A note about my experience teaching in Cap-Haitien, Haiti.
Summer, 2015
Bonjour y'all,
Three weeks since I returned from Cap-Haitien, I'm looking back on my time there with so much gratitude. It was a wonderful experience for me, both professionally and personally. I want to thank my teammates, those who donated to my fundraising project on GoFundMe, and the members of my church family who donated markers and color pencils.
For those of you who might be interested, here's a brief summary of what I did in Haiti:
I participated as one teacher in a group of six on a volunteer trip to Cap-Haitien through an organization called Teachers2Teachers International. We worked with the teachers and students of a Methodist school, "École Methodiste Baudin," running a week-long academic summer camp on their campus. Our purpose was to share teaching strategies and best practices with the teachers at Baudin. To this end, we were each assigned a grade level (I taught first grade) and a pair of Haitian teachers. We modeled instructional techniques by teaching a week-long unit of study to our group of students while our Haitian counterparts observed and took notes. After each session, we met as teachers to discuss the instructional merit of the techniques presented and plan for the following day. This way, we were able to show our Haitian teachers what we do, while also collaborating with them to meet our students' specific needs.
For those of you who might still be reading, here's a little bit about the impact of this work (on myself and others):
Before the trip to Haiti, I was a little bit worried about the prospect of teaching other teachers. I'm still new to my content and grade level (2014-2015 was my first year teaching Elementary French in Chapel Hill), and I wasn't sure I'd have much to offer a more experienced teacher in the way of best practices. As I prepared, however, I realized that I do have a powerful teacher toolbox, accumulated through five years of experience in three very different settings. In Haiti, I had the opportunity to ask myself: what are the most unique and effective elements of my teaching practice? Identifying and sharing those with other teachers was a very rewarding experience.
But what impact did this work have on others? K-12 Education in Haiti faces many challenges, and I would never claim that any of my ideas or resources (we shared many material resources with our teachers at Baudin as well) had any impact on a broken system that often fails students. But I do believe that my teachers learned some useful practices, and will make use of this learning to improve instruction for their students. For now, that's good enough for me. When it comes time to find systemic solutions, I plan to focus my efforts right here in the United States, where WE often fail to serve all of our students.
As my thoughts turn back toward my work at home, I'm considering how my experience in Cap-Haitien will impact the way I teach French to my students in Chapel Hill. The connections I made with individuals and communities in Haiti brought this corner of the Francophone world to life for me. Having real memories from Cap-Haitien gives me new energy to bring cultural content from Haiti into my French curriculum. I know from experience that couching language instruction in a cultural experience increases student motivation because it engages them in something that feels real, rather than an isolated academic exercise. By connecting to people and communities in Cap-Haitien, I gained the knowledge to create engaging and authentic cultural experiences for my French students in Chapel Hill.
So thank you for your support. It would not have been possible without you.
All my love and hundred times "MERCI!!!"
- Jaci
PS - Just in case anyone was wondering, I taught French in Haiti. Haitians speak Creole as their native language and learn French in school. A student's academic success can be determined by their command of the French language, although many Haitians leave school with little proficiency in the language.
Bonjour y'all,
Three weeks since I returned from Cap-Haitien, I'm looking back on my time there with so much gratitude. It was a wonderful experience for me, both professionally and personally. I want to thank my teammates, those who donated to my fundraising project on GoFundMe, and the members of my church family who donated markers and color pencils.
For those of you who might be interested, here's a brief summary of what I did in Haiti:
I participated as one teacher in a group of six on a volunteer trip to Cap-Haitien through an organization called Teachers2Teachers International. We worked with the teachers and students of a Methodist school, "École Methodiste Baudin," running a week-long academic summer camp on their campus. Our purpose was to share teaching strategies and best practices with the teachers at Baudin. To this end, we were each assigned a grade level (I taught first grade) and a pair of Haitian teachers. We modeled instructional techniques by teaching a week-long unit of study to our group of students while our Haitian counterparts observed and took notes. After each session, we met as teachers to discuss the instructional merit of the techniques presented and plan for the following day. This way, we were able to show our Haitian teachers what we do, while also collaborating with them to meet our students' specific needs.
For those of you who might still be reading, here's a little bit about the impact of this work (on myself and others):
Before the trip to Haiti, I was a little bit worried about the prospect of teaching other teachers. I'm still new to my content and grade level (2014-2015 was my first year teaching Elementary French in Chapel Hill), and I wasn't sure I'd have much to offer a more experienced teacher in the way of best practices. As I prepared, however, I realized that I do have a powerful teacher toolbox, accumulated through five years of experience in three very different settings. In Haiti, I had the opportunity to ask myself: what are the most unique and effective elements of my teaching practice? Identifying and sharing those with other teachers was a very rewarding experience.
But what impact did this work have on others? K-12 Education in Haiti faces many challenges, and I would never claim that any of my ideas or resources (we shared many material resources with our teachers at Baudin as well) had any impact on a broken system that often fails students. But I do believe that my teachers learned some useful practices, and will make use of this learning to improve instruction for their students. For now, that's good enough for me. When it comes time to find systemic solutions, I plan to focus my efforts right here in the United States, where WE often fail to serve all of our students.
As my thoughts turn back toward my work at home, I'm considering how my experience in Cap-Haitien will impact the way I teach French to my students in Chapel Hill. The connections I made with individuals and communities in Haiti brought this corner of the Francophone world to life for me. Having real memories from Cap-Haitien gives me new energy to bring cultural content from Haiti into my French curriculum. I know from experience that couching language instruction in a cultural experience increases student motivation because it engages them in something that feels real, rather than an isolated academic exercise. By connecting to people and communities in Cap-Haitien, I gained the