“When are we going to travel again?” The children in Mr. Tomás Bocel Quisquina’s classroom ask him. These students clamor for another reading hour, which, for them, is a chance to time-travel.
“¡Croac! ¡Croac!” Tomás impersonates a toad, hopping around the classroom and using a deep, throaty voice. He’s reading a favorite book, and the children fall out of their desks, giggling.
These kids are becoming literacy buffs thanks to their teacher and Child Aid Literacy Trainer Rosenda Ajpacaja, who coaches and supports 50 primary school teachers each year through the Reading for Life program.
At first, Tomás resisted learning techniques from Rosenda. He would welcome Rosenda to his classroom, but leave her alone to read to the children instead of participating himself.
“These strategies don’t work for me,” Tomás told Rosenda. “What is visualization about? I don’t understand.”
Coaching Provides Personalized Support
But Rosenda persisted. She demonstrated how to involve the students in the reading experience, how to ask questions that made his students laugh. She taught Tomás how to set up a reading corner with titles tied to science, geography and history. Slowly, Tomás ditched the rote, lecture-based learning techniques standard in Guatemalan elementary classrooms.
“In past years, the Guatemalan Ministry of Education has sent us books and told us what to do with the kids, but no one actually came to support us in the classroom,” says Bocel. “We need someone who teaches us strategies and techniques to teach reading well.”
Child Aid fills that gap by working with teachers to transform floundering classrooms into places where learning happens and children are eager for the next lesson.