Reflections on July Teacher Training Workshop (August 12, 2012)
In January of 2011 I flew SOPUDEP Founder/Director Rea Dol out to Canada to do a small speaking tour from Toronto to Montreal that was organized by Canada Haiti Action Network in regard to the one year anniversary of the earthquake in Haiti. There were many great and eye opening moments about the two weeks I spent with her. One on one at my house after the days activities, Rea really took the time to expounded on the political and social situations revolving around Haiti as well as offering her philosophical views about these various subjects. One thing I heard every time was a genuine pride and love for her people and country. Her work is not just something that gives her a fuzzy feeling inside, it is an intense passion that I have never seen before.
A running theme in her vision about Haiti was a need to break down barriers. She doesn't simply see the elite of the country having negative views of the poor, but the poor having negative views of those poorer than themselves and so on. She understands that part of our human survival instinct is to identify ourselves with a group of people that are in a sense, winning over another, but knows that this defeats the purpose of our humanness.
She explained that SOPUDEP is not just a school for the poor, but a school for whoever wants to come. In this way, there is interaction between different social classes with a deliberate attempt to have a common ground for them to coexist together. Rea said that, the way for Haiti to heal is through the strengthening and expanding of community and it's the job of the grassroots to promote a united community. She went on to say that without understanding that we are all of the same cloth, there is no hope for equality and a way forward for true democracy in the country. Uncivilized and civilized are labels we adhere to prescribed from the elite, but there is actually no natural distinction between us other than that of opportunity.
When I was to meet Nancy Loraine President of Teacher Mentors Abroad (TMA) eight month after Rea's visit, I had a better understanding of SOPUDEP's vision and was better able to pursue projects that I knew would be in line with their philosophy. TMA's training is about cooperative and communal learning which certainly goes with breaking with an individualistic mentality for success and adhere's to that of cooperation and the success of Self through community.
It is always a risk to raise and spend resources on a new project when a struggling organization looks to you to sustain their basic programs. And I might have pulled the plug too if both Rea and Nancy weren't so convinced it needed to happen. However, this initial training session was in everyone's estimation a great success. It seems to me that this introductory training has begun ratifying the wholistic views of community that SOPUDEP, MOJUB, Les Petits Amis de SOPUDEP and other social organizations share and the ability to somehow materialize it through their teaching techniques.
This was the first in hopefully many sessions that Haitian grassroots education programs can expand their skill set to better achieve their goals. I'm sure we will be looking to next year to send SOPUDEP, as well as other grassroots organizations back to TMA's workshop in the Dominican Republic.
I asked both Rea and TMA president and founder Nancy Loraine to give me their impressions on the training course. Their letters follow...
Rea Dol, SOPUDEP Founder/Director :
This training was for us, a step towards improving our education. Next week we have a staff meeting on the training provided by the TMA group in the Dominican Republic. One point of this training, is it has allowed us to improve our ability to identify a child who is having trouble learning in a traditional sense and modify our teaching techniques. No one child is the same and therefore we should not expect a singular way of teaching to work for all children. Typical difficulties that can be observed are students who have trouble spelling or reading, others are clumsy in manual or physical activities, and difficulty understanding practical and theoretical concepts in science, language studies, or mathematics.
From our training, we made an extensive statement on the best methods to use to facilitate student understanding. This has also allowed us a better view of how leadership from the teacher is projected and reflected back from the student consistently to ensure the efficiently of the teaching to improve the results of the students. Students should no longer be passive observers, but active participants communicating with each other.
Because teaching is an art, that is to say teaching is, or should be, creative problem solving, the educator must lead their students to read, write, understand, think, analyze, and synthesize best suited to each students needs. The teacher must identify key concepts of learning and pass that on to the students and let them evolve it. We must also link this process to the observation, measurement, and evaluation of our students and better define that role of evaluation in the learning process.
Our time with TMA was a blessing and we give them our heartfelt thanks.
Rea
Nancy Loraine, Teacher Mentors Abroad President
Just this morning I again watched the video of the SOPUDEP team members singing their thanks to the Canadian team and our hosts Pastor Jose and Gloria Lopez.
For five days we had shared life together in three languages. We broke bread together, lived together, heard about each other’s families, journeys, hopes for our homelands and connected in the deepest places of our beings. Daily we travelled back and for to the workshops to learn how to best support student learning in Haiti, the Dominican Republic and yes, also back here in Canada, then returned to the host homes and continued conversations and exchanges about teaching and learning. During times of rest and recreation we experienced the rich resonance of song and laughter; our Haitian brothers and sisters sang with reverence and joy. We also visited historical sites, an aquarium, and had an impromptu visit to a church where one of the Canadian team members played the pipe organ accompanied by the Haitian team breaking into song.
We were one in the spirit, a combined team of 25 people with a common purpose. Thank you Sawatzky Family Foundation, for sponsoring this team from Haiti that left a profound and lasting mark on our Canadian team. We left hopeful that we will work together again. In fact, next week Rea and I plan to briefly connect in Haiti, so she may meet Pastor Martinez Jovin, another visionary Haitian leader with a heart for people and education.
The story continues.....
Nancy
SOPUDEP's dedicated educators are the backbone behind this program for the poor and is a full time job for them. What they are paid is nominal, but is critical that they continue to receive a paycheck so that they may continue their work. I ask for you to keep SOPUDEP's teachers in mind for this coming school year. We must continue to give SOPUDEP and other Haitian social organizations ongoing support to better affect their students in a positive way. With this, they can give these children educational resources that they would otherwise not have and set a platform that builds equality, unity and understanding.
Thank-you
Ryan Sawatzky, President
The Sawatzky Family Foundation
