3.1 Cambridge
3.1.1 Team meetings
3.1.2 Funding
3.1.3 Selecting and coordinating participants
3.1.3.1 The advertisement
3.1.3.2 Correspondence with applicants
3.1.3.3 Participant selection and notification
3.1.3.4 Suggestions for future workshops
3.2 Auroville
4.
Teaching classes
4.1 Organisation of the workshop
teaching in Auroville
4.2 Classification test
4.3 Language classes
4.4 Focus sessions
4.4.1 Teachers’ reports on focus sessions
4.5 Help sessions
5. Enterprise and business skills
5.1 Introduction
5.2 CV and cover letter skills workshop
5.3
Visits to Auroville enterprises
5.3.1 Reports on individual business units visited
5.4 Enterprise skills day
5.4.1 Essential vocabulary
5.4.2 Interview and voice-projection workshops
5.4.3 Business plans
6.
Culture, nationality and language (seminar day)
6.1 Cultural awareness game
6.2 Short focus sessions
6.3
Speech by Brigadier General Tewari
6.4 Afternoon sessions
7.
Renewable energy and other environmental issues
7.1 Introduction
7.2 Visiting speakers
7.3 Group visits
8.
Evening and Weekend Activities
1.1
The workshop
The ELST (English Language
Scholarships for Tibetans) summer workshop 2003 was devised to help a group of
Tibetans of proven ability and potential to enhance their English language and
communication skills, and to raise their awareness of the possibilities of
small-scale enterprise. The three-week workshop was held at the Pavilion of
Tibetan Culture in Auroville, near Pondicherry, in south India.
The
workshop team of six student volunteers was selected by the ELST committee, and
were joined by an ELST trustee, Gabriele Reifenberg, to prepare and teach the
workshop. We worked from December 2002 to plan and structure the workshop,
using the 2001 workshop as a model. The core theme of ‘enterprise’ was chosen
to compliment the main aim of improving the participants’ English communication
skills because it was felt that this would be useful to the wider Tibetan
community in exile in India and elsewhere.
English
language lessons, using standard EFL (English as a foreign language) textbooks
formed the core of the workshop, two sessions on most mornings. Afternoon
classes – which we called ‘focus sessions’ – were, instead, topic based
sessions designed by teachers themselves and which reflected their own
interests. We took advantage of the unique nature of Auroville to pay visits to
the small-scale, eco-friendly enterprises around the settlement, and to have visits
by Aurovillians with different areas of expertise. (Because of the nature of
Auroville, renewable energy became one of the unplanned themes of the
workshop.) We also had two full ‘seminar’ days: the first, on a theme suggested
by the 2001 workshop, entitled ‘Culture, Nationality and Language’; the second
devoted to ‘Enterprise Skills’. Throughout the workshop participants were asked
to give group presentations, reporting on visits, renewable energy, cultural
issues and business plans.
It
wasn’t all work! We had a lot of fun with informal activities in the evening
and trips at the weekend. The value of these shouldn’t be underestimated: group
cohesion, as well as the sense of an experience shared by volunteers and
participants alike, was greatly helped by these activities.
1.2 Recommendations
The
structure of the workshop, explained in detail below (see section 4.1 and passim), worked reasonably well, and we
would suggest it be adopted as the model for a future workshop. We went well
organised and prepared, and this was vital, but we were ready to re-organise and improvise according to
problems and opportunities that arose.
The
main change we would suggest, in response to participant feedback, would be to
have more language-oriented sessions in the afternoon, to replace at least some
of the focus sessions, which however should not be replaced altogether. These
language sessions could focus on pronunciation and phonetics, writing skills,
the receptive skills (reading and listening) or simply discussion (though with
correction feedback at the end of any discussion session). We would also
recommend having ‘Help’ sessions for students with individual difficulties.
In
terms of preparation in Cambridge for the workshop, we suggest that a different
.. team member chairs each meeting.
This would add to the sense of ‘ownership’ of the project for each team member
that Bill discusses in his introduction, section 2 below.
Other recommendations,
made by the participants themselves, are contained in section 10. We would just
mention one major and difficult issue, and that is the issue of the gender of
the participants: we had many more men than women, right from the application
stage. See section 3.1.2 for more on this problem and how it might be remedied.
1.3 The workshop report
This is what you're reading
now. The structure of the report was adapted from the report for Workshop 2001.
It was overseen and edited by the workshop coordinator and written by all the
workshop team. We did as much as possible in the two days following the end of
the workshop when it was still fresh in our minds. It’s rather long, but we've
tried to be as analytical and critical as possible in order that our experience
can be a guide to the organisation and running of future workshops. Where the report
seems merely descriptive, such descriptions are meant to give an idea of the
sort of activities possible and the sorts of topics that can be covered. Where
it seemed appropriate, the editor has maintained individuals’ opinions on
specific aspects of the workshop, but mostly the first person plural is used to
signal the collective nature of
the writing of the report, and of the workshop itself.
2.
INTRODUCTION (BILL PAPWORTH)
Workshop 2003 has successfully extended and built on the
foundations laid by Workshop 2001.
There were two major changes.
First, the volunteer team, both in
Cambridge and on campus at Auroville, took much of the responsibility for all
aspects of the project, funding and fundraising, travel and logistics,
selection of participants, as well as workshop content preparation and
delivery. This both provided volunteer
team members with a real sense of “project ownership” as well as hands-on
experience of work in the not-for-profit charity sector.
Second, Workshop 2003 identified and
worked on a key critical issue for the Tibetan community in exile. Educated young professional Tibetans, like
the 150 who applied and the 22 who attended the Workshop, require enterprise
skills in order to maintain their community without undue dependence on
charity, to contribute to their worldwide diaspora and to help their kinsfolk
on the Tibetan plateau. The Workshop
showed that ethical enterprise development was possible and desirable, that the
skills and the help needed were available, and that courageous and ambitious
individuals and groups could reach out and succeed.
Claude Arpi, director of the Tibetan
Pavilion, and his colleagues at Auroville
www.auroville.org gave
generously of their hospitality, time, expertise and enthusiasm. They have helped sow ideas and ambitions
that will flower. We all thank them.
The project has been completed within
budget and without using the contingency provision. ELST thanks those individuals, companies and colleges who have
supported ELST financially and made Workshop 2003 possible. In particular I thank the Commonwealth
Trust, the Isaac Newton Trust and the University of Cambridge Corporate Liaison
Office who supported the Cambridge volunteers as individuals and as a
group. This report justifies the
confidence you placed in them.
ELST believes it should consider a
further Workshop, possibly in the summer of 2005. Working with the newly formed Cambridge University Himalayan ELST
Society our plan of action is:
ELST programmes in the short run bring
learning, experience, insight, friendship and fun both to Tibetan participants
from India and Cambridge volunteers drawn from all over the world. Their long-term impact may be even more
significant. I am privileged to be able
to help.
3. PRE-WORKSHOP PREPARATION
3.1 Cambridge
3.1.1 Team meetings
Once
the team was selected, we held fortnightly meetings during term (less often
outside term) to plan the workshop. Meetings tended to last for 1½ to 2 hours.
Three joint meetings were held between the team and the ELST committee in order
to monitor the progress of the workshop planning. This number of meetings might
seem excessive, but was actually indispensable in structuring the workshop
carefully, as well as organising funding etc. Naturally, not every member of
the team could be present at every meeting, but we took careful minutes, which
were circulated to both the team and the ELST committee after each team
meeting. Two of the original members of the team dropped out for personal and
work reasons at an advanced stage, but
because of the careful preparation and recording of meetings, the two
replacement members (selected by interview by the remaining team members) were
able to join the workshop team with a minimum of fuss and confusion.
Alan
was volunteered to be team coordinator at an early stage and chaired the
meetings (we think now that this was a mistake and that different team members
should chair each meeting). Minutes were taken by a different member each time.
Team members were given specific roles and duties: for example, Yen-Pei and
Margaret oversaw the participant selection, Katie coordinated funding
applications (and acquitted the thankless but vital role of accountant in
Auroville) and Gabriele corresponded with the Tibetan Pavilion in Auroville,
and was the fearsome workshop discipline officer once we arrived.
