During the last 6 months we had a stellar teacher aboard Nesi: Ian Bacon from Chicago (UCSB recent grad- go gauchos!!). He was aboard during the toughest sailing stretch we’re likely to have for a loooong time. We knew this was the case, so we wanted to find a super amazing person for the role… And guess what? We got very lucky 🙂

Here’s the story — and read at bottom for Ian’s impressions of life aboard & his favorite teaching activities with the girls.  

Check out all the posts from our previous teachers.

THE STORY, AS TOLD BY CAPTAIN K

End of August, 2024. The Madagascar coastline was phenomenal on so many levels — the culture, the natural beauty, the animal life. However, the chaos was taking a toll on us: gales, poor anchorages, running aground (!), extreme poverty, typhoid fever (luckily, no malaria).

So yeah — we were exhausted after 4 months of being “on edge” in this very amazing but undeveloped country.

Our onboard teacher Joelie had been with us nearly 5 months (check out her great blog post). She had left two weeks earlier, and we were all feeling a bit frazzled.

Not to fear, the cavalry arrived!  Our new boat school teacher Ian arrived — along with his two sidekicks, Dophaise & Abi.  It was just a week before our departure across the Mozambique Channel, enroute to South Africa. 

Ian is from our home town of Santa Barbara, California, shares family ancestry in Martinique with Sabrina, is a recent UCSB graduate with fluent French, and has experience in outdoor kids education (Sea League, bringing watersports to under served communities in Santa Barbara).

Over the next several months, we were to become tight as turtles 🙂 

Sidekick #1 was Abi acting as a teaching assistant and brightwork polisher. She was doing a gap year after college and joined us last minute. Abi is a South African who grew up in the Caribbean and Saudi Arabia, a true global citizen, and has a wonderful positive attitude and zest for life. 

Sidekick #2 was Dophaise, acting as our onboard electrician and all-around handyman. During our 1.5 month stint in Nosy Be, in northern Madagascar, Dophaise did many projects on the boat, including installing solar panels, USBs, fans, and batteries. He is super sharp, has great vibes, and his dream was to work abroad.  “Would you like to sail with us to South Africa?” I asked him one day.  He nearly cried in joy. Such a great guy.

To travel overland from his hometown of Nosy Be to Toliara, where Nesi was, Dophaise took 48 hrs of packed chicken buses (taxi brousses) to the capital “Tana” and then onward, with at least two breakdowns underway.  He made it onboard… But the saga of getting his exit immigration stamp needs to be saved for another story.

This noble trio was joined by my dad Bob (who turned 84 during the trip). He had navigated a tough phase with cancer, somehow bounced back, and joined us. In the spirit of “let’s make the most of this bonus time”, he embarked on this voyage with us, because he LOVES the sea.

Our crew of 8, together with Sabby and the twins, set sail from Toliara, Madagascar, across the nearly 500nm wide Mozambique Channel. This is the start of a supremely difficult stretch of sailing, considered by many tropical circumnavigators the hardest in the world.

During the next 60 days (!!) we navigated from Madagascar to Cape Town, under extremely technical sailing. Back to back gales, monstrous ocean currents, and unsheltered coastlines. This could be considered a “triple X black diamond” — like the ski equivalent of heli-skiing in Alaska.

Those two months were constant white-knuckling for Sabrina and I, keeping the boat & crew safe; managing constant repairs under duress; all while squeezing in land excursions and safaris, because that’s what South Africa is famous for.

This is context for our post today: figuring out how to provide schooling for our kids, underway, in the midst of all this 🙂  – Captain K

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IAN’S IMPRESSIONS OF LIFE ABOARD:

Wow…

what a journey these past six months have been. Joining the Nesi crew in August, I was fresh out of my last year of university, and I could not wait to see how Kristian and Sabrina had been able to build their lives, grow a family, and cultivate a community around their love for being on the water. I remember that first day, boarding Nesi from the “lambor-dinghy” and being met with a flurry of hugs and an emphatic “Welcome aboard!” that left me feeling right at home.

As I got settled into life on board and saw the curiosity and engagement with which Kristian, Sabrina, and their girls – Kaiana and Naiyah – move through the world, I quickly realized that my role as the onboard teacher was not to pass on knowledge to the girls but was more so to facilitate their curiosity, creativity, and exploration of the world around them.

This wouldn’t always be easy though. Life aboard the sailboat comes in two forms: ocean passages (offshore sailing) and port time (shore time). On our first passage, navigating 7 days non-stop from Madagascar to South Africa, we had trouble figuring out how to continue teaching the girls with 8-10 swells and strong winds rolling us around. Sabrina’s mantra played in my mind: “If you’re feeling nauseous, sit outside and look at the horizon!” 

