Gurwinder Sandhu Elizabeth Hinnant 3/1/14 English 1102 Sikh Sunday School

For my ethnography, I was able to get the chance to observe a Sikh Sunday School in Charlotte for the past Sundays. This class was a little different than your average classroom. It had more than one teacher and even the classroom didnt really have much of a classroom appearance just because of how the room was setup. Lots of things such as sofas and boxes that weren't needed for the classroom. I soon found out that the room was only used temporarily and that it wasn't specifically just for Sunday school. I got to mainly observe one of the upper age classes which the students age ranged from ten to fourteen years old. During my time of observation, my main focus was on what the students would be doing in the class, whether it would be related to the class or not, and I also focused on the communication aspect within the classroom. For this ethnography, I am hoping I will be able to show what this Sunday school is about and how they helped me get my argument across. This research will help me show how the students focus affect their proficiency in the classroom. For my interviews, I got the chance to interview the teachers and some of the students. Receiving a lot of information from both teachers and students, the interview process cleared up a lot of questions that I had trouble understanding. I asked questions like what type of learning activities do the students do and how they try to keep the students focus in the class so they can get the most out of the class. Their responses helped me make my overall question and make it be able to explain how well these students do. I would reach the Sikh church at 9:00 A.M. every morning to meet up with the students. Everyone enters the church and everyone, including the parents, meet in the main hall of the

church. They didn't really have a set schedule but from going each Sunday, it looked like the history part of the class was 9:00 AM to 10:00 AM, then a ten-minute break, followed up by language class from 10:10 AM to 11:00 AM. The Sikh church is a place where Sikhs meet and practice their beliefs. All the Sikhs meet on Sunday every week to listen to the sermon and bring their children to Sunday school. The parents would sit near the back watching their kids. This hall is huge with big windows and the Sikh holy scripture at the front of the main hall. This is how they begin class every day. All the students would get up by their age group and be quizzed on the basic knowledge of the religion like naming influential people that impacted their culture, who started the religion, and being able to recite the first verse from the holy scripture by memory. After the students finished this process, one of the teachers would get up and read a random verse from the holy scripture. That whole process usually took up to about thirty minutes of their time. After that, everyone would go downstairs to their classrooms, according to the group level they were in. I got the chance to observe one of the upper level classes. Even though I had the chance to watch the younger age groups, I decided to only do the oldest group because I assumed their curriculum might be a little bit more academic than the others so I was hoping for a little bit more seriousness in their time of education rather than learning from a song they play for the little kids and watching educational cartoons. As I said before, this classroom did not have the classroom like atmosphere that most people are used to. The classroom was a small square room with o bjects that werent really suited for a classroom and very cold. There were sofas and televisions and the back along with other boxes that were not of any use. The only way this room even made an attempt to look like a classroom were the eight desks in the middle that were facing a small marker board that was on the wall. I walked into the class and sat in the back on the sofa which was pretty comfy. In the
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class, there were five girls and three boys, all of which were from the Sikh religion. They were all talking before class about the weather and how they were excited for the snow to hit Charlotte. The reason why they were so excited is because school would most likely be cancelled and they could all stay home and enjoy the snow. They all seemed happy and were seriously hoping for school to be off . One of the students, Amar, was talking about football and made comments about how he rooted for the Seahawks to win the super bowl. Amar asked me what I was doing here and I told him I was a secret spy agent and all the kids started laughing One of the teachers started the class at around 9:50 and I believe she starts off where they left off last week. She first asked Amar if he did his homework and he replied by saying no. Hearing the response, everyone could tell the teacher was very angry and she asked why. He made many excuses saying he didnt have time because he was at a friend's house but she replied back by saying You had a whole week to finish and youre telling me you were at your friends house for the whole week DURING school?. Amar didnt reply back and the whole class was silent. Watching this whole incident take place I could see that the teachers take this very seriously even if they do only have class once a week and want these students to put in effort into what they are assigned so they could learn something valuable. The other teacher who teaches the history part of the class, is in the back sitting next to me. All the students are usually quiet while writing their notes down but I did notice some low-volume side chatter going on with the girls who sat closer to the back of this class. The teacher is very interactive with the students and is always asking questions for the students to answer. She goes ahead and already hands out the homework that is due next week and tells Amar specifically to either finish it after class if he doesnt have time or else she will tell his father. After this she asks all the students to pu ll out their worksheets that was labeled people-and-relatives. Im assuming they are learning what

you call the people in your family. It had nice little drawings on it for the students to understand who they are like for example: they showed a mom and dad and their son and daughter and the students were to name them by their familial roles in Punjabi. They went through the whole worksheet together. This took up the whole part of her class. Observing the first part, I found the kids really trying to understand and keep up with what the teacher was saying. Even though there was some chitter chatter in the back you could tell the difference between the students who cared and the students who were there because their parents made them go. I found a direct correlation to how their seating affected their lack of interest in the class. For example, Amar, was one of the students all the way in the back who doesnt do much except write when he is specifically told to do so. This seating was affecting how much they learned in the class. During my observation, I noticed that the students in the front were more interested in learning the material than the kids that were sitting near the back of the classroom. I found this to be really important since I could see a direct correlation with how the students focus and seating were affecting each other. The students in the back were usually the ones that don't care about the class and are just there because of their students while the students near the front are more focused and are wanting to learn the curriculum. After the first part of the class, the second teacher decided stood up and decided to give the students a five minute break and grab something quick to eat from the kitchen. This class was the history class. This class seemed a lot more relaxed and unorthodox than the last one. This time all the students gathered around in a circle on the ground. while I move over a little to get a better view but not being actually part of the circle. One thing I noticed about this class was that there was a lot more talking involved in the lesson. Its not like you answer the question and then you stay quiet for the rest of the class, but you actually have small discussions about the history