The key topics discussed
in the meetings were as follows:
·
Structure and
organisation of the workshop
·
Content of the workshop
(both teaching and informal activities)
·
Textbooks to be used
·
Participant selection
·
Funding and publicity
(e.g. we set up an ELST stall at the Alternative Works Fair. See also section
3.1.2 for details of fund-raising)
·
Travel arrangements and
visas
·
Accommodation,
arrangements and facilities in Auroville
Other issues not strictly
related to the workshop that we nonetheless worked on were:
·
Visit of Tibetan scholar
to Cambridge
·
Founding of new
Cambridge University society ‘CU-HELST’ (Himalayan ELST).
ELST has hosted Tibetan
scholars in Cambridge, each for one term, in the past. It has now instituted an
arrangement with Girton College to continue these visits. The workshop team has no official
relationship or duties with regard to the visiting scholars, but we tried to
make the Kalsang Dorji feel welcome and to show him around during his stay in
Easter term.
Katie Marwick is the
moving force behind CU-HELST, now a registered University society. It is likely
that future workshop teams will be recruited at least in part from among its
members.
3.1.2 Funding
The workshop team and ELST
managed to raise money from the following sources:
·
College
travel funds
·
The
Isaac Newton Trust grant for community-related vacation projects
·
Commonwealth
Trust travel bursary
·
Charity
concert (Yen-Pei)
·
University of Cambridge Corporate Liaison
Office - Active Community Fund
Other
sources that seemed promising but ultimately failed to deliver were RAG and
Cambridge Flava (www.cambridgeflava.com), but it may be worth applying to them
again.
3.1.3 Selecting and coordinating participants
Several points could be
improved in participant recruitment, especially with regards to the low number
of female participants and the high instances of last-minute no-shows.
Nevertheless, the organising of participants has been a largely positive
experience. The fact that the team were much more involved with participant
liaison than for Workshop 2001, facilitated interaction with the Tibetans on
the workshop. The selection process appears to have been a fair one. The
application letters accurately revealed the applicants’ levels of English, and
the selected participants turned out to be all highly intelligent, motivated
and admirable individuals.
3.1.3.1 The Advertisement
The advertisement for the workshop was distributed
to Tibetan settlements in India and posted in various Tibetan journals and online
in early January 2003. We received an overwhelming response: over 100
applications were received by the deadline of the end of March, and some further 50 late applications.
Our advertisement on the website, given prominent place and extended for an additional
two months after the application deadline, probably accounted for this
remarkable increase in interest from the last workshop.
3.1.3.2 Correspondence with applicants
The vast majority of the correspondence was done by
e-mail. In January we set up a hotmail account to which all applications were
directed. The applicants were required to write a letter of no more than 250
words, stating their future career plans and how they thought they would benefit from the workshop. Their applications
were printed out and filed both in a folder and in the e-mail account itself.
We worked closely with Hilary Papworth from ELST, forwarding all our
correspondence with the applicants to her e-mail account. The two members of
the team responsible for applications took charge of the mail-box on alternate
weeks. Generally the work was not overwhelming: about 3 – 4 hours a week,
increasing to 5 hours in the lead-up to the deadline.
We made a point of using simple, clear but
“unofficial” language, keeping as closely in touch with applicants as we could.
Additional information was encouraged where they did not make a full case for
themselves. The Tibetans were extremely appreciative of the correspondence.
After the first selection meeting we produced a
full list of potential participants and their details on Excel. This
participants list underwent constant revision throughout the months leading up
to the workshop. This was probably the most useful thing we’d done: it enabled
us to easily keep track of the expected numbers and the status of each
participant, and finally served to enable the participants themselves to
contact each other and make travel arrangements together.
3.1.3.3 Participant Selection and Notification
Late January: First
applications received
Mid March: First selection meeting. Whole team
+ Bill and Hilary Papworth. 100 applications reviewed, 15 definitely accepted,
14 ‘reserves’.
Preliminary list of applicants drawn up on
Excel.
Mid April: Second selection meeting. Papworths,
M, P, YP + Kalsang (Tibetan visiting scholar). Around 44 applications reviewed,
some 30 new + original14. 20 Definitely accepted, 12 ‘reserves’.
Rejections notified.
Preliminary list of workshop participants
drawn up.
Early June: ‘Information Pack’ including joining
instructions, provisional workshop timetable, list of participants and ‘To Whom
it May Concern’ letter (for obtaining paid leave) posted to participants.
Late July: Confirmation required from all
participants that they would be attending the workshop. 12 reserves contacted.
1st Wk August:
List of 32 participants finalised.
24 August: Start of workshop. 21 participants
arrive in Auroville.
3.1.3.4 Suggestions for future workshops
A) The men – women ratio: Of the final 21
participants who attended the workshop, only 2 were women (6 had been selected
to attend). The problem was already evident in the application stage, when less
than a tenth of the applicants were women.
·
Advertisement:
in advertising the workshop, future teams need to consider venues which would
be readily accessible to women. Some suggestions from the participants
themselves include: universities, Tibetan Youth Congresses, students’ hostels
(maybe women’s hostels?). You may even want to state somewhere in the
advertisement that applications from women are particularly welcome.
·
Venue:
It has been pointed out that Auroville is a long way from most Tibetan
settlements. The long journey may have discouraged women from the northern
settlements to attend. The distance also makes it difficult for married women
to combine attendance at the workshop with their domestic responsibilities.
·
Applications:
The sex of the applicant should be considered in the selection process. It
would thus be helpful to firmly establish the sex of each applicant before the
selection meeting (many Tibetan names being the same for men as for women).
B) The
numbers: The final number of participants was much lower than anticipated.
Many of the no-shows had been prevented from coming by unforeseen circumstances
– the majority notified us within 2 days before the start of the workshop, and
some did not get in touch at all.
·
Keep
more reserves: Besides the firmly accepted 30, at least another 30 candidates
should be kept in the reserve. This would give us more room for manoeuvre in
the face of cancellations, while reducing the sense of fierce competition for
workshop places, which ELST never has intended to create.
·
Enforce
a stricter deadline by which expected participants have to confirm their
attendance. To reduce the uncertainty around final numbers, participant
coordinators should demand confirmation for attendance at least two months
before the start of the workshop. Make it clear that if participants fail to
confirm by the deadline, his/ her place will be passed on to another candidate,
and enforce it. Participant coordinators should have a *definite* list of 35
participants one month before the start of the workshop, leaving room for a few
no-shows.
·
C) Paid
leave issues: Many accepted participants had a hard time obtaining leave
from employers, and this resulted in numerous cancellations and several
difficult negotiations. It would thus be helpful if a ‘To Whom it May Concern’
letter from ELST trustees is sent to participants along with the notification
of acceptance, by the start of April.
3.2 Auroville
Negotiations
with a potential venue need to begin at least one year in advance so that
details can be worked out satisfactorily. We benefited from the preliminary
work undertaken for a potential Workshop in 2002. Throughout, Claude Arpi, the director of the
Pavilion of Tibetan Culture, was very patient and obliging with all our
requests.
The main items to be
covered are:
·
Joining instructions and
travel arrangements for
participants and for resource people (for the latter from nearest point of
arrival in India).
·
Accommodation and meal
arrangements,
both for participants and resource persons. For the latter, single rooms are
most desirable. The schedule is quite tiring and problems with possible illness
and individual reaction to heat demand privacy. (For a future Workshop at the
Tibetan Pavilion we should note that a maximum of four per room can be
comfortable in the Pavilion, i.e. 16 people. The daily cycle ride to the Solar
Kitchen in the hottest part of the day can be tiring for some.)
·
Costing of accommodation, meals,
hire of equipment and any other extras, so that a reasonably accurate budget
can be set up in good time.
·
Textbooks, if using Oxford University
Press it is good to order the books in India because of the advantageous price.
Plenty of time should be given (we ordered in May) and when the books are
delivered, the delivery needs to be
checked immediately, to ensure that the total order has been fulfilled. The
FOCUS bookshop in Pondicherry has CUP language course books and is reasonably
efficient.
