Honduran Values Education… and Tutti Frutti!

The first course that I just completed this week for my M.Ed. (online!) is called ¨Developing Character through the Curriculum,¨ and I wanted to share an excerpt from one of my essays for the class. Hopefully this will give you a glimpse of values/character education in Honduras.

At my school, a K-12 institution, students are required to take a ¨values¨ class throughout elementary school that meets once a week and consists mostly of doing workbook pages and watching videos. Most elementary school students complain that they think the class is boring, but most teachers would argue that students need more, not less, values education. At the high school level, where I teach, lack of values reinforcement appears all the time through behavior problems and academic dishonesty. It would seem, as Lickona (1991) puts forth, that the problem is not whether we should teach values, but which ones, and especially how they will be taught. Based on my observations at school, and the readings in this course, I feel that artificially isolated character education should be included, but minimized, and that character education integration into core academic subjects should be maximized.

Exercising personal virtue can be likened to speaking a foreign language. As in a language, a grammar point or an agreed-upon virtue can be easily practiced in controlled isolation—it is modeled, and eventually everyone ¨knows¨ what the right answer is. However, out in the real world, the language of moral values needs to be spoken—truly practiced—in spontaneous, often troublesome situations. Can students live out ethical behavior, or are they only able to do the workbook exercise? Moral knowing is not enough—students must demonstrate their embodiment of good character by turning that knowledge into genuine moral feelings and moral actions (Lickona, 1991). Students must face situations in which they must use moral courage, and those situations can never truly be simulated by staged classroom role-play. A contrived, isolated, serial approach to values education does not allow students to see how seamlessly many values are integrated (Kohn, 1997), nor does it allow them to see how they are related to outside subjects or situations.

Even though in my above essay excerpt I berated our school´s values education program as being too workbook focused, there is one activity that the elementary students do every year in values class that I think is really sweet. The students get together and make Tutti Frutti, or the Honduran version of fruit salad. The difference is that it the fruit is soaked in fruit punch to keep the fruit from turning brown, plus a little dollop of condensed milk on top. Each student must bring in their assigned ingredient (the value of responsibility, and being an integral part of a group), help chop and prepare the salad (the value of hard work), and then they distribute the fruit salad to the teachers, administrators, and support staff (values of sharing and gratitude). The students usually don´t get to eat any of the salad themselves—it is purely a practical exercise of values. Now that´s the way character education should be!

My school is a private, bilingual school, so I asked a friend, Nohelia, who is currently doing her teaching practicum in a public school, how values education works there. She told me that there is a weekly, nationally-decided-upon value that teachers must at least mention but hopefully also weave into their class. The idea is that students should get the same value reinforced across the board from all teachers, and see how it fits into their curriculum (there are some problems with this plan, but at least in theory, it´s a good thing!).

All graduating high school seniors in Honduras, public and private schools alike, are required to complete what is known as TES—Trabajo Educativo Social, or Educational Social Work. This is one of my favorite things about my senior students. They have organized toy drives at Christmas, tutored low-income students in English, and planted trees, among other things. Recently, and through the leadership of a parent involved with the Lions Club International, seniors and even students from lower grades have been participating more and more with medical brigades. They interpret Spanish and English for visiting US doctors and low-income patients who receive free medical care. Students even help with organizational tasks such as setting up a makeshift pharmacy for the week that the brigades are in town. The other cool thing is that you can always spot the TES groups from the different high schools around town as most of them get special t-shirts printed for when they participate in TES service activities. I think it´s wonderful that Honduras has asked its young people to give back before they are given their diploma.
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PS—Here are the references from the essay (in case you´re interested!). I highly recommend the second one to ALL teachers and school administrators!
Kohn, A. (1997). How not to teach values: A critical look at character education. Phi Beta Kappan, February 1997.
Lickona, T. (1991). Educating for character: How our schools can teach respect and responsibility. New York: Bantam Books.

Walls Follow-Up

Even though the topic of my recent blog post, http://dianainhonduras.blogspot.com/2011/06/to-wall-or-not-to-wall.html , was not the most light-hearted or easy to write, it did generate some interest. I am proud to announce that the editor of Honduras Weekly, and independent, online newspaper, contacted me to publish it on his website! You can see a slightly-edited version of the original post published here:

http://www.hondurasweekly.com/culture/3833-our-walled-in-life

I also recommend just browsing the page in general--there are lots of great articles about everything from volunteerism to politics to Honduran culture.

Also, I wanted to share some thoughts from other bloggers and articles about their experiences with walls abroad.

