Mountain Village Teacher's Workshop

Ok....How often does a person get to ride up a small winding mountain road and do a workshop in an outdoor community area enclosed by a village temple structure, while looking out on a tropical mountain vista? Not often? Maybe not, but....

Dewi, representing the Helen Flavel Foundation and I were invited by Undiksha University Student's Union to give a workshop on TEFL for YL. (Teaching English as a Foreign Language for Young Learners). The students organized the event as a part of their social services. Teachers from 2 local schools and Education students from the university English, Idonesian, Art and the Japanese Departments attended.

Out the window went the plans as we were told at starting time that only 2 of the teachers were English teachers and only a few of the students were from the English Education Department. Dewi spoke about general teaching strategy and I spoke on child-centered and active student learning environments. We also spoke about reading and gave out copies of “eka's bali” and Maggie Dunkle's book “Making the River Clean” for the teachers and schools.

One of the best moments was when I translated part of my presentation into Japanese for the Japanese Department students! How often does a tall white Canadian speak Japanese to Indonesian students in a remote village in Bali? They were so surprised but happy and we had a spirited round of JanKen (Rock/Paper/Scissors) in Japanese with a copy of “eka's bali” as a prize! Very fun! Very cool!

Teachers in remote villages and schools get basically no inservices nor any kind of professional development opportunities. I was possibly the first foreigner to actually visit their village. The HFF also donated some teacher supplies like chalk and pens/pencils as well as some old but unused Indonesian textbooks that had been donated to HFF.

All in all – an awesome day! I'll definitely go to other tiny villages like this again when invited!