·
Classrooms: three classrooms are needed
and one should be large enough to hold the whole group. A black, or white,
board is needed in each one. The teachers need a room for their meetings etc
but this could be the computer room if necessary.
·
Equipment: requirements for
computers, printer(s), e-mail facility, photocopying facility, telephone
facility, video, OHP, cassette player(s) and stationery should be given in good
time and, if possible, all these should be in place before the Workshop begins.
If only one computer has e-mail, it would be best to connect the printer to a
different one. At least two cassette players are needed, one of them preferably
a roving one, for teachers to use the coursebook tapes.
·
Visits to outside sites and invitations
to outside speakers should be made in good time, if possible, so that these can
be built into the timetable.
·
Leisure and social
facilities,
evening entertainment including possible loan of musical instrument(s), sports
facilities, final dinner.
·
Participants, when the participant list
is finalised a copy should be sent to the co-ordinator in India. Participants
need to be notified of documents they need to bring with them.
·
Financial arrangements in India, including transfer of funds to cover costs,
which needs to be done in good time.
·
Transport facilities during the Workshop
4. TEACHING CLASSES
4.1 Organisation of the
workshop teaching in Auroville
The
workshop was split into Language Classes, Focus Sessions, Seminar days, visits,
guest speakers and student presentations. The days were split into four
sessions followed by a meeting in which teachers prepared for the following day
and discussed workshop organisation in general:
09:00-10:30
Language Class
10:30-11:00 Break
11:00-12:30 Language Class
12:30-14:30 Lunch
14:30-15:45 Focus Session
15:45-16:15 Break
16:15-17:30 Focus Session
17:45-c18:30 Teachers Meeting
On
Seminar Days and visits we kept as close to this timetable as possible. It was
felt that 90 minutes was a suitable time for each Language Class. The Focus
Sessions were made slightly shorter as team members were more worried about
structuring them and running out of material. In fact they often overran and a
full 90 minutes would have been preferable.
A
vital tool of the workshop was the noticeboard. Each day’s timetable and events
were posted here at the latest the previous evening (during or after the
teachers’ meeting), and participants were required to consult it and sign up
for focus sessions and weekend trips. Sarah was responsible for seeing that the
information on the noticeboard was accurate and up to date – a vital role.
Aside
from her role as discipline officer, Gabriele was also available as substitute
teacher for the language lessons if any of the other teachers were ill. It was
very important to have this extra person.
4.2 Classification test
We
used a multiple choice test provided by the Studio School, supplemented by a
brief conversation with each participant, in order to divide the participants
into three groups. The test, answer sheets, and correction acetates are
preserved in the workshop archive file. The test was an efficient and effective
way of discovering the participants’ relative levels, and allowed us to
allocate classes for the beginning of teaching on second day. The brief
conversation with each participant was meant to confirm the evidence of the
written test: we tried to use a variety of verb tenses in order to check their
facility with different constructions.
4.3 Language Classes
Based
on the standard of English of the applications, we went to Auroville prepared
to teach three levels of language class: Intermediate, Upper Intermediate and
Advanced. It was decided to allocate two team members to take each class for
alternate lessons.
The
twenty-one students were divided according to the test results into the three
classes with equal numbers in each class. The Intermediate class contained more
of a range of abilities than the upper two classes. It was felt however, that
having one or two students of higher ability in the Intermediate class was a
great help in communicating grammatical concepts and explanations to the
members of the group with a poorer grasp of English.
In
most group work activities throughout the workshop we ensured that each language
class was represented in each group so that all groups were of mixed ability. This was an effective way of getting the more proficient
communicators to challenge and to help the intermediate students. We were
careful not to call the classes ‘higher’ or ‘lower’ in order not to discourage
those in the lowest class – we called them Class 1, 2 and 3, or ‘Katie’s
Class’/ ‘Peter’s Class’.
The
Headway series was selected as the most suitable for our needs. We discovered
it was possible to purchase the relevant books in India from the Chennai branch
of Oxford University Press which saved on costs and weight (see section 3.2
Textbooks)). Each student received one Student Book and one Workbook, and each
teacher had access to the relevant Teacher’s Book.
The
order of Advanced Books unfortunately did not arrive which caused difficulties
for Yen-pei and Alan. They improvised with photocopies from
the Upper-Intermediate book to begin with and then switched to the Cambridge Language in Use Upper Intermediate books
which we were able to buy in Pondicherry. Yen-pei found the Headway series much
easier to teach from as it is well structured with discussion based activities
followed up with clear grammatical exercises, whilst the Cambridge series is
more discursively presented. She was forced to look for additional exercises
from other grammar books as a supplement. Alan felt that the class was really
of an advanced standard and the upper-intermediate material was too easy,
certainly in terms of the introduction of grammatical concepts and rules. He
felt that being able to give them each a good monolingual dictionary made up in
some respect for the lack of a suitably advanced textbook, and the students
became proficient in its use. The advanced group found the creative activities
more challenging and enjoyed them more, and both Alan and Yen-pei found essay
writing and poetry writing to be enjoyable and productive exercises with this
class. Alan and Yen-pei's experience also points to the importance of taking
plenty of supplementary photocopiable materials at various levels.
The
students in the Intermediate and Upper-Intermediate classes were generally
impressed with the interactive materials used in the language classes. Many
said they had not experienced the type of approach we took and were more used
to straightforward grammar lessons. They appreciated the way they were forced
think about using English through the diverse texts and exercises in the
Headway books. Many specified the use of audio material as a positive point and
they would have liked to be able to take a cassette away with them.
Most
lessons were structured around the introduction of one or two particular
aspects of grammar or language as laid out in the Headway chapters, and
included one or two listening exercises, a series of language activities from
the Student Book or Workbook and a reading and comprehension activity. The
classes were small enough to allow a great deal of group work, oral
comprehension and practice, and individual attention to the students.
The
Cambridge Team felt that some of the exercises in the Headway books were rather
Euro-centric and also aimed at a younger audience, but the books contained
enough material for us to be very selective about which exercises to do and the
students also enjoyed learning about British culture. Peter particularly
enjoyed using the "Postscript" sections at the end of each Chapter as
a way to encourage the students to be more expressive and animated with their
English. Yen-pei found the students enjoyed learning colloquial expressions and
also doing grammar games which tested the grasp of structures just acquired
or revised. Sarah found that many of the straightforward comprehension
activities in the Upper-intermediate book were actually too easy for her class,
and that the students found some of them a bit patronising. She was careful to
choose comprehension activities that were clearly linked to follow-up grammar
exercises which the students preferred.
Some
of the Cambridge Team were first-time teachers who were initially quite nervous
about being in front of the class and worried about not meeting the needs of
their students. Peter found attending a 90-minute class at the Studio School in
Cambridge a reassuring experience and also found it helpful to have Gabriele
sit in on one of his language classes and give him feedback. Yen-pei says her
fears of letting her students down never really left her but that the feedback
was very positive and the students were extremely cooperative and responsive in
class. Katie found it quite a challenge teaching students who were so much
older than herself, but quickly learnt how to approach the class and the
attitude of the students was a great help. All teachers gained in confidence
over the three weeks and quickly learnt how to structure lessons to make them
varied and lively.
Gabriele writes: For
members of a workshop team who have not taught grammar before, I think it would
be helpful if they decided quite early on the level they are going to teach and
prepare one or two lesson plans. These can be tried out on members of the team
(or someone with EFL experience, if available). This would give them more
confidence and would benefit the participants.
4.4 Focus Sessions
We
saw the focus sessions as an opportunity to get the students to use English by
provoking discussion and debate on topics in which we had a particular interest
or expertise.
We
ran three classes simultaneously in the first afternoon session and two in the
session after the break. We posted the title and description of the session on
the notice board the night before and students were required to sign up for the
session that interested them most before dinner. This enabled us to prepare
enough photocopies and materials for the following day.
