Cambodia Volunteer Journals
The Global Volunteer Network currently has opportunities to teach conversational English through our partner organization in Cambodia. This will allow you to help students improve their English skills while at the same time immersing yourself in urban Cambodian life.
Volunteers will be working as language teachers in a school project which provides affordable conversational English language courses for students. The aim of this project is to raise money for a local NGO working to improve livelihoods in rural communities in Cambodia. Students pay a small fee to attend the classes. In the past, the money raised by the language centre has been used to improve water and sanitation, for small livestock and agriculture production and for community environmental awareness in rural Cambodia.
Volunteers teach conversational English classes which have around 10 students in each class. All students and teachers have books, from which to learn and teach. There is scope for volunteers to include their own exercises/games into each class. Most volunteers work up to 5 hours per day. Lesson plans and materials will be provided by the school to make preparation and teaching easier.
To learn more, please visit the Global Volunteer Network Cambodia program page.
May 4th, 2009 by Brooke Hallam
Wow, I can’t believe that at this time in three weeks I will be packing up my stuff and getting ready to head to the airport….. 21 sleeps until the adventure begins. It’s probably even harder to imagine because I am still sitting at work in a nice warm office with all the creature comforts at my disposal!! Of course it’s also a little stressful, the fear of the unknown and all that, particularly the thought of the huge bloody spiders that live there, the lack of hot water and the fact that even with royal grade security Princess Eugenie [...]
Posted in Cambodia
October 28th, 2008 by Karin Holzknecht
In talking with/writing to friends and relatives back home I have compared Sihanoukville to Queensland Australia’s Gold Coast, but actually I think it is more akin to Byron Bay in New South Wales. It has the same bohemian vibe. One long weekend, six of us volunteers headed down to Sihanoukville check out the beach scene. Our volunteer coordinator sorted out tickets to get us there. It is a bus ride of about four or maybe five hours, which seemed longer because the buses here invariably have some very loud Khmer music videos and stand-up comedians on the TV, which gets a [...]
Posted in Cambodia
October 25th, 2008 by Karin Holzknecht
This was my biggest worry when packing for Cambodia – what on earth should I take to wear?! Here are my tips. Don’t bother bringing a jumper unless you need one for the plane. Don’t bother bringing more than two pairs of socks – thongs (by that I mean flip-flops) and sandals are the order of the day here. It’s worth bringing some sneakers but I wouldn’t worry about dress shoes. I know this isn’t clothing but don’t bring a sleeping bag or a mosquito net! You don’t need them. Do bring swimmers/bathers/togs/swimsuit/boardies – whatever you call them! One of [...]
Posted in Cambodia
October 25th, 2008 by Karin Holzknecht
For those of you who are considering volunteering in Cambodia, I have set about polling the volunteers here in the house to give you an idea of what is essential packing and what you can probably give a miss. Having said this, please be aware that most things you can buy here and probably cheaper.
Here are a few special mentions first:
Insect repellent – don’t leave home without it. You can apparently buy it here but I don’t trust it so much. Get something that is at least 30% DEET but watch the strength if you have sensitive skin and avoid [...]
Posted in Cambodia
October 17th, 2008 by Karin Holzknecht
We’re past the half-way mark of the teaching term now so I feel like I have sufficient experience to talk about the classroom side of volunteering here in Cambodia. During the orientation week, we had a brief introduction from some previous volunteers and other local English teachers as to classroom techniques, some practical activities to use, and also a more general idea of what to expect from our students. Everyone in the house was a bit nervous the night before our first day of lessons, but without exception we had generally good first days. After two or three days of [...]
Posted in Cambodia
October 17th, 2008 by Karin Holzknecht
One of the stand-out differences for me living over here has been the animals. Even dogs and cats are so different from what I’m used to seeing at home. And when you see a cow here in Cambodia you know you’re not, to use a well-known phrase, in Kansas anymore! The first thing I noticed in terms of animals here in Phnom Penh is that dogs are everywhere. Who knows if they have owners or not – but they are on every street: black scruffy ones, grey woolly ones, brown skinny ones, white yappy ones; mutts of every kind and [...]
Posted in Cambodia
September 14th, 2008 by Karin Holzknecht
I’ve been in Cambodia for three weeks now and those weeks have been action-packed! For the past few days we have been having so much rain. Every night I can watch the lightening splash around the clouds, and sometimes the downpours are so heavy the street outside our door floods. The porch roof of the volunteer house is tin and sometimes the drumming of water-drops is so loud it interrupts your conversation and you need to speak up. For a South Australian this is all very exciting and jealous-making.