These ocean passages became a great time to slow down, go with the rhythm of the ocean, and explore the world together through stories (which I describe under my “Favorite Teaching Activities” below)

In between the ocean passages, we spent several days in each port: shore time. During this time, we did boat repairs, resting, and sight-seeing. Shore time is an entirely different flow for us and the kids, which is a more normal routine: from 9am to 2pm on most days, we’d go out and do daily field trips and land adventures, then rest aboard the boat in the afternoons. Meantime, Kristian & Sabrina repaired the boat (a constant effort), getting her ready for the next leg of the journey.

In Richards Bay, the easternmost port in the country, we rented cars and drove to Hluhluwe game reserve for our first ever safari, driving amidst the famous wild animals of Africa.

Each and every stop along the South African coast was different and grand in its own way. In Durban, we were dwarfed by skyscrapers and freighters as we entered the bay; in Knysna and Hout Bay, we were dwarfed by the earth itself with towering rock formations that would protect the bays from the wind and waves.

After 3 months in South Africa, we sailed our way north to Namibia and visisted the ports of Luderitz and Walvis Bay, along with other remote anchorages. All along the way, we were struck by gusty winds and the starkness of the white-sand landscape. Jokingly, we called it our “White Christmas,” as we were anchored for the holiday with Santa hats surrounded by 1000-foot sand dunes and instead of reindeer, there were flocks of flamingos flying around the bay. 

I thought back to my own anticipation before coming onto the boat three months earlier. I remembered telling friends, “living with the same people on a boat for six months? By the time I leave, I’m gonna either hate them or they’re gonna be like family.” Sitting on Nesi, looking around the dinner table at the people I’d spent the previous months fighting hydraulic leaks and soaking in moments of awe with, it was clear that I had found a family here 🙂

IAN’S FAVORITE TEACHING ACTIVITIES

Activity #1: Storytelling 

On our first passage, across the Mozambique Channel, we had rough conditions for several days which put our stomachs in a near-constant knot. So looking down at watercolors – or even worse – reading a book was off the table, since it tends to make us nauseous in rough conditions. So we turned to storytelling. 

To get the storytelling going, I asked the girls about things they were interested in – such as whales and turtles. I would prompt them, “What are they doing?”, “Where are they going?”, and (my favorite) “Tell me more,” to get the story going. Soon enough, they would be running with it. I would scribble down their ideas as fast as I could until we’d have a three page story about a whale and turtle best friend duo who sailed to an island with a chocolate museum powered by flying rainbows. 

This quickly became one of my favorite activities to do with the girls and served as a great way to tap into their boundless creativity both while on passage and at dock alike (and it’s even more fun reading the stories back together later)

Activity #2: Book of Wonder

Whenever we visited new places and saw new animals, the girls would light up, so we decided to make a flipbook for each of them about the animals they saw and wanted to learn more about. We called this their “Book of Wonder.” 

This ended up being a great opportunity to go deeper into the kids’ curiosity, exercise their memory, practice writing, and have a memento of our animal sightings for later exploration! 

How to make your own Book of Wonder

1. Create the book by taping pages of colorful piece of paper together along a single seam. This will be the binding of the book.
   
2. Choose an animal (or other plant / critter / item of interest)
3. Print out a photo of the animal at a size that will fit in their book
4. Have your child glue the photo into the book
5. Dot out the animal’s name for your child to go back and trace out. 

And now the coup de grâce! To cap it off, choose 3-5 facts about the animal to write into the book

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Activity #3: Language Learning Through Play

One of our goals during my stay was to help the girls practice French. However, since everyone is speaking English all the time aboard, it can be tricky to practice another language consistently (more on this under “Major Takeaways”)

The best way I’ve found to practice French is to integrate it into something the kids love! The girls love running around, playing tag, and beating me in Uno — so those were our big opportunities for practicing another language.

1. Playing tag: If we were playing tag or they chased me around the boat, I would ask them in French, “In which direction should I go?” and say “Right or left?” or “Forward or back?” while pointing in the directions. They’d say, “À gauche! (To the left!)” and I’d go in that direction
   
2. Playing in nature: If they wanted to climb a tree, jump from a step, etc. etc., we would practice verbs such as “I want to” and “I am going to” to practice basic sentence structure and expressing their needs.
   
3. Playing Uno: The card game Uno has been so great for teaching the girls numbers and colors. Play the game in your language of choice, and you’ll be well on the way to learning colors and numbers in that language.

Activity #4: French Fun Days!

The other way I found to teach French successfully was through immersion, and a great way to do this was to spend several hours together outside of the boat. We called these “French Fun Days!”

Essentially this was a field trip in French language (and as we all know, kids love field trips, so it’s a good start). To get off the boat and have a more immersive experience, away from all the English-speaking, we would go to a playground or beach and I would speak to the girls in French. 

