Taco in South Africa
Participant
Taco
Programme
Internship
Country
🇿🇦 South Africa
How satisfied were you with the support from Holland?
I was really happy with the support we received in Holland. After we had been for an interview, it was very clear what we could expect if we did our internship here. We were well enough informed before we arrived.
My story
“Teaching these children is the most wonderful experience I’ve ever had.”
Taco · internship in South Africa
Through United Through Sport I followed the coaching programme in South Africa for 12 weeks. I took on the adventure together with 5 others, and so we set off for South Africa. We arrived with the idea that we would spend 5 days a week coaching children at primary schools in the townships. In the first week we were given lots of information about UTS and the places where we were going to teach. We were given the task of putting together a session that we would teach at all the schools that week. The people I had to work with were all about my age, which made working together easy. Preparing the sessions usually went very smoothly and didn’t take too much time. Teaching for the first time in another country and in another language definitely took some getting used to. Also because the pitch was in poor condition (there were lots of stones and pieces of glass). After this session I flipped a switch in my head and accepted that the pitches here were simply worse than I was used to. The children here were also different from those in Holland. Most of them here in South Africa are more eager to learn. Whereas in Holland I sometimes taught as many as 34 children on my own, here I taught 35 children together with 5 coaches. Because we worked with several coaches, the children got more individual attention. I thought that was a lovely aspect, because there were plenty of children who needed that individual attention. Teaching these children is the most wonderful experience I’ve ever had. This internship opened my eyes and showed me how different life is on the other side of the world. We can mean so much to people there, and that’s why I hope to have experiences like this many more times in my life.
My name is Taco van der Hek. I’m 21 years old and I’m in the final year of my PE teacher training. As well as teaching sports sessions at schools, I coach children at my local football club. I also teach sports sessions to former heart patients aged 40 to 80. Through this course I’ve gained a lot of knowledge and skills in different sports. I’ve wanted to be a PE teacher since I was at primary school, and soon I’ll be able to make that happen.
Taco’s photos
