Mr. Hodsdon's Travel in Ghana

 I wanted to keep the two parts of this day separate. In the afternoon we had a chance to create red-red with fried plantain, boiled yams and collared greens with pumpkin. We started at a center that helps woman earn a steady living wage and can offer them loans to get their feet under them. Many of us bought things there to support the cause. We were all a bit shell shocked and quiet after Cape Coast Castle. However, the cooking class seemed to break the ice and we all enjoyed it. The food we made was some of the best we tasted in Ghana. It was a 4 hour ride each way to get there due to construction, it was very bumpy in the back seat for Darius and me. Cooking Class in Cape Coast The road to and from Cape Coast

7/27/24 Cape Coast Castle Today we visited Cape Coast a town that took us about 4 hrs to get their because of a huge construction project. I knew this part of the trip would have a great impact on me, but it did more than I would have thought. In this Blog I tried to find a balance between telling a disturbing story and making sure it is told appropriately. Just for my own memory, I am going to try to summarize a brief history of slavery in Ghana. Indigenous slavery was happening long before the European’s came to the African continent. Slaves Between states and kingdoms in Africa happened for a number of reasons including warfare, market supply, tributes, pawing, gifts, convicts and kidnapping . The difference was that as A.A. Perbi, an expert on indigenous slavery defines it as “A person in Servitude guarded by rights.” Once a person was taken into slavery, they could be freed or incorporated into the the people through marriage. I am not saying this type of slavery was OK, but it...

       Today we are in Accra for the day. We started today at a place called Perbi Cubs. It was a husband and wife from Canada who moved to Ghana and started a digital library to confront the problem of literacy in Africa. It started with a collection of books, but they later found that they could reach more people through a digital platform. There is a literacy crisis in Africa and this would be a way to reach many more kids. In Africa, 300 million kids between the ages of 6 and 14 have poor literacy. It is estimated that 90% of children in Africa can not read and understand by age 10. We heard form the Perbi Kids founder and then had students show us the platform. Kids read books, then can take a quiz and earn medalions for reading. It is a neat concept, thus far they have 30,000 kids involved in the program.     We had extra time so we went to an older science museum. We had a guided tour. They had some older communication items from my childhood like ty...

Our last morning in Yendi. It was definitely a sad time. When leaving I was not looking forward to going back as Yendi felt like a home away from home. It was a community that had welcomed me and made me feel at home. I had never felt nervous or threatened and they never made me feel like a tourist or an outsider. Any person who felt unsure about us the misconception was taken care of with a smile and a wave. We made a final trip to the school. We gave the Fulbright certificate to the assistant headmaster, who gratiously accepted it. We then took a walk around campus to explore the idea of how they take care of 2500 students at Yendi SHS.  We visited the wells that the students use for water and the area that they use to make the student's food. It is such a huge task to provide food, shelter, water and sanitary services for so many kids. All these thigs are free to students in Ghana. Students mostly board in school because they are placed in a school based on their results on a na...

  July 25th   Today we are back in Accra. We started our morning at the teacher’s training college in Accra. The teacher’s there were on strike, but we got to meet the principal and learn how teachers are trained in Ghana. I will provide more detail when I get my notebook back from the bus. We then went to independence square. This was an area of the capital that is used to commemorate   Gianna gaining independence in 1957. There is an arch and a square surrounded by seating. Unfortunately, the square was blocked off and filled with construction equipment. We did take a picture in front of the arch though. You can also go up in the arch. The indie and top of the arch seemed in disrepair for the symbol of their countries freedom. There was a flag at the top and we took a picture of ourselves holding the flag. We then got on the bus for the minister of education. We were informed by our Fulbright representative of the importance of the minister of education and that we shou...

A math class that I observed at YSHS Speaking to the staff on my observations from the week and tertiary education in the US The class I did my see / think / wonder lesson with and who wrote pen pal letters.   7/23/24 Today we finally got to spend an entire day just going to school. I first just observed kids who are starting level 3 go over practice exams in both math and science. The science seemed a bit simplistic, just identifying lab equipment that the kids don’t have access to. The math class was doing some pretty high level geometry, I guess because they have the tools they need. The most interesting thing during this part of the day was that they had peer teaching! It was an entire class with no teacher. it was just a student leading the lesson!   I also found it interesting that in the social studies class they were talking about the challenges with being an independent nation such as limiting corruption,   good relations with neighbors etc. We then met bac...