Clifford the Dog

''Ok, so I want you to shut your eyes and imagine something. I want you to imagine your future, I want you to dream of where you would like to be one day, and what you would like to be doing. When you are ready, open your eyes and draw. Draw that place, that time, that dream....''

So, when I am subsequently faced with fifteen pictures of Clifford the Dog, I am semi-disappointed. Fifteen pictures of Clifford the sodding dog. I asked for hopes, dreams and aspirations but what I actually got was a giant red canine. Multiple copies thereof. Oh, and sketches of cartoon students wearing graduation outfits.

Funnily enough, illustrations of both Clifford the Dog, and the wide-eyed animated alumnus can be found on the walls of Salon 3 . It seems that, if there is something within a 10 foot radius which can be replicated by my students in favour of using their respective noggins, they will almost invariably opt to copy. And by 'almost' invariably, I mean, invariably.

A similar thing happened last week, when a perfectly intelligent and talented friend of mine was absolutely taken aback when his planned lesson - a university style seminar type shebang, where we would all talk openly about our feelings in relation to music, probably, according to his rather unrealistic imagination, sipping tea with our shoes and socks off - bombed:

''What do people think of XXX song? [silence] Has anyone ever written a song? [silence] What is your favourite musician? [silence]". This cycle of questioning and aggressive non-answering went on for a period of time before the whole thing was finally aborted in favour of fashioning maracas out of plastic cups.

From these examples, can we then safely that the kids at the project are devoid of taste and opinion? That they don't have ideas? That they lack creativity? Hm...It seems more likely that they don't the confidence to voice their thoughts in an open forum, or to say 'this is what I think, this is what I like'. I have found that you almost have to trick them into it expressing themselves, disguising choices and thinking activities as instructions and formal lessons, it is then you uncover a wealth of imagination and talent. It's all there.

And that's when that old chestnut, cultural context, becomes absolutely relevant.

Just one contributing factor must be that the traditional educational framework here in Guate is based on a system of rote learning and regurgitating information. It is categorically not based on giving the students the tools with which to think for themselves (unless you consider printing 27 pages on the origin of football according to Wikipedia to be a useful activity for the children of the Basurero community).

This country is also only recently emerging from a period of extremely violent and oppressive conflict, where to know anything, to have information about something or someone was extremely dangerous. Although most of the kids in Guatemala are too young to have been directly personally affected by the war, this sense of fear and mistrust is deeply ingrained in the community psyche, fed by ongoing violence and gang activity. And the problem is especially noticeable with the girls who are struggling to breath in a overtly machismo society.

On that note, I'm off to buy some veggies...