I was a member of Wave 6 of TEEA 1969-71.  This was the last group of TEA/TEEA to be sent to East Africa.  I was posted to Kenyatta Teacher Training College to the Biology Department.  The college was at Kahawa, near Nairobi.  I along with my wife Jeanette and four children spent two years in an adventure of a life time. There are many experiences that I could share about these two years but I will concentrate on two snake adventures that relate to my students of that time.

The staff and students had built a “Snake Pit” in the Biology Department area.  It was made out of concrete. It was about 8 foot square and 5 foot deep. We landscaped it so there were rocks, plants, and a water source at the bottom.  The students provided the upkeep and feeding. The snake and lizard inhabitants were nonpoisonous examples of reptiles of the nearby area. The purpose of the pit was to help our students overcome their fear of reptiles and teach them the benefits they can provide for the natural environment. The approach seemed to be successful.  Many of the students both male and female became very comfortable handling and caring for the snakes.

Sometimes an objective lesson can have unforeseen circumstances. One day as I was teaching a student from another section came into the room.  What was unusual about his appearance was that he was holding a snake of about 2 feet in length just in back of the head as he had been taught for safe handling. He was very proud of his accomplishment and asked if I knew what kind of snake it was.  One look and I realized he had captured, by hand, a young Black African Spiting Cobra.  I asked him to keep a very tight grip on the snake while I went to get a secure cage.  We deposited the cobra into the cage and then I, the student and the class started to breathe again.  The snake ended up at the Nairobi Snake Park and not in our pit.

Another snake experience concerned a student of mine during his student teaching at a girl’s secondary school about 12 miles north of the college.  The school was in an agricultural area with many small shambas and apparently some snakes in the area.  One part of the Biology Department’s goals was   emphasizing the teaching of lab experiences by our students when they did their student teaching. The department tried to help our students develop labs that could be done with a minimum of lab equipment and using local resources.  My student had planned a laboratory lesson and had to take his students to the lab.  The lab was a building a few steps from the main buildings and very little used.

The student teacher got his 40 girls seated and started to introduce the lab activity.  He was interrupted when a Spitting Cobra crawled out from under the teacher’s desk.  There was some confusion among the girls as 40 of them tried to exit through the doors and open windows all at the same time.  The student teacher managed to dispatch the snake but only after the cobra was able to eject some venom, which a little did get into the student teacher’s eyes.  He was able to flush out the poison with abundant water and was treated at the local hospital.  Luckily no damage was done and the lab proved to be very successful the next day. The student teacher being a dedicated blossoming biology teacher preserved the snake in a jar of formaldehyde and proudly showed it to me when I came on my observation the next week. It just goes to show that trying to introduce good biological teaching practices in the African teaching environment of those days could have some very interesting and unexpected outcomes.