So let’s say you live in a world with no birth certificates, and a place where most people – including yourself – don’t know their birthdays. Of course, that eliminates the possibility of celebrating yourself for one day every year, which is unfortunate. But it also means you never get grief for not remembering other people’s birthdays. Depending on your crowd, that’s not a bad tradeoff.
Some people here have to do things differently when it comes to age. Take for example Alon, the driver I described in a previous post about a week ago. We went to Rwanda the other day and he wanted me to fill out the immigration form for him because he was having trouble understanding it. So, we’re at the border and I’m filling out his form and I ask him what his birthday is. And he’s like “Oh, now, I can never remember that.” ‘Seriously?’ I thought. I wasn’t sure whether to laugh or to feel ignorant, or both. “Here’s my driving permit; it should be on here somewhere,” he said as he passed me his card. I had to pause for a second. It was another one of those times when I found myself thinking ‘we’re not in Kansas anymore.’
The above picture is not in any way related to this story (except that it was taken in Rwanda), but simply serves to illustrate the importance of checking your tire pressure before transporting a truckload of sugar cane.
I’m getting sidetracked. What is worth sharing is the way they decide whether to send a child up from nursery school to primary school. We’ve established they can’t use age. Of course, height doesn’t seem fair…plus they’d have to sort out differences between girls and boys. And it’s hard to use the Ugandan equivalent of an Intelligence Quotient test because there are so many languages used in Uganda, and English is introduced differently in each household. So what to do?
Answer:
The headmaster says to the child (spoken in Luganda or the child’s first language): “with one of your hands reach over your head to touch the opposite ear.”
Child: follows instructions (or tries).
I did this experiment a couple weeks ago with a family I’ve known since 2005 when each morning I passed by their house on the walk to school. The kids were happy to demonstrate.
It’s excellent. It assesses both cognitive and physical development. If they can’t follow these commands, they’re probably not ready to move on. If their head circumference is that much greater than their arm, then most likely, they’re younger than they’re acting.
It’s not perfect. But I can’t think of a better alternative. It's brilliant.
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