In practice this worked
well, and most students gave very positive feedback about the range of classes
- they enjoyed being exposed to subjects they had not studied before Other
students suggested at the end that it would have been better if we had been
clearer about what vocabulary/language skill we were trying to introduce or
practise through our various focus sessions. This seems a very useful
criticism, but it is important to emphasise that focus sessions can be an
important method of making the students speak outside the more rigid guidelines
of a Language Lesson. It tests their
conversational skills in a more relaxed atmosphere and in a situation more
attuned to authentic situations where they would have to speak English. Perhaps the team should have communicated
the benefits of focus sessions better to the students, so the students didn’t
think they were wasting their
time learning about topics which might not
have much interest or relevance for them.
Conducting
independent focus sessions are challenging; we would recommend that future
instructors be sure they feel confident and comfortable with the subject area
they want to teach. Quite a lot of
thought and preparation went into our focus sessions, and generally the team
found them an enjoyable and rewarding experience. Unfortunately, due to the
scheduling and re-scheduling of the various visits and guest speakers we were
not able to teach some of the sessions we had all prepared - it would have been
helpful to be clearer about the timetable of these extra activities before
leaving the UK.
4.4.1 Teachers’ reports on
focus sessions
We
include team remarks about focus sessions here, in the hope that they might
suggest the variety of topics that can be dealt with and offer some guidance as
to how the sessions might best be run.
Yen-pei
·
Shakespeare
in Performance: Twelfth Night
·
Englishes
in Exile: the Caribbean Example
·
Poetry
Workshop
·
Drama!
(in collaboration with Katie)
Because
of the predominantly literary focus, the sessions were attended generally by
small, often overlapping groups of students. While it’s a shame I couldn’t
reach out to a wider range of interests, the small groups provided an informal
and supportive setting for people to exchange interpretations and opinions. The
most successful was ‘Englishes in Exile’, about which I had worried the most.
My opening introduction to the Middle Passage and the resulting diaspora in the
Caribbean’s – a geographical region most of the students had not heard about –
received a striking response from the students, and the following small-group
discussion and presentation on short, but fairly challenging quotations proved
an effective way to penetrate further into the background and to get students
of varying abilities to express their opinions. It was an extremely interesting
exercise for me too, as it revealed how much more densely packed the quotations
are with meaning than I had thought.
The
poetry workshop arose out of a surprising level of interest among the
participants in composing poetry. Some, indeed, are already quite competent
poets despite the slight irregularity in their choice of vocabulary. The
students responded sensitively to a Walcott extract I used to introduce the
workshop, and had fun although the idea of evaluating poetry seemed new to
them. Quite excitingly, a little poetry anthology grew out of this workshop,
and was distributed to all the participants on the last day.
Peter
·
The
Space Race
·
India
vs. China – A new space race?
·
Technology
and society
·
Christian
beliefs and the Bible
For
my first focus session I prepared the most material (including several
colourful acetates) and the least for how to make it interactive. Having learnt
from this mistake I started later focus sessions with 10-15 minutes eliciting
their knowledge/opinions on the subject to get them talking and show me what
they already knew/misunderstood. I also noted the language was too technical in
some of the Space Race articles. In the latter half of the two of the lessons,
I split the students into two debating teams to argue over whether India should
spend money on space exploration or whether technology is beneficial to
society. Some took to this with great vigour!
Margaret
·
The
American Dream: Myth and Reality
·
Sports
and National Identity
·
Pronunciation
(with Gabriele)
I taught two focus session independently (The American Dream: Myth or Reality and The Role of Sport in National Identity)
and two Pronunciation focus session
in conjunction with another instructor, Gabriele. In general, I think that focus sessions are a good idea as the
instructors get to know students outside their own specific language
classes. Moreover, it allows the mixing
of different language levels in one class.
The material I used in my independent classes was more challenging than
the material I used in my Language Classes (I taught the lowest level), and
therefore it pushed those students to read and work with material that they
wouldn’t normally work with in the Language Lessons. I also think it allowed the more advanced students a chance to
take the lead and explain and help teach those students who were having
difficulty.
My independent focus sessions were also more
spirited than the Language Classes because there was room for debate and strong
opinions throughout the discussions. To
be specific, in my American Dream
focus session, I organized the class into small groups to read American
documents and then had them present to the class. After this, I opened the floor to discussion and encouraged
debate about the topics raised. As this
was my first focus session and was conducted in the beginning of the Workshop,
encouraging debate was challenging; however, I think it was important for the
students to think on their feet and form opinions to challenge notions that
other students and myself might have had.
In my National
Identity focus session, I introduced the idea of national identity, and
then had the students read a contemporary newspaper article on football and
nations. This was way of an
introduction to a debate about David Beckham and his move from Manchester
United to Madrid. Choosing a topic that
was recent and that the students had strong opinions about worked well as it
motivated them to speak fervently about their point of view.
The two Pronunciation
focus sessions I taught with Gabriele were run very differently from my
independent focus sessions. They were
more similarly run as a Language Lesson and lecture. In terms of lessons learned: firstly, running joint focus
sessions can be more challenging than running individual focus session just
because of the mere fact of finding time to liaise with another
individual. Moreover, in my situation,
Gabriele was the expert in teaching pronunciation, and so she kindly took the
lead in these sessions and I acted more as a support person. I would recommend teaching pronunciation in
future workshops, possibly for an entire day or as a unit. Teaching pronunciation is important, as I
found with the 2003 students that they often knew the right English word, but
had no idea of how to pronounce it. The
benefits of knowing how to pronounce words would be great.
Katie
·
Perception
vs. Reality – how your mind deceives you
·
Biology
for Beginners (cancelled due to lack of interest)
·
Human
Cloning – Mechanisms, Applications and Ethics
·
Genetic
Modification – Mechanisms, Applications and Ethics
I
enjoyed teaching my focus sessions very much. In Perception vs. Reality I had a
lot of mini-experiments the students could perform on themselves to demonstrate
that what they perceive can be different from ‘reality’ e.g. visual illusions,
blind spot experiments, number of fingers poking you in the back. An
interesting philosophical discussion emerged from this. Biology for Beginners
was cancelled due to a combination of lack of interest and my illness. The
participants evidently felt they knew all about biology but in fact in my later
biotechnology focus sessions I had to spend a lot of time attempting to explain
basic biological concepts to them! I enjoyed ranting away about the beauty of
biology but I think they found it hard to keep up (time was very limited) and
so were a little confused. Human Cloning and Genetic Modification both went
well; although I am uncertain of how much of the mechanism they actually
understood. However, we had good discussions about ethics. Giving small groups
a page of quotes and asking them to rate their agreement with them on a scale
of 1-5 was a very effective stimulus to discussion.
Gabriele
·
Roads
and where they lead us
These
three sessions were called: Roman roads in England, the Srinagar/Leh road,
Village life in England, Ladakh and Peru.
i)
We
first had a discussion about roads, advantages and disadvantages, then
road-related vocabulary and read texts about various roads in England,
including one near Cambridge
ii)
We
looked at text describing the road, as well as photographs and use this as a
basis for questions and discussion
iii)
We
looked at descriptions of festivals in various English villages and related
them to Tibetan festivals, text about life in a Ladakhi village and a
description of the Taquile islanders of Lake Titicaca.
·
Pronunciation
There
was quite a strong demand for pronunciation sessions. Margaret and I gave one
together for about 14 participants and then a further one for all of them. We
looked at the phonetic symbols for vowels (and played a related team game),
intonation, stress, differentiating between e.g. ship and sheep, and
pronunciation of the, and ed in the
simple past.
General comment: If
possible, it would be good to be very clear about how many focus sessions there
are going to be, and their content. I had three prepared that I did not use,
and no doubt this was the same for others. In view of the comments made by the
participants, the overall purpose, form and content of focus sessions maybe needs
to be thought about more carefully.
Sarah
·
Language
and Decolonisation: examples from Nigeria and Algeria
·
Memory,
History and the Art of Memorial
·
History,
Memory and the Holocaust
·
Development
and Counter-Development
I
was very concerned not to present my focus sessions in a lecture format.