I’m really enjoying living in the volunteer house here in Phnom Penh. It’s like being [...]
Posted in Cambodia
September 14th, 2008 by Karin Holzknecht
During the orientation week the volunteers all went by bus up to Kratie-town in Kratie province. This was a trip of six hours or so, and very far out of Phnom Penh. We went to visit the organization our school supports, the Cambodian Rural Development Team (CRDT), and to see their projects in action in local rural villages. A 45 minute mini-bus ride and a short boat ride later we were on an island in the middle of the Mekong River, meeting villagers and seeing the ways CRDT provides support to them. Most significantly they had encouraged the use of [...]
Posted in Cambodia
August 15th, 2008 by Karin Holzknecht
…and counting. I am not ready, but in my experience it will all come together in the end. It always does. Armed with mosquito net, insect repellent, teaching books and a camera I am fully prepared to go forth and have an adventure!
A question I am often asked by my friends and relatives (and other people I gush to about my upcoming trip) is “why Cambodia?” Well, the truth is, I have no idea what prompted me to sign up for this trip. I was just looking around for a volunteer opportunity and when I saw this listing for Cambodia [...]
Posted in Cambodia
July 2nd, 2008 by Joseph Allen
It’s getting a little to think up what to include for my journal entries, but there is still a lot.
Teaching
At the school there are 9 levels that students can be assigned to. I’m assigned to levels 4, 5, and 7. The texts we are using are in American English and it’s interesting other English speakers will spell certain words differently. While teaching for the most part is going well, it really is difficult to get motivated and plan for some of the irrelevant/uninteresting topics. As we do have some flexibility in teaching, I decided to take the liberty and skip [...]
Posted in Cambodia
June 23rd, 2008 by Joseph Allen
If you’re traveling to Cambodia, and want to travel light for the plane ride, you can pick up anything you need here in Phnom Penh. It might take you a few days to find where everything is, so bring some bear essentials to get you by. Good mosquito repellant, sunscreen, an English dictionary, and duct tape are exceptions. Also what to bring will depend somewhat on what time of year you will be here, and whether or not you plan on traveling to other areas. Personally, I brought too many socks, haven’t worn any since I arrived. The best months [...]
Posted in Cambodia
June 14th, 2008 by Joseph Allen
Well all the uncertainty has come to an end. My first day of classes and the week, I would say went fairly well considering I’ve never taught before.
We have course books to use for teaching, however these books are geared more toward acclimating foreigners to US living and are not very applicable to local Khmer culture. Despite the curriculum the students are eager to learn and are open to learning anything and everything you teach them. Other resources are available, and though rudimentary serve their purposes. Major skills that the students need to work on are vocabulary development, improving coherent [...]
Posted in Cambodia
June 8th, 2008 by Joseph Allen
We took a trip out to the Kratie Province from Wednesday to Friday of last week. The main purpose of the trip was to allow us to better appreciate the work and efforts of CWF’s partner organization Cambodian Rural Development Team (CRDT). Although we are volunteering here at CWF, students still pay for their lessons. The tuition proceeds go to fund CRDT and their projects.
We started our trip with a 6 hour bus ride, with occasional rest stops. The food dishes along the way were very good. Aside from the roadside restaurant we stopped at, there were numerous venders selling [...]
Posted in Cambodia
June 1st, 2008 by Joseph Allen
I’m really enjoying it here in Cambodia. They’ve been pretty good about giving us the chance to acclimate to our new environment. We had a quick tour of the city by tuk-tuk, these motorcycle-drawn carriages, and we’ve been taking Khmer classes for an hour a day. Just can’t seem to get the hang of it … it’ll click one of these days.
The program with CWF is well structured and the staff is very supportive. Orientation has gone well, and they have provided information on how to stay safe & healthy out here. Nothing alarming, with the mosquitoes being my biggest [...]
Posted in Cambodia
May 24th, 2008 by Joseph Allen
T minus 3 days 15 hours and 20 minuts (approximately).
Really looking forward to getting out to Cambodia. Still working on some checklist stuff, but I’m getting there. Someone will be meeting me at the airport holding a sign with my name on it either Sopheap or Huy. Erin from GVN has been very helpful answering questions. And I’ve been in touch with the other two GVN volunteers from Australia. There should be others, but they are involved through different organizations. We’ll have to see how many people are there.
As Conversations With Foreigners has lesson plans to work with, I’m sure [...]
Posted in Cambodia
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