The Center hosted 64 teachers from 19 Montessori schools around Haiti for the annual in-service training this month. These teachers were all trained by us over the years.These in-service seminars are always very popular with our teachers, both to learn new classroom tools and to see old friends from their graduating classes again. Many more enthusiastic teachers traveled to the Center for this year’s seminar than were registered. Since the campus only has sleeping accommodation for 40, some slept on the floor and we “poured more water in the soup” to make room for everyone. Everyone was happy to crowd in together in a good-natured atmosphere.
This year’s seminar focused on demonstrations of science experiments. The teachers learned some basic science demonstrations that they can do with children in their their classrooms to teach science concepts. Leading the training was Educateurs sans Frontiers (EsF) volunteer Anastasia Muller from Canada. Anastasia did a great job of explaining that “it was no magic but cause and effect” by explaining the science concepts, and showed the teachers exactly how to do the experiments. Simple available materials were used so that the experiments could be easily replicated in any setting.
We also introduced the teachers to the electronic white board. This interactive technology is becoming much more widespread in countries like Haiti, and could easily be used to help teach Montessori content. Junior Athénus from Haïti Futur led this session.