Sessions were structured around a short piece of text, usually accompanied with
a set of questions to assess comprehension and to provoke debate. I enjoyed the
first class on Chinua Achebe's 'Thing's Fall Apart' and Frantz Fanon's 'The
Wretched of the Earth' most of all as the discussion was very extensive and the
lesson well-timed. The two history/memory sessions were interesting although I
got sidetracked into more of the basic history than I had intended as the students
had only a very elementary understanding of the Holocaust and the First World
War in Europe. They did nonetheless get on to discussing the historiographical
concepts that I wanted them to deal with and they were very eager to learn
about the Holocaust in particular. Some more visual aids would have been very
useful, especially film, for the second of these sessions. My final focus
session was the least successful, partly because I was faced with a larger
class than I had been prepared for which meant my original intention to have a
text focused class discussion plus essay writing and presentation was scuppered
and I decided to have a debate instead. The class was split into two groups,
provided with varied material presenting positive and negative interpretations
of globalisation and they were asked to debate a set of statements based on the
evidence they had been given.
·
The
Classical Hollywood System: Narrative
·
The
Beatles and Sixties Culture (two sessions)
·
Defining
Terrorism
·
Translations: Ireland, Tibet and the
language of the colonizer
My
sessions were a mixture of lecture style, and text and activity study sessions.
The lecture format was not ideal given the aim of the workshop (i.e. to develop
the participants’ communication skills); however, the participants seemed to
enjoy the topics, and sang along gustily to 'Love Me Do'. The discussion and
writing activities about terrorism worked very well, and in general I would say
that it's a good idea to have them take the ideas dealt with in a session and
have to 'do' something with them - whether it's only discuss or (better)
produce something, e.g. a report, a definition, etc.
In
our planning for the workshop we scheduled 'Help' sessions in the afternoon for
students with particular difficulties. These didn't end up happening, for the
following reasons:
·
Teachers
were very busy
·
There
was a sense that we didn't want to interfere with the focus session timetable
·
It
was felt that it might be embarrassing to individual students to suggest they
attend a session
·
Some teachers weren't confident they could run such a session
·
Students
didn't ask for any sessions
In
retrospect, it was a mistake to drop these sessions, and students have
mentioned their absence in the feedback forms. Certain students would certainly
have benefited, e.g., from one-to-one conversation classes. It wasn't enough
that students didn't ask for the sessions;
we should have been more proactive in (at least) reminding them the facility
existed. The teachers’ lack of teacher confidence would probably have been
remedied simply by their running the sessions.
5. ENTERPRISE AND BUSINESS
SKILLS
5.1 Introduction
The
theme of ‘enterprise’ was expressed in the workshop through sessions on CV and
cover-letter writing, business planning, and visits to the Auroville business
units. Several students reported feeling inspired to start their own business,
but the single afternoon spent on business plans was long enough only to
impress upon them the need for
planning, not to give them much practice in how to go about it. The visits to
Auroville businesses took place on the Friday of the first week and were very
successful. However, they might have been more beneficial after the Enterprise day, once the students had a sense of business
concepts and structures in their heads.
This
was a useful exercise. We took materials from the Cambridge careers office and,
in a full afternoon, guided the students through the organization and writing
of (Western-style) CVs and cover letters. We also had job adverts culled from
the Tibetan press: each student had to choose one and write an appropriate
cover letter and create a new CV. The notion of presenting on paper seemed new
to many of the participants, while those used to the Indian form of ‘Bio-data’
were impressed with the difference in the Cambridge material. Those who had
never applied for a job found the cover letter writing quite a challenge and it
should be of help to them. We insisted on their writing the material on
computer – difficult because of the limited time and number of machines we had.
The standard of computer use varied greatly. It would have been good to give
them more computer practice, but hard to see how it could have been arranged.
This
was a full day activity, with the visits taking place in the morning and
students reports on the visits in the afternoon. Two teachers accompanied each
group of five to one of four local businesses. Based on the two-hour visits,
students made presentations in a later session. The students were given a
questionnaire (copy preserved in the workshop archive file) to guide their
investigation of the business, and each student was given a topic area to
present on before setting out,
something which motivated them to take notes and ask questions.
Margaret
writes: I think that the mixing of abilities of the students in the business
visits and their presentations worked very well – it allowed the students to
learn from each other and help each other.
As this was our first visit, the instructor team provided questions that
the students needed to answer. I found
that in my group, the students stuck mainly to the questions on their sheet of
paper and were more intent on finishing the assignment than being really
interested in the business itself. This
may have been only specific to my group though. Whilst the students tended to stick to the questions on their
piece of paper, I still think that providing the students with the list of
question was appropriate as it provided a guideline for their presentations it
also provided the students with an example of what kind of questions to ask in
future business visits where the instructors didn’t play as prominent a role.
5.3.1 Reports on individual
business units visited
Handmade paper
Students
were clearly very interested in the factory tour and asked plenty of questions.
Some students were surprised at the lack of a transparent management structure,
and the stated unwillingness to do business with clients unless they
demonstrated sufficient passion for handmade paper.
Upasana
Uma,
the director of Auroville’s fashion label Upasana gave a personal, candid and
very idealistic introduction to her business. All the students’ questions were answered
in great detail although with growing distaste as we broached the topic of
marketing strategy. The impact of the visit was evident in the way Uma’s
environmental concerns resurfaced two weeks later in the students’ garment
industry business plan. The fact that the aspects of marketing and business
expansion - normally crucial for enterprises - were lacking in this instance
was pointed out by the students, and one participant raised the question of
whether spiritual development could really go hand in hand with business
development.
Imagination
Imagination
is a cloth, garment and soap manufacturer. The founder, Dara, kindly showed us
around for a couple of hours and patiently answered all our questions. The
business is run on fair trade principles which particularly interested us; the
participants seemed particularly interested in the methods of manufacture and
marketing. I thought the questionnaire was useful as it directed their thoughts
in a way that helped them to gain a good understanding of the business. They
all seemed impressed by the business and possibly even inspired.
Shradhanjali
I
(Margaret) joined my students on a visit to Shradhanjali, a hand-craft unit
which creates stationery, cards and
interior designs by using flowers, foliage and hand-made paper. Overall, our visit was a very positive
experience. The proprietor was
extremely patient and welcoming to us and spent a great deal of time
explaining, showing and answering questions.
If business visits are planned in future workshops, I think the
cooperation and willingness of the businesses would be essential for the
success or failure of such an endeavour.
Both the students and myself learned a great deal about ethical ways to
run a business and also about the culture and way of life of Auroville itself.
This extra dynamic of relating business to the surrounding environment was a
useful and pertinent point and I felt it encouraged additional depth to the
student’s presentations.
5.4.1 Essential vocabulary
(1st session)
At
the start of the day, in order to prepare students for the following sessions,
we introduced twenty or so words of business jargon such as 'cash flow' and
'distribution'. In the teachers’ meeting the night before, it had taken half an
hour to get six native speakers clear
on some of the definitions. Accordingly we increased the time allotted to this
session from 10 minutes to 30 minutes and scrapped the textbook-based business
role-play/discussion session we had originally planned.
5.4.2 Interview and
voice-projection workshops (2nd session)
These
were run simultaneously by two residents from Aurovile: Marijke (who also gave a talk on career empowerment) and Eugeen,
who both generously gave their time. Two groups of ten students each (with
teachers in tow) did each workshop for 45 minutes and then swapped to the other
workshop.
Marijke
gave the interview workshop, following some preparation in teacher led groups.
The idea was for students to use their newly-created CVs and cover-letters as
the basis of role-play situations. This was perhaps not communicated clearly
enough to Marijke and was forgotten in the case of the first group. In general,
students seemed to feel that the role-play situations were useful to a point
(students played both interviewers and interviewees, and interviews were also
performed as if 'by phone'), but they would have liked more information about
interview formats and skills beforehand. Feedback was also a little inadequate.
The problem in the end was perhaps one of time, and such a session could easily
have taken a morning.
The
voice-projection workshop was also too short and a little unfocused. Certainly
it was a vital exercise for the meek Tibetan students to raise their voices a
little, but they needed more encouragement and time to do so. More simple (and
clearly-explained) group exercises would have given them more confidence, and
only then should they have been asked to bellow alone. Again, maybe we didn't
communicate the intention of the
workshop quite clearly enough. In the end, the session functioned more as an
awareness than a volume raising exercise.