From a religion-blogger´s experience at a conference in Jamaica:
http://blog.sojo.net/2011/06/01/unveiling-the-walls-that-divide-us/

¨When I first arrived at the University of the West Indies where we were staying, the first thing I noticed was the amount of barbed wire fencing that surrounded the campus and each of the dormitory buildings. Sharing my observation and surprise with a participant, he said it is the cheaper means of security, which I had not thought about before. With the barbed wire fencing so obviously visible, I was constantly faced with my own need to feel safe and protected, making the assumption that this must not be a safe place. I guess I prefer the invisible barbed wire of hidden cameras, security alarms, and people I would never meet providing 24-hour surveillance supplying me with a false sense of security that gives me the luxury not to face any fears I have that I may be vulnerable to danger. This got me thinking about other things in my life and my surroundings that I have easily overlooked because they aren´t obviously visible.¨

I recommend reading the whole article!

The following link is to an article http://www.nytimes.com/2011/06/05/opinion/05kristof.html?_r=2&scp=1&sq=our%20fantasy%20nation&st=cse comparing the privatization of many public services in the States to Pakistan. Many of the things mentioned in the article are true of many developing nations, including Honduras. Here is a passage that rang true for me:

¨Instead of paying taxes for a reliable electrical grid, each wealthy family installs its own powerful generator to run the lights and air-conditioning. It´s noisy and it stinks, but at least you don´t have to pay for the poor.... Police budgets are being cut, but the wealthy take refuge in gated [Honduras note: OR WALLED] communities with private security guards. Their children are spared the impact of budget cuts at public schools and state universities because they attend private institutions [Honduras note: or they avoid yearly teacher strikes! And yes, I teach at one of these private institutions for the wealthy in my city].¨

Hope you enjoyed the links, and hope they provided a little food for thought.

Making Honduran Refried Beans from Scratch

Hondurans are choosy about their beans. Although I enjoy all kinds of beans, Hondurans overwhelmingly prefer the small, red beans (NOT kidney beans) that they eat with almost every meal. They say the taste is unequaled by any other bean, and I have even heard of Hondurans who live in the States bringing back the dry beans because nothing is the same as that little taste of home. Black beans are common in the markets (and they seem to be the bean of choice in Nicaragua and Costa Rica), but they are cheaper than the red beans and not widely used.

Homemade refried beans are the best, and I´ve been lucky enough to have several bean mentors who have shown me the way (thanks, Nohelia, Ana Paola, and Karen!!). Here is the the Honduran way to make refried beans from scratch--note that like any good Central American recipe, all measurements are estimates :)

Ingredients:

Beans (about 2-3 cups) Use leftover, already cooked red beans from dinner the night before, or use canned beans in a pinch. Rinse and drain. Some people add a little of the cooking liquid back into the refried beans for extra flavor

Some sort of fat (1/4 to 1/2 cup)--most commonly vegetable shortening, but I used bacon fat the other day and it made the beans A-MAZ-ING!!!!

Onions (about 1-2 Tbsp, chopped VERY finely)

Salt, to taste, but you probably won´t need much at all

Start with a large, non-stick fry pan over medium heat. Heat up the shortening (or bacon fat!) and saute the onions until they are golden. Next, add the whole beans to the pan and find a nice strong flat-bottomed cup or glass. This is my favorite part. Use the bottom of the cup to squish the beans flat in the pan, directly into the fat. This is waaaay better than using a potato masher like some of the other recipes I´ve found on the internet. It is also extremely theraputic. It leaves some of the bean skins intact, unlike blending the beans, to give that nice, slightly chunky homemade texture. One the beans are suffiently mashed and the fat and onions sufficiently incorporated, taste them and add any salt you would like to add. Keep heating the beans, stirring occasionally. The beans are done when they stick more to themselves than to the sides of the pan. You can even give the beans a little flip. If half of the beans flip easily like a flapjack and stick back to themselves, you´ve got it!!! Flip onto a plate and serve immediately.

The mashing and flipping techniques are really best shown to someone in person, which is why I am so thankful to my mentors :) Too little fat, or overcooking, will make your beans dry and crumbly. Too much fat will make your beans greasy and icky when reheating. The cafeteria lady at school puts so much shortening in her beans that when I take them home and refrigerate them, they turn white. Eeeeew...

I know it´s not the traditional way, but the bacon fat refried beans were a big hit with my husband (and me!), and he liked them even more on his baleadas the next morning :)

To Wall or Not to Wall...

Most houses in the city here in Central America have high walls around them, often topped with broken glass bottles cemented spikily in place, barbed wire, or electric fences. When I studied abroad in Costa Rica in 2002, this was one of the first things that really hit me as a big cultural difference--the place looked like a war zone. Once I got used to it and traveled to other Latin American countries, the omnipresent ¨security¨ feature faded to the back of my mind, and I began to appreciate the decorative ironwork that is often used to make those big walls look a little classier.

