Amid the outbreak of the coronavirus, Alaa Al-Astal, 25, saw her neighboring children while spending most of their times playing in the streets of Khan Yunis village as their schools have been closed since months.
As Alaa graduated in 2020 with a bachelor degree, she adopted the of helping those children keep remembering what they learned in schools.
Like all countries of the world, the education process in Palestine and Gaza faces several obstacles; schools' closure and E-Learning.
She bought a small wooden board and a box of colored chalks at her expense, gathered old wooden chairs, chose a room in her small home located in Khan Yunis camp, and started teaching the primary students Arabic language and revising their old lessons.
She gives them 3 days a week; an hour for each lesson. They set around her on a plastic table reacting to what she gives them as she encourages them with games and gifts.
The space of the class is no more than 10 meters. It has clotheslines, household items on the walls, and gas oven which Alaa transferred it into a desk handling the board she bought.
Alaa met a reporter from Safa and told him about the conditions of the poor camp which is full of children, noting that the camp lacks teachers or teaching centers to provide lessons for those who need.
"I always try to persuade the children with the importance of education either in schools or in homes in the wake of the outbreak of the pandemic," she said.
She added, "Most of the people here are simple and poor. They barely have their daily source of income. How would they take of their children and send them to teaching centers which need heavy prices?"
She volunteered during the lockdown and the closure of schools to teach those children rather than leaving them to streets and poverty.
"Most of them are my neighbors and relatives. I do not receive any money in return," she commented, considering this step the start of her way towards achieving her dream of opening a teaching center for low prices.
She mentioned that her first experience of learning was two years before her marriage, when she taught her nephews.
She admits how hard it is to teach those children, especially that they have not gone to schools since weeks and months as well as the space of the class cannot accommodate the 20 children, forcing her to distribute them into 4 groups.
Alaa looks forward to being supported by any institute to help her establish a center for teaching the children of the camp, expressing her desire to give several lessons of Arabic, English and others.