5.4.3 Business plans (3rd
and 4th sessions)
An
article from the Guardian about the importance of planning for new enterprises
provided excellent motivational material. Students were asked to answer five
comprehension questions designed to elucidate the key points and vocabulary.
Next, Peter gave a 20 minute lecture on the basics of a business plan: Who
should write one? What is it for? What does it contain?
The
remainder of the afternoon was spent writing plans in five groups of four.
These were presented the next morning, the final day of the workshop (see
section 9.4). Happily, we had five people with some prior ideas for new
businesses, so we organised the groups around these individuals.
In
retrospect we would have done well to impress on them the importance of being
realistic with their goals and financial projections, especially in the early
stages. One group, who were to manufacture clothing, wanted 12 lakh Rs
(GBP1.5million) to get off the ground! Nevertheless, judging by students'
comments and their feedback forms, we succeeded in impressing upon them the
importance of planning. A couple were even inspired to start new businesses, or
expand existing ones.
The
day kicked off with a ‘Cultural Exchange Game’. Participants were split into
two groups, or cultures, and then each group was given a different set of
cultural rules to follow. Participants had to interact in their own culture and
then visit the other culture in pairs, where, without instructions, they had to
attempt to work out the rules of the alien culture. (See archive folder for
details.)
The
primary aim of this game was to introduce the ideas of the day; get them thinking
about what is meant by culture by providing an abstract culture to analyse. It
was also meant to be fun. Both these aims were fulfilled, although the whole
group discussion at the end was a little inhibited, and more participants might
have contributed given a smaller group setting. Overall, most found it an
unusual, enjoyable and mildly thought-provoking experience.
6.2 Short focus sessions (2nd
session)
The
first part of the second session consisted of the delivery of mini-focus
sessions by the teachers. These were 30 minute long guided discussion sessions
on one particular point or topic related in some way to the day’s theme, with a
maximum of 4 participants at a given session. Students signed up for the
sessions on the previous evening.
Katie
writes: I think the teachers in general found the time to be too short - just
as a discussion was warming up they had to stop – but personally I liked the
format and I think the participants appreciated the wide choice they were
given.
‘Body language’ - Gabriele
We looked at the universal
gesture: the smile, and then at differences in body language between Westerners
and Tibetans. It was predominantly a discussion session.
‘Global vs. Local
identities’ – Sarah
I used a few short quotes
from a variety of commentators and presented the group with a series of
questions based on the quotes but designed to provoke wider debate on these
themes. It was nice having a very small class as those with better English were
able to help the weaker members with some of the difficult vocabulary. The
discussion was interesting and the themes were used to inform some of the
presentations in the afternoon. We looked at the idea of 'collective identity'
and the way in which globalisation may have led to both the annihilation and the regeneration of local
communities.
‘“Fear is the key”: a
Chinese writer on Tibetan religious culture’ – Alan
This session introduced an
extract from a patronising text, by dissident Chinese writer Wang Lixiong, on
the 'fearful' Tibetan plateau and the religion (from Bon onwards) it as a
consequence generated. The students discussed and vigorously rebutted his
prejudices, then considered a short reply by the Tibetan writer Tsering Shakya.
The session was useful inasmuch as it raised issues further discussed in the
sessions after lunch.
‘How does the language you
speak influence your thoughts?’ – Katie
This was fun and fitted
the time slot well. I ran through some examples of the correct classification
of something requiring correct conceptual understanding e.g. the oft-repeated
example of the many Eskimo words for snow requiring Eskimos to actually look
carefully enough at the snow to give it the right name, hence influencing their
thought patterns (?)… and tried to get them to give me other suggestions. Those
who attended clearly got to grips with the ideas as they later included them,
plus some of their own examples, in their afternoon presentations – giving me a
little flutter of pride in them!
‘Does sharing a language
necessarily lead to the homogenization of different cultures?’ - Margaret and
Peter
We
took the US and UK as an example, and showed two clips from the film "The
Great Escape" - one of how the British commander interacts with the German
commander of the POW camp, and one of how the American officer behaves
differently when introduced the same commandant. We made the mistake of
encouraging discussion before the
clip was shown, which quickly covered the underlying points we had wanted to
make with the film. Perhaps we were just being too simplistic!
My mini focus session was centred on a presentation pack
called ‘Human Faces’ produced by the British Museum, featuring the faces of
statues, portraits and artefacts from its collection. My main aim was to use
these faces as simulations of “culture shock” by confronting the participants
with unfamiliar representations, then getting them to try to come to a deeper
understanding by attributing a voice or thought to the faces. At the end of the
session I concluded by revealing the cultural background which created the
images.
The
exercise produced some interesting results, especially when despite obvious
distinguishing features one participant mistook a statue of the Buddha-to-Be
(from present-day Palestine) for that of a revolutionary, but I felt I did not
lead the discussion nearly as far as I’d have liked though and this would
probably have been a more profitable as a longer, perhaps written, activity.
6.3 Speech by Brigadier
General Tewari
The
second part of the second session consisted of a talk by Claude Arpi’s father
in law, a former Brigadier General in the Indian Army. He described his
experiences as a prisoner of war in Tibet to an attentive audience.
6.4 Afternoon sessions
The
afternoon was given over to participant presentations: the first session to
preparation and the second to delivery. Participants were split into groups of
three and given a total of 10 minutes talk time, but each member had to speak
individually. Teachers facilitated both the preparation and initial choice of
topic – the participants were encouraged to choose a presentation topic
themselves based upon the morning’s activities or otherwise, and if no
inspiration was forthcoming, given a wide-ranging list of possible topics to stimulate
them.
The
presentations were the second given by the Tibetans and there was clear
improvement upon the first attempt. Participants made more use of visual aids,
and talked with more confidence and clarity. Presentations were agreed to be
very useful by most of the participants, and providing them with a topic they
could speak with some passion on, as opposed to asking them to merely give a
description of something, was helpful in making the presentations interesting
to them as well as useful.
7.1 Introduction
Mainly because of the
nature of Auroville, we were able to take advantage of substantial local
expertise and endeavour in the field of renewable energy. Several Aurovillians
visited the Pavilion to speak to the group, and we also visited several of the
units in Auroville itself (students made presentations on these talks and
visits on the final day). These activities were useful not simply for
consciousness-raising about the environment, but also for offering small
business ideas with a lot of potential. Strictly speaking, we shouldn’t
distinguish the visits to ‘environmental’ from ‘business’ units, as we do in
this report, as Auroville businesses tried always to be environmentally aware.
Originally, the visits and talks were to be concentrated in a single afternoon,
but because of timetabling difficulties and also the very number of speakers
and visits, we spread the activities over several days.
7.2 Visiting Speakers
Introduction to Auroville
by Tensee
Tensee,
a European with a bad cold, gave us a slideshow and lecture on the history of
Auroville which vividly illustrated the change in the landscape of Auroville
from an arid plateau in 1968 to the verdant, scorpion-infested forest it is
now. He summarised the many environmental initiatives undertaken by the
residents: afforestation, water management and the avoidance of soil erosion,
solar energy (and the mechanism of the solar kitchen, the settlement’s
refectory), ferro-cement technology, etc. The talk was a good, contextualizing
introduction to the achievements of the settlement, and many may have found it
inspiring, demonstrating, as it did, what can be done in a relatively short
time in a place that was once a near-desert.
‘Moving Solar’ by Joss
(Centre for Scientific Research)
This
presentation was about bringing solar energy to Ladakh, the trans-Himalayan
region of India. It was intended to bring basic lighting to villages that have
no electricity and was funded by Tata/BP Solar. It involved careful
organisation of resource persons and equipment and involved walking
considerable distances to reach the most remote areas. The solar panels are
easy to use and maintain and provide lighting for at least one room in a house.
Tata/BP Solar also provided solar lamps, which have
a small panel attached and can be used for trekking, for nomads in remote areas
and as emergency lights when electricity fails. Joss showed us how, with quite
simple means (but obviously requiring funds) lighting can be provided in an
area where sunlight is almost constantly available.