Honduras is no different. There are walls everywhere and the richer you are, the bigger and scarier your wall. You won´t see walls around most houses in poorer or rural areas, just fences. This past week, two tragic incidents have made me think a lot about walls...

A Honduran teacher I know from school got mugged and essentially sexually assaulted at the same time (as the mugger looked for cell phones and cash tucked in her underwear--¨You women keep things everywhere¨). It happened on a street that is narrow and lined with large houses with equally large walls. And it happened very quickly--between the time she got out of the taxi and the time the door of the house was opened for her. Basically, no one saw what was happening because everyone was walled in. So walls might make residents safer while they are actually in their houses, but it makes the street more dangerous. Besides the safety (or not) of people in the streets, walls with electrified fences as home security kill wildlife and even killed my husband´s aunt´s cat.

By contrast, my husband´s immediate family is from a poorer neighborhood where there are many un-walled houses. When I first moved there to a small aparment only a few blocks from the family´s house, I was taken aback by all the interaction in the streets. Kids were out playing with one another, neighbors stood or sat on corners chatting, etc. At my previous neighborhood (with big walls at the American teachers´housing) the streets were emptier and there was less activity. At least when there are more people out and about, there are more witnesses, and several Hondurans have given me the advice that it is always safer to walk down streets with more people on them.

My mother-in-law lives in an unfinished cinderblock house with a couple of dogs out front to help guard the property. No big walls. One of the dogs, Doby, is a great dog but is totally a mutt (the use of and attitudes toward animals in Honduras is another blog entry entirely). About a year ago, my husband made a trade for a purebred rotweiler named Max. He loved this dog and so did Anthony, his nephew. In the last few days, Max had been refusing to eat, and his face and neck had been swollen. We took him to a vet who said he just needed to be treated for parasites, so we got him all the shots and pills we thought he needed to recover. However, he continued to get worse and died this morning. Anthony said his eyes were completely green. We racked our brains trying to figure out what went wrong (why doesn´t Doby have parasites, too?) and we are now pretty sure someone on the street poisoned him. After all, there is no wall to keep someone from throwing him a piece of meat with poison pellets in it.

Why? Well, when I was in Costa Rica, someone poisoned the ¨guard dog¨ at one of the houses on our street, and then a few days later, their house was robbed. I mentioned my concern to my husband, and he was like, well, why didn´t they poison Doby, too? (We will keep watching out the next few days!!) He has seen other instances of people poisoning more purebred dogs simply for jealousy or revenge, so that´s more his theory. We had been talking recently about constructing a wall at his mom´s house for several reasons--the dirt road always kicks up dust that comes into the house, and la pobrecita has to spend half the day dusting and mopping, so a wall would at least block some of it. We were hoping to finish constructing the house and a wall would provide some security that the construction materials wouldn´t ¨wander off by themselves.¨ But, with Max´s death and the speculated cause, it looks like it´s definitely time...

I wonder how many other people have gone through similar debates with themselves. To wall or not to wall? Walls are expensive, so that means they are not an option for some. No walls means better community interactions and a more beautiful neighborhood (assuming people take care of their yards, but at least you can see the houses!), but anyone can wander in. Walls means screw everyone else, at least we are ¨safe.¨ There really is a strong sense of fear here in Honduras about so many things, and it is reflected in the physical construction of neighborhoods; the ¨war zone¨ I mentioned before. Maybe it´s just that many other people simply got hurt too many times and reached the same frustrating point where we are. We just want our dogs, our belongings, and especially our family to be safe. Or ¨safe.¨

La Libertad--Cerro de los Tornillos

Nohelia, Alexis and I took a little day trip recetly to La Libertad, a small city near our home base of Comayagua. I was most excited to check out a place I had heard about that had some interesting fossils called "Cerro de los Tornillos" or Screw Hill. While it has nothing to do with teenage trysts, it is a reference to the shape of the fossilized shells that look like twisted screw shapes (See image). I was hoping to scout out the place before taking a class on a possible field trip there to do our own fossil hunting. I didn't know if it was a park or what, and I wanted to see for myself.

When we got there, the hill was literally right next to where the bus dropped us off (how convenient!). That also meant that it was smack in the middle of a neighborhood. There were some cement steps built to help visitors and residents up the hill, but there was no kind of protected area. We asked some local residents about the place, and they said even they would like to see it more protected. One woman said that at some point, an interested party tried to get the residents to sell their land so the site could be excavated, but the residents preferred to stay. I think it would be nice to have some kind of interpretive sign set up to explain to visitors what it is they're looking at and how it came to be. After a little internet research, the fossils are gastropods from the Cretaceous period.

