Literacy Workshop


Last week Peace Corps brought together the volunteers on Grenada and their counterparts for additional training in teaching literacy to primary students. It was a three day and three night event at a hotel. We arrived Tuesday night so we could get started Wednesday morning, returning to our sites Friday night. The workshop will be also held on St. Vincent and St. Lucia. The volunteers on Dominica will travel to St. Lucia.

The hotel was nice – the Grenadian by Rex Resorts. It was a three star hotel, so the venue was rather upscale for Peace Corps volunteers. Of course it was still Peace Corps so we all had roommates. My roommate was a male teacher I first met during check-in who is the counterpart of a female volunteer.

(Peace Corps is a very effective agency from a money perspective – its total annual worldwide budget is on par with the cost of one of our new fighter aircraft. I’m hoping the rounding error of a rounding error in the federal budget does not get cut – it is money well spent according to our military and political leaders who understand the value created by volunteers in developing countries. Full disclosure: some of the cost of the program was supported by USAID.)


Nice beach ocean side - didn't spend much time there.

Nice pool - didn't go swimming

Small lake and I encroached on some birds to get an action shot

The days were full of presentations and activities – 9 to 5. We learned a lot. Of course, in just three days you cannot learn all aspects of teaching literacy – but I did learn a few things about reading comprehension, writing, and parental involvement that I can take back to the school and the teachers. Other topics in a balanced literacy program were presented as well. The participants also presented their best practices in an expo format. A lot of information!


Working on projects

Lectures

Student presentations

Spending time with the other volunteers, meeting some of the teachers, and having meals cooked was very nice. I really enjoyed seeing old friends, meeting new people, and engaging in a wide range of conversations.

However, sitting in such training is generally tiring for most people. I also didn’t have much alone time. As previous stated I’m a pretty extreme introvert who expends energy being around larger groups of (particularly new) people in such situations. I need alone time to recharge. I didn’t get much of the later during the training. Therefore, I spent a good bit of Saturday recovering.

Still it was great training and I’m really glad I had the opportunity to attend and hope to be able to apply some of the things I learned to help the students learn.

I also learned that I learned I need to remember to pack my razor.


A few days not shaving and you have to face to sun to catch the rainbow

Garden


Aaah!!! So, third planting of corn yielded one plant. I noticed depressions in some places at seed intervals so perhaps a rodent or bird dug down deep enough. My last attempt will be transplanting corn. And those are two words “transplanting” and “corn” I never thought I would put together in a sentence, much less attempt to do in practice. But desperate times calls for desperate measures. I’ll let you know how it turns out.

On the plus side the sweet potato should be able to provide shade if the corn grows.



Love always,
John

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