The Family Business

I am surrounded by teachers.  My mother, sister, aunt, cousins and numerous friends: all teachers.  Given my innate aversion to children, I was perfectly happy to let this hereditary vocation pass over me.  Sure, I yearned for their ample summer and holiday breaks but when it came down to it the extra time off wasn’t worth the 180-something days of thankless exhaustion. 

But there I stood:  impotent and defeated in a barren dirt classroom.  Unruly Picassos were snatching chalk and scribbling sloppy masterpieces everywhere their tiny arms could stretch.  A gang war raged savagely in the far corner.  Dueling despots had torn rulers from the wall and were whacking the board with authority as they lorded over their stick-less compatriots.  Every available inch of my body had a child attached to it – grabbing, poking, examining.  Still more stampeded through the available floor space.  A chorus of foreign nursery rhymes taunted me from just outside the door, sounding increasingly more like a battle hymn.

And it had all started so innocently….

One of the issues I have been working on with CEFASE is violence reduction, particularly for women and children.  Cameroon remains a largely traditional and patriarchal society.  Here wives are “purchased” through the dowry system and are viewed as property of their husbands.  Female genital mutilation is still a common traditional practice in the northern regions, brutalizing as many as 20% of Cameroonian women according to the World Health Organization.  Spousal abuse is not viewed as legal grounds for divorce, and while rape is a criminal offense, men are exempted from punishment if they agree to marry the victim.  All of these practices have contributed a culture where over 80% of women are the victims of domestic violence, according to the US Ambassador.

CEFASE tackles domestic violence head on, meeting directly with couples and families in rural villages to discuss women’s rights, peaceful resolution of conflict and the impact of domestic violence on families and communities.  Seminars are held to teach women how to recognize the forms of abuse, what their rights are and how to report violence.  Most importantly, CEFASE works to establish a culture where violence is not tolerated by working with village chiefs to establish vigilant committees that encourage reporting and enforce penalties for abuse.

But the problem is not just in marriages – it is in a deep rooted cultural acceptance of violence.  Children grow up witnessing domestic violence in their homes and are commonly subjected to violent discipline by their parents and even teachers.  It becomes ingrained in them as a traditional behavior; boys grow up thinking violence is normal and girls grow up thinking it is deserved.  In fact, a recent UN survey showed that 55% of Cameroonian women think beating is a justifiable punishment for a perceived neglect of their children.  The percentage approaches 90% in the rural villages.

To break this cycle, CEFASE works with parents and teachers to educate them about the impact of violence on childhood development and provide tips to manage children’s behavior peacefully. The goal is to remove violence as a disciplinary measure to help solidify the practice of peaceful conflict resolution for the next generation – stopping the cycle of violence against women.

It was at one of these trainings that my story began.  I was standing in front of about twenty-five primary school teachers at a very rural school outside Yaounde, extolling the virtues of non-violent education.  (Don’t worry…the irony of the only non-teacher in my family standing up there telling teachers how to do their job has not escaped me.)  I encouraged them to create a positive learning environment through colorful pictures and collaboratively setting classroom rules.  I advised them to use positive reinforcement to foster good behavior – “choose a student of the day!”  And when all else failed, try things like a time out chair to manage misbehavior.  My personal favorite was the smirking disbelief on their faces when I tried to say that you can quiet a classroom just by silently holding up your hand and waiting until all the children join you. 

After the training, the headmistress came up to thank me.  She thanked me for teaching them new methods because at the school down the street they were hitting a child and he turned into an animal!  Alright so their motivations might not be altruistic, but if it prevents even a few cane beatings then I am considering it a job well done.  It was at this moment that she asked if I would be willing to come back and work with the children, get them excited to learn English.  Marsha, who was standing next to me, jumped in enthusiastically, “Oh, that would be fun!”  Speak for yourself Marsha….

But nonetheless, I agreed and a few days later we traipsed back to the school armed with lesson plan ideas solicited from my teacher entourage.  I was put into a pre-nursery, nursery and nursery school class with about thirty children aged about 4-7.  Although my absolute worst nightmare – I do not have the knack for talking to little ones.  I never know what to say and my discomfort is palatable even to them -- for awhile, things were going great.  They sat quietly, and even dutifully repeated the letters and shapes back to me.  When they rang a bell to indicate break time, I was feeling pretty good about myself.

However, after break the teacher went to see the headmaster.  And that is when all hell broke loose.  Newly energized from their break-time snack and play, these sweet little tikes turned into a horde of demons.  I would separate two from a headlock, only to turn around and find three more wrestling on the floor.  I would confiscate the last piece of rogue chalk, only to have some infiltrator for another room restock the black market supply so I’d find my carefully drawn school bus irrevocably defaced.  Forget teaching, I became a cage-match referee.  And soon I wasn’t even refereeing….I was just trying to survive.  The kids pulled at my hands and legs, grabbed at my clothes, pulled my hair from behind.  There were so many of them around me I couldn’t even move.  My desperate pleas to “stop that!” and “sit down!” were easily drowned out by the warrior cries, dictator tirades and rebellion songs of the masses.  I am only grateful I wasn’t wearing my glasses, or I am sure I would have suffered the same fate as Piggy.  It was survival of the fittest in that room, and they had the home-court advantage.

Just when I was about to give up and head for the hills, a voice boomed “Why are you not in your seats?”  Instantly these miniature warriors transformed back into adorable angelic children.  The teacher strode across the room with confidence, picked up a piece of chalk and returned the lesson like nothing had happened.  I felt like I was in the eye of a tornado – just a few minutes before it was utter mayhem but now it was eerily normal. 

Unwilling to wait for the phase two, I politely thanked the teacher for letting me come to her classroom and ran.  As I left, all the children stood in unison and said in their best sing-song voice “Thank you Auntie Tracey.”   Children are jerks.