If they didn’t understand something, I would use hand gestures and sometimes translate bits and pieces of sentences. If they responded in English, we’d just enjoy some good ol’ bilingual mix-conversation. The goal here was to expose them to how the language should sound.

IAN’S TIPS FOR LANGUAGE LEARNING

Teaching a foreign language at home: A major goal of mine was to help the girls develop a love and knowledge for the French language. A big challenge I found was that it was difficult to maintain consistency at home. I found four strategies that that helped a lot in engaging the girls in French. 

• Prioritize immersion time: The best way to learn a language is to be immersed in it, which can be really hard to achieve when surrounded by English-speakers. We found two great ways of doing this in my time on the boat. French Fun Days (see above in the “Favorite Activities” section) were a great way to get off the boat away from the English speaking and have a French field trip. 
• French hour, an hour during the day when we only communicate in that language with the kids. A great way to do this in a structured way is to plan your language hour to be during a meals (i.e. lunch time, dinner time). What matters is that you consistently find a time to immerse the kids in the language. 
• Give a “Heads up” that you plan to switch to the new language: Letting the girls know when I planned on switching to a new language helped give them the awareness and time to prepare for the change. This helped smooth over the transition into the language and made it feel less forced when the time came
• Time your switch into the new language with a new activity: Doing so in conjunction with another activity provides a nice natural break to help everyone switch gears
• Integrate language-learning into play: The best way to help somebody learn and LOVE something is similarly to integrate it into something they love!
• Let them come to the language in their own time: It can be really uncomfortable to learn a new language. In the beginning, we don’t communicate as comfortably or as easily as in our first-language. So the goal in those beginning stages is to plant the seed of a love for the new language. 

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IAN’S TIPS FOR LIFE ABOARD – AND AT HOME

A 5 Step Transition Survival Guide : 

The different roles you play aboard a sailboat: Aboard the boat, I found myself playing many different roles. After all, we live together 24/7! We have many tasks to do each day: Teaching kids, cooking meals, and boat maintenance to name a few. And then we’d also try to carve out a few hours for personal downtime each day. 

So I had to learn how to transition between all of these roles, communicate this clearly to the kids, and plan something for them to do in the meantime. So between tasks and teaching duties, I’ve found that a quick “heads up” goes a long way in helping switch gears more smoothly.

1. Think of the next activity you would like to do with the kids.

2. Give a five minute “heads up!” for cleaning up and moving onto the next activity. It can help to give them two options of activity to give them some choice
   
3. Guide the kids’ energy levels towards the desired frequency. 

• Moving from a high-energy activity (i.e. tag) → low-energy activity (i.e. quiet time, reading, storytelling)? Try challenging them to move like they’re stuck in mud and crawl as if in slow motion to the table inside (where you’ll set up the next activity)

4. Communicate when it’s time to shift gears, then shift gears. In times when the girls are loving the previous activity and want to continue for a little bit longer, I’ll give them a “heads up” that I’m going to go inside to set up the next activity and they typically appear through the doorway soon after. 

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IAN’S MESSAGE TO NEW TEACHERS COMING ABOARD

Hello new teachers,

Coming aboard as the resident teacher has been an amazing learning experience. It was also pretty daunting to say yes to living on a boat with people I didn’t know for six months. So I wanted to close this post off with some lessons that really helped me make the most of my time on the boat.

1. Make sure you take time to rest and recharge each day: On a boat, there is a never-ending to-do list with maintenance projects, teaching responsibilities, cooking, household chores, etc.. Set out time each day to take a break and recharge your batteries. This could mean going on a solo kayak adventure, going for a walk when you have access to land, going for a morning surf, calling with friends, or even taking a nice long nap. 
2. If there is a misunderstanding, talk it out, and then hug it out: When you’re living on a boat with a group of people 24/7, points of friction will arise. So talk out issues as they come up. That way, you can work through it together and make changes that need to be made. 
3. Check out Non-Violent Communication (NVC) for more on this. It’s a great framework for moving through conflict which Kristian and Sabrina use religiously on the boat 
4. When you want to learn something specific while on board, ask directly: Kristian and Sabrina are amazing teachers in themselves, and they want to share their knowledge with you. It’s what they do! So if you want to learn something specific, tell them, and they’ll be over the moon to be able to share what they know. 

If you have any more questions about what it’s like teaching on the open ocean and whether it might be a good fit for you, share a comment or ask me a question here: teacher@greencoco.org (be sure to address to Ian). Always happy to chat.

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Finally, to my Nesi family:

Kristian, Sabrina, Kaiana, Naiyah, my partners in crime Abi & Dophaise, Bobby-Jim, and everyone else who joined along the way. I love you all and wish you fair winds and following seas

Check out all the posts from our previous teachers.