Peter DAngelo has taught English to refugee students from the worlds trouble spots for 35 years, and they all have stories to tell. A classroom of students stared back at Peter DAngelo, wide-eyed and silent. They couldnt even pronounce his name. He struggled with theirs. My first class was Vietnamese and Cambodian boat children. I was straight out of Rusden State College, says DAngelo. He had taken a job at Noble Park English Language School, a new set up to teach incoming refugees. These kids were afraid of him. DAngelo understood fear of a new country. The sea had almost killed him on his way here, too. When DAngelo was five, his mother hauled him and his sisters from their farm in Italy to Melbourne, where his father had migrated before DAngelo was born. He was terrified, especially to leave his beloved Nonno behind. The boat trip took a month. I remember a rolling room, glasses and plates breaking, my mother crying hysterically and my two sisters holding each other in fear, he says. On a calm night, DAngelo climbed up on deck to watch the stars. It was icy, really cold. I heard this roar, in the black. The boat pitched savagely, a huge wave crashing over the deck and washing him towards the edge. A life boat at the edge stopped him being washed overboard. I scampered back below deck and didnt come up for days, he says. His first school teachers were often cruel and racist; one caned him constantly, calling him a dumb dago pup. It was like Id landed on Mars. It was really scary. His next teacher changed his life. Miss Leibert taught me the alphabet. I learned it straight away. Back at Noble Park English Language School, DAngelo taught his class one word at a time. They told stuttering stories under a tattered world map. At the end of their time together one student, Trung told his story. His family had left home at night, walking three days and nights to reach their boat. During the trip they slept one on top of another. Pirates boarded the boat, kidnapping six women and shooting two men. He said, Mr Deeno, you teach me English, you help me forget. It sounds corny, but coming from a 16-year-old kid whos just witnessed his sister raped by Thai pirates, I thought, This is what I have to do. From those early experiences, he has gone on to teach refugee students for 35 years. Whenever there was global conflict, it was in my classroom, says DAngelo. He found his capacity for empathy was a necessary tool in helping students to learn. It was important that they dealt with whatever it was that could be upsetting them, he says. It didnt always work. One South American boy came into his class after fleeing Pinochets regime. DAngelo usually had the class write poetry, and keep a journal. This boy wouldnt, and I didnt know why. He found out that the boys father had disappeared after writing an anti-government piece. So for him, writing a poem was fear. During the 90s, hearing story after story finally became too much. DAngelo had an emotional breakdown. I began to distance myself, just be clinical in my teaching, he says. I was pretending to listen. It was a protection mechanism. It was a student who brought him around. Alma was a Bosnian refugee. She slipped into my classroom like a wasted shadow flung out of another brutal civil war, DAngelo writes in his book. Alma was 14, emaciated, with kidney failure, respiratory problems, loss of sight in one eye, severe tooth decay and frequent post-trauma flashbacks. But she came to school every day. She said, One day Im going to write about all this. I want to thank you for helping me with the language. DAngelo knew he couldnt distance himself any longer. Im allowed to be a part of the human healing process, he says. Later, he moved to Noble Park Secondary College. There, he encountered the first wave of Sudanese students. The Sudanese had more difficulty coping with the resettlement. They had come from a horrendous background of civil war. They generally had more literacy problems, as well. A Sudanese student has recently been elected school captain at Noble Park Secondary College. More recently, he has taught hundreds of Afghani students. One in particular did not respond to confrontation or conflict. He was an older student, and struggling. But he didnt want to lose face amongst the other students. DAngelo took him aside, and asked him how he thought they should go about his learning. Giving him that window: wow! now he would do anything for me. DAngelo believes a lot of teachers miss opportunities to create connection. They read the riot act too early, he says. Nowadays, when he gets overwhelmed, DAngelo goes back to the ocean, swimming and writing poetry. He remembers five-year-old Peter, who eventually went back up on deck, only to see a pod of dolphins swimming alongside the ship, as his Nonno had predicted. He said, They guide lost ships and people to beautiful new lands, he says.
Posted on: Mon, 08 Dec 2014 03:52:12 +0000
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