and go into detail about what actually happened. The teacher said today would be a short class since all they are going to do was review since they MIGHT have a test next one or two weeks. All the students hear the word test and look at each other with huge eyes. The teacher uses a presentation off of his laptop to teach the students. I thought this was pretty neat because I feel like slideshows are a great way to keep peoples focus on the subject in hand and not wander off and daydream. Slideshows have those nice transitions and pictures which keeps the students, especially at their age, more focused. They reviewed about the fifth Guru of the Sikh religion and mainly went over his life and the major goals he achieved while being the Guru at the time. They talked about who his mother and father was and how many brothers he had and what he had to sacrifice for the greater good. The students would inch closer and closer to look at the pictures and would accidentally get in the way of other students. It looked like the teachers favorite thing to do was to make hand gestures to teach the students and the kids looked quite entertained by them. His teaching method was very entertaining. I think his reasoning was if the students were having fun then they would learn more and that is a win-win situation from both sides. What I thought was very odd was that he allowed them to eat their food while they were in class. Most teachers would tell you to put it away or to throw it away because they dont want anything spilling on the floor and papers but he seemed pretty relaxed with it even though there was the risk of having water spilled on his laptop but I guess he decided to take that risk. After a normal day of class is over, which usually somewhere around eleven o'clock, all of the students either get something to eat or go back upstairs to listen to the hymns of the Sikh choir. Some of the students even participate in the choir. The type of seating is not the same in this part of the class as it was to the first part but just like before, the seating affects the way their focus affects their proficiency in the class. Since all of them are in a circle, there wasn't much room to get away

with little things since the teacher could see everyone easily. I think this type of learning strategy is really effective since it makes sure that everyone is paying attention and participating in the lesson. This whole day of observation, I was able to see the difference between the teachers and how they were teaching. The first teacher was very boring with his lesson. It felt like a college lecture and it was very hard for the students to pay attention. The second teacher, on the other hand, was much more interactive with the students, made the setting much more relaxed so the atmosphere didn't feel so tense. I could see the students liked this class more than the first one since everyone was participating and enjoying the class . After a few days of classes, I finally got the chance to interview the teachers that taught the class I was observing. I got to ask some questions and with those questions, I got some great responses. I asked the first teacher "How does the class interact in a way in which their focus is still intact with the lesson?". She responded by saying "Sometimes we like to put them in groups and make them work together figure out ways to solve problems and be able to brainstorm ideas. I work in a financial corporate building and one thing we do to get things done is that we split up into groups to complete a certain task and I feel that type of strategy could also work within a classroom environment". I found this to be a very powerful response. Being able to bring their own real-life experiences and then channeling it into a way where the students are basically doing the same thing but it's related to the subject in hand. Even during my observations, I felt as if I saw some parts of that come into play. Students would ask their peers for help on things they didn't understand. It was like they were having little workshops within the class. This was a great way for students to learn. Workshops help you understand where you are in the class compared to your classmates, and you can figure out, with the help of your peers, what you need to do to get where you want to be. Unfortunately I wasn't able to observe

during a day where they might have worked in groups but what I did see is that if the whole class is involved with whatever is going on, usually the slackers would at least make an attempt to try and do what the rest of the students were doing. Sometimes they were rewarded with candy and no young student will ever say no to candy. The interview with the second teacher also went well. I asked him "What type of learning activities do you guys plan or have planned for the students?". He gave me an answer that at first caught me off guard just by assuming the little resources they had in the classroom. He said "We do all sorts of stuff to get the kids learning. We make them do art projects and presentations to show their peers, parents and the whole Sikh community that come and visit the Sikh church. The children's favorite thing to do is act out plays."That's right, they act out plays. Basically, the teachers will write the script and assign all the kids a part and they all have fun and learn at the same time. Even though they don't have all the nice costumes and such and the scripts are usually just a quick write-up, it still gives them the opportunity to learn in a creative way and have fun with it. I understand that trying to teach a young group of kids is not as easy as it sounds but being creative with the job these teachers have make it at least more enjoyable than it would have been if they made them do busy work for the whole entire semester. Students would rather do something entertaining than learn, but when you mix activities that get the students to become active within the class, it starts to become fun and educational. This is when young students, I believe, start to actually learn since it is an entire class activity that they do together. Their focus towards the class is all there but the students don't actually realize they are learning something because they know they are having fun. I asked both teachers "How much focus is involved for the students to do well in the class?". They both said that you could tell which students are here to actually learn about where

they come from and who they are so they actually put in the time and effort even after class is over but you can also tell which students are here just because they have no other choice but to come because their parents are making them go and that's just the cold hard fact. Some of the students won't care about doing homework because they think that just because it's a Sunday school, it will not have much effect on them in the future and the parents don't even try to push those kids to do their work. Even though Sunday school won't be a factor as to what your career path will be, it will affect them as a human being and they will not learn any of that through a textbook in primary/secondary school. After hearing their responses, I fully support them on that viewpoint because everything you do outside of primary/secondary school basically shapes you up on how you will interact with people in the real world. Observing this class gave me an insight on what path each student is going on and you see the types of struggles and hardships they have to face in order to be move on up throughout the classes. I also saw what it takes to become successful in that class. This class showed me what it took for the kids to learn something valuable and then be able to move on with that new knowledge. Some take the shortcut or the easy way and just try to get by so they can get it over with while others challenge the obstacles they have in front of them and make themselves become stronger.
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