A South African Teacher's Adventures In & Out of the Global Classroom
After four years of teaching in the Middle East, I walked away from teaching as a full-time career. My partner wanted to continue his career here and I supported him so we have stayed in the region. However, after my third year teaching in a…
I’ve been at school for the past 4 weeks and since I began teaching, my most requested topic has become, “Panda please write about your school experience! Tell us how you feel now that you have started teaching! What is teaching in Abu Dhabi like?”…
Whenever I tell people that I teach abroad, they look at me like I’ve struck gold. And in some ways I have. Teaching abroad can offer a wonderful package for teachers enabling them to pay off debt in their home countries, live comfortably in their…
Earlier this year, I started my new teaching job in Kuwait and was informed that I would be teaching 5 year olds. This wouldn’t have been a problem if I was a qualified and experienced kindergarten educator. However- I am most certainly not. After 5…
I arrived in Kuwait on the 14th of September, which means I have officially been here for three weeks. Time seems to have sped up since I arrived here because how on earth did 2 weekends pass already?! During the first few weeks in Kuwait I…
Yesterday was my first day of work… and what a day it was! I was told to report to Kindergarten and so I did. The classroom looked something like this: Each kindergarten teacher has a teacher’s assistant (TA) which is basically a person who…
I arrived in Kuwait on Wednesday afternoon, fatigued after 17 hours of traveling from Durban, South Africa. While waiting in transit at Doha airport, I finally started to feel more than just a little trepidation at the thought of moving to this conservative little Muslim…
It took exactly 74 days, from the time I accepted the offer from my school in Kuwait till the time the visa was issued (If you want detailed information on the Kuwaiti visa process please click here). During that time, I resigned from my job,…
My No Objection Certificate (NOC) FINALLY arrived- after 8 weeks of waiting- and I have sent off all my other documents along with my passport to the Kuwaiti embassy in Pretoria. It will hopefully be returned with the visa sticker in my passport (fingers crossed…
Since I am documenting my journey toward a life in Kuwait as an educator, it is inevitable that I blog about packing up my life. Seriously though… how do you pack your entire life into two 20kg pieces of luggage? The walls of my apartment…