The rest of La Libertad was not much to write home about (sorry Libertenos!!). We spent probably an hour and half poking around on el Cerro de los Tornillos, then ate lunch and came back to Comayagua. Since the place wasn't really set up to receive visitors, I don't think a field trip would be the greatest idea unless it included some other things, but it might be nice to come up with some interpretive signs as a class service project :)

Photo credits go to El Heraldo newspaper, which has a site on Honduran fossils (in Spanish) and lots of great pictures here http://www.elheraldo.hn/Otras-Secciones/Especial-Fosiles/Inicio Clicking on the articles section also has more info about the lack of fossil protection in Honduras.

Paperwork and Beaurocracy Part 2

After writing the last blog entry, I realized that I had left out a very important way in which beaurocratic inefficiency GREATLY affects my life here in Honduras. My husband is a taxi driver... sort of (I realize I never blogged about getting married but I got married to an amazing Honduran man at the courthouse back in September 2010, and our big white poufy dress ceremony is in just a few weeks!).

I say sort of because after buying our own taxi (so he would no longer have to pay 60-80% of his daily income to the owner of the car), we have had ridiculous amounts of trouble with the paperwork. Due to two major paperwork incidents and a major repair, my husband has only been able to legally work the taxi for 4 weeks out of the 6 months we have owned it. This has been EXTREMELY frustrating to him because he wants to work and feel useful in life, and also because he's trying to do things the best way he can and be completely legal in everything. There are plenty of illegal taxis working in the streets and he doesn't want to be one of them.

The most frustrating part is the illlusion of the wait times. I'm the kind of person that gets annoyed when I'm on a car trip or something and someone says "we're almost there" when there is about an hour and a half left to go. Please don't tell me we're almost there until there are like 5 or 10 minutes left because I will falsely get my hopes up. Piece of paperwork #1: Cambio de Unidad (changing a taxi number from one car to another). They told us it would take 2 weeks. It took 2 months. The whole time, hubby was under the illusion that the paper was about to arrive, just any day now... so he thought he was being patient, and didn't look for other jobs.

As soon as the Cambio de Unidad arrived, we had the taxi working for about 1.5 weeks when the car broke down, like major engine repairs. Hubby was fixing the car while I was in the States for Christmas and finally got it up and running in early January (with a major investment of DINERO!!!). He was only working for about 2 weeks when the Transitos (traffic police) stopped him. His car is already kind of a target because it has a "high" number (anything over 600). Basically, as far as I can tell, here in Comayagua there were only 600 legal taxi numbers, but Mel's administration released almost 200 additional numbers 601-799 because there were lots of young people out of work and taxi driving is a good option when you can't get hired by a store or a company. Many of these higher numbers are considered to be illegitimate and there was even talk of revoking them (we were worried!). Anyway we are renting the number and the owner of the number is a lawyer (Lawyering isn't lucrative enough for ya???) so he has at least (if not SLOWLY) been helping us ensure that the paperwork is up to snuff.

The Transitos said that there was an "inconsistency" in the taxi's paperwork, and everything had to be sent back to Tegucigalpa to be corrected. They said it would take 2 days. Yep, that's right, it's been 2 MONTHS again. This whole time my husband was basically denied the right to work in his own taxi because of stupid paperwork. It's no wonder many people do work illegally because it has been excruciating to try to play by the rules.

If you are the praying type, please pray for a little more grease in the wheels of Honduran government (really, at all levels) and also for our situation.

Blog Response: Beaurocracy and Paperwork

I just read this blog entry--La Gringa's Blogicito gets emailed to me when updated and I enjoy reading it very much:
http://lagringasblogicito.blogspot.com/2011/02/why-is-honduras-so-poor.html?utm_source=feedburner&utm_medium=email&utm_campaign=Feed%3A+blogspot%2FvZZx+%28La+Gringa%27s+Blogicito%29

A little response to that... my (new! awesome!) husband's birth certificate, national ID card, and drivers' license didn't match up in terms of his birth date. We had to get these documents changed to all match each other before we could get legally married and before we submit any immigration paperwork to the US. Some said his year of birth was 1985 and others said it was 1987. He is pretty sure (but the fact that he's not entirely sure is kind of weird!) that he was actually born in 1987, but he decided to change it to 1985. I'm happy about that since I'm older than him so it makes me feel a little less like I'm robbing the cradle, haha. Luckily, he didn't have a hard time getting the documents fixed such as the cases in the blog entry above... We don't even know exactly when his mom was born... sometime in January or February, maaaaybe...the year? Anyone's guess.