7.3 Group Visits
Ethno-medicinal forest
We
visited Joss Brooks at Pitchandikulam. This is an area of tropical dry
evergreen forest which has regenerated, partly by planting and partly by
natural means. All the plants have a medicinal purpose and the project works
with the local people to preserve the various systems of indigenous medicinal
treatments. One of the important elements of this is that it is primary health
care and helps those who would not normally go to see a doctor. The variety of
plants was very interesting. We were all impressed by his dedication and
commitment.
Visit to Auroville Building
Centre/Earth Unit
The
tour was conducted by the unit's executive, Satprem Maini, the most extreme in
an Aurovillian series of intense French residents with accents on a scale from
the Closeauesque to the impenetrable. Satprem is an innovator in mud-brick
technology and building and a specialist in dome and arch design (he was also
the original designer of the Tibetan pavilion). The visit was useful in making
us aware of traditional mud-brick technology around the world, and the students
gleaned a lot from it, despite comprehension difficulties, if we are to judge
by their well-informed presentation. As ever the students made good use of the
printed information they got. The visit was also useful for Satprem's dissident
view of Auroville, which he sees as untrue to its avowed environmental
principles: "When Auroville grows up, I am ready to build it".
8.1 Evenings
The
programme of evening activities, run on weekdays only, was very well attended
and generally well received.
It
included:
·
film nights - unfortunately sound
quality of the equipment and poor acoustics in the video room sometimes made it
hard for even the teachers to understand the dialogue. Hopefully when the next
workshop is run in two years time, DVD will have become so ubiquitous that we
won't have to rely on poor quality VHS. We brought far more films than needed,
and the students had many suggestions of their own about what to show.
·
quiz night - started with a grammar
quiz, but should have used harder questions to begin with. The evening
benefited from letting the Tibetans introduce their own games later on.
·
singing - very popular though this
did require a lot of leading by the teachers. The students didn't show much
initiative as a group, and it took a
lot of cajoling to get them to sing Tibetan songs together. Rounds worked very
well, and some dancing (or stomping!) was occasionally thrown into the mix. Two
guitars and a flute helped the festivities along.
·
Ceilidh dancing - Many of the Tibetans were
reluctant to get up and dance. However, those who did enjoyed it greatly. We
tried to get them to show us Tibetan dances, but again the students lacked
self-organisation in this respect.
·
debate on "What is
Tibet?"
- this evening was placed completely in the hands of the Tibetans, and in the
end it was more like two group presentations than a debate. Shame we couldn't
have organised the first 'debate' earlier in order that another might be more
lively. The teachers were allowed to ask six questions in total, which the
students managed not to answer in most cases! It was a very informative but
slightly frustrating evening.
·
film: The Genius of India - a talk and showing of the
film by Claude Arpi about the importance of spirituality in Indian culture
·
story telling - by candlelight. This was
spontaneous due to one of the regular blackouts, and would have benefited from
more preparation.
·
final dinner - a wonderful evening
beginning with drinks at Claude's house, followed by an open-air and candlelit
dinner, beautifully created by a French chef friend of Claude’s, and a dance
party till midnight. (The one flaw in the evening was that the vegetarian food
was inadequately policed and was all swiped by the meat eaters.)
Peter
was responsible for overseeing the activities, although the other teachers ran
or contributed heavily to many of the evenings.
8.2 Weekends
We decided to leave
one day of the weekend entirely free, but to offer an optional trip on the other. We ran two popular weekend trips:
1) Gingee, a nearby hill fort; Tiruvanamallai, a large temple
complex
2) the beach and Pondicherry
These
were chosen on the advice of the caretaker Kalsang, and transportation was booked by Claude.
9.1 Introduction
The
students were asked to give short presentations throughout the workshop
culminating in the final morning when they were expected to give two fairly
extensive presentations each, one of which they had been preparing over the
course of the week. The students were also given more informal opportunities to
practise their presentation
skills such as through the evening debate on the 'Genius of Tibet', and in
small language groups and focus sessions.
The students appreciated
the emphasis on presentation skills and felt they gained in confidence over the
course of the workshop (many had not had experience of giving presentations in
English before).
We
noticed improvements in:
·
overall
confidence
·
voice
projection and pronunciation
·
use
of visual aids
·
keeping
to time limits
·
ability
to communicate directly with audience
·
working
together as a group to avoid repetition in individual presentations.
The
first presentations were on the visits to the Auroville businesses in the first
week of the workshop. The students had been given pre-prepared questionnaires
to use to gather the relevant information from their respective businesses. As
each group visited a different enterprise this presentation was actually quite
difficult as they had to present the structure, aims, and history of the
various businesses as well as the specific information about its daily
operation. The students spent the first session of the afternoon preparing
their presentations to give to the whole group after the tea break. They worked
with the guidance of a member of the Cambridge Team. There was some reluctance
to use visual aids, and students found it difficult to complete their
presentations in time to have a practice run. This meant that there was quite a
lot of repetition within groups. Some of the students who were less proficient
in English struggled with the vocabulary and the amount of information they
were expected to present and needed a lot of individual attention. The actual
presentations were good, despite the repetition. The students used visual aids
although only one group was really successful in producing an aid which gave a clear outline of the whole
presentation. The students were less good at keeping to the time limit - the
more confident speakers tended to run on whilst the less confident found their
words had been said for them by the more dominant members of the groups.
The
second presentations took place on the Culture, Nationality and Language
Seminar day. The students were split into small groups, asked to debate a
question or set of issues relevant to the day's theme (in practice, in relation
to Tibet) and then to prepare a presentation to the rest of the group after the
break. The small group discussions were successful. Some groups got so deep
into their discussions that they didn't leave enough time to prepare for the
presentations. The presentations were strictly timed by Gabriele - just two
minutes allowed per person which was a valuable exercise although it made for
some rather hastened talks! Perhaps because of the strictness of the timing of
these presentations, those given on the final day were much more succinct,
clearer and well-timed.
9.4.1 Renewable Energy
On
the final morning the students first had to give the presentations on renewable
energy which they had been preparing throughout the week and which were based
on their visits of the previous Friday and Monday and the talks by the various
guest speakers. The week-long project worked well and some got quite involved
in researching their various areas. The students all made good use of visual
aids, they spoke much more clearly, and loudly than they had in the beginning
and most were successful in communicating with the audience. The level of
research was impressive as was the range of vocabulary and understanding of the
technical terminology. The voice projection workshop of the previous morning
may not have been entirely successful, but it certainly made the students think
a little more about using their voices, and the importance of talking directly
to the audience. Although some students were still reading from their scripts,
most effectively used their notes as prompts only and made good eye-contact
with the group. We allowed time to give constructive feedback at the end of
this session. We were mostly positive but pointed out that some students were
still talking to the wall when using visual aids.
9.4.2 Business Plans
The
session after the break was devoted to the presentation in their groups of four
on the Business Plans they had produced the previous afternoon. There was an
impressive use of visual aids, very little repetition, excellent timing, and
the students were generally very confident, clear and easy to understand – many
were also very humorous. Bill, as a person with extensive business experience,
oversaw the feedback, asking some follow-up questions to the groups. The five
virtual enterprises were:
-
Tibet
Cable Network (cable TV for the Tibetan settlements)
-
Lhasa Chang (brewing company making a
traditional drink for modern times)
-
Kunga
Youth Centre
-
Yankee’s
Company (garments/ boutique)
-
Tzi
(traditional Tibetan garments)
The
different natures of the businesses raised interesting issues. The Tibet Cable
Network played on the advantages of being an extension of a current enterprise,
a position it could have exploited even more. Lhasa Chang had clear market objectives and brilliantly spelt-out
role allocations. The Kunga Youth Centre faced the additional challenge of
being a charity, and introduced the solution of community fund-raising. The two
garment enterprises dealt creatively with competition: Yankee’s Company
effectively employed cross-marketing by advertising on the Tibet Cable Network,
and Tzi underlined its image as an environmentally-friendly enterprise.
For
most teams, detailed financial projections were felt to be the greatest
challenge given the limited time they had to plan their start-ups. The exercise
also served to emphasise how important it is to have the target audience in
mind. The participants learnt that effective persuasion and that clear,
easily-followed presentation structures are crucial to winning over potential
investors.
Overall,
student feedback was very positive indeed about the presentations, although
some would have preferred individual rather than group work. They all felt that
they had greatly gained in confidence, and many pointed out that giving
presentations in English was not something they had ever had to do before.
10.1 Feedback sheet
The
students were given an anonymous feedback sheet on the final day and asked to
be as honest as possible. It included 5 sections: 1) Things I liked 2) Changes
I would make 3) What I have gained 4) How I will use what I have gained 5)
Other remarks. We left them alone to complete the sheet.
10.2 Self-assessment sheet
We
also gave them a self –assessment sheet on which each student was asked to
grade their English skills – speaking, writing, vocabulary and listening
comprehension –on a scale of 1 (poor) to 5 (excellent). Some of these
assessments were a little eccentric and did not correspond to the teachers’
view of individuals’ abilities: many of the weaker students seemed to
overestimate their abilities while the stronger did the opposite. However, comparison
with the self-assessment completed by students on the first day suggests that
they were marking their progress over
the three weeks of the workshop rather than their objective ability. This
comparison reveals that all but two felt they had improved in all aspects of
their English - a very heartening result for us.
10.3 Analysis of
participant feedback
In
general the workshop feedback was good. The length of the workshop was felt by
most to be appropriate, and students appreciated the Tibetan Pavilion and
Auroville itself as a venue, despite the heat, for offering a) an alternative
model of living and enterprise and b) an environment where they were encouraged
to speak English as much as possible (not the case in Dharamsala, for example).
There was disagreement about the food, and it seems that more variety would
have been preferred.
Positive
points:
·
Good
organisation.
·
The
intensive nature of the workshop.
·
The
friendly and interactive teaching style.
·
The
fact we had them do several presentations. They gained greatly in confidence
and fluency (again and again, students stress their increased confidence).
·
The
emphasis on enterprise and especially the exercise of preparing business plans.
·
Visits
to the Auroville enterprises: offered models of small-scale business.
·
Increased
knowledge of how to deal with business.
·
Practice
in pronunciation, listening, discussion and role play.
·
Grammar
and language classes much appreciated.
·
Insights
into Tibetan and other cultures.
Negative
points:
·
Vastly
disproportionate number of men to women.
·
Workshop
too short; should have been one month (a minority opinion).
·
Many
suggest having fewer focus sessions and more language based sessions,
presentations or debates.
·
Not
enough grammar teaching, pronunciation work and correction of mistakes.
·
Absence
of Help sessions.
·
The
heat.
·
More
individual, rather than group presentations.
·
Should
have been more student-led activities.
·
Should
have been informed to bring all identity documents.
Some
remarks:
Complaints
about not having enough grammar and correction are typical of language
students, especially those used to non-communicative modes of teaching. This is
not to suggest that such complaints be discounted, but that students' interest
be channelled into skills work, especially writing and speaking, which amount
to 'grammar in action' (grammar is theoretical knowledge and useful only
inasmuch as it can be activated). The replacement of one of the afternoon focus
sessions with skills workshops is one obvious solution to the problem. Although
the students didn't mention it, there wasn't enough writing practice in the
workshop (partly because we avoided giving homework). Overall, however, the
students seem to agree that the organisation of the workshop worked well.
Appendix A
The
workshop team
|
|
Activity
when recruited |
Specific
Workshop Role |
Current
Activity |
|
Yen-Pei
Chen |
Final year Bachelor’s degree in English |
Applications coordinator |
Masters in Linguistics at UCL |
|
Peter
Eckley |
Final year Bachelor’s degree in physics |
Social secretary |
Telecommuni-cations
consultancy in Cambridge and, eventually, PhD |
|
Katie
Marwick |
First year medicine |
Accountant |
2nd year Medicine and President CU-HELST |
|
Alan
O’Leary |
MPhil literature student with EFL experience |
Coordinator |
PhD at Cambridge on Italian Film |
|
Gabriele
Reifenberg |
ELST trustee with EFL experience |
Discipline officer |
Continues to travel and teach, and remains an
ELST trustee |
|
Margaret
Tench |
MPhil in Politics, Democracy and Education |
Participant liaison officer |
Wine maker moving from California to Amsterdam,
and learning Dutch |
|
Sarah
Waters |
Member workshop 2001; Cambridge Bachelor’s degree
in history followed by a graduate scholarship with Christ’s College |
Administrator |
MSc at London School of Hygiene and Tropical
Medicine |
All the team members can be contacted through ELST.
Appendix B.
The workshop participants
|
|
Name |
|
Postal address |
|
1 |
Chime
Tenzing |
|
c/o Dept. of English,
Vivekananda College, Mysore, Chennai 4, India |
|
2 |
Chime
Yungdrung |
|
Menri
Monastery, Kotla-Panjola, Solan, Ochaghat 173223, H.P. India |
|
3 |
Dawa
Tshering |
|
Travel
Slique, 5 Pasang Building, J.P. Sharma Road, Darjeeling-734101 (W.B.) |
|
4 |
Dhondup
Tsering |
|
The
Tibet Journal, Library of Tibetan Works & Archives, Gangchen Kyishong,
Dharamsala 176215 |
|
5 |
Gedun
Gyatso |
|
c/o
Tibet Times, Session Road, Dharamsala - 176215, Distt. Kangra (H.P.), India |
|
6 |
Jampa
Sangpo |
|
Nampaling
Tibetan Settlement, PO Box 97, Hiletar Pokhara, Nepal |
|
7 |
Lhakpa
Tsering |
|
H.H.
The Dalai Lama's CTHE, 24 Feroze Gandhi Road, Lajpat Nagar III, New Delhi,
India 110024 |
|
8 |
Lobsang
Sherap |
|
Secretary,
Tibetan Refugee Service Co-op. Society Ltd, Sonamling Tibetan Settlement,
Choglamser - 194104, Leh - Ladakh, J&K State |
|
9 |
Lobsang
Wangdak |
|
C
Village House no. 24, PO Tibetan Colony, Kollegal Taluk, Chamrag Nagar Distt,
Karnataka 571457 |
|
10 |
Lobsang
Yonten |
|
Gu-Chu-Sum
Movement of Tibet, Jogibara Road, Mcloed Ganj, Dharamsala H.P. 176219, INDIA |
|
11 |
Ngawang
Tharchen |
|
Lyn
Regis, Dick Road, Musoorie, Uttranchal, India |
|
12 |
Shedup
Tenzin |
|
Department
Of Indo-Tibetan Studies, Visva Bharati University, Santiniketan - 731 235,
Distt. Birbhum (W.B.), India |
|
13 |
Sonam
Dorjee |
|
House
no. 48, Kailashpura, Bylakuppe, District Mysore, India 571104 |
|
14 |
Tenpa
Dhargyal |
|
TCV
Health Centre, Dharamsala Cantt, District kangra HP 176216 India |
|
15 |
Tenpa
Thargyal K. |
|
Dhondenling
Venthal Hospital, Dhondeling Tibetan Settlemen, PO Oderpaliya-571457
Kollegall Taluk, Chamaraj Nagar district, Karnataka |
|
16 |
Tenzin
Choeying |
|
House
34- Top Floor, Indravihar Near BBM Depot, Delhi 110009 |
|
17 |
Tenzin
Llundup |
|
Mahatma
Gandhi College of Law, Bhavan, Jhansi Road, Gwl-09 (M.P.) India |
|
18 |
Tenzin
Yangkyi |
|
House
no. B-72, Group 5, Tibetan Colony Sahastradara Road, Dehradoon, Uttranchal,
248001 |
|
19 |
Tsering
Choedon |
|
c/o
ATA, 2nd Floor, G-33 Lajpat Nagar III New Delhi 110024 |
|
20 |
Tsering
Paljor |
|
Senior
School, Tibetan SOS Children's Village, PO Bylakuppe, Mysore, KS, India |
|
21 |
Tsewang
Dorjee |
|
House
No. 65, Old Camp No. 1, P.O. Bylakuppee, Distt. Mysore, Karnataka State,
India |
To email any participant, please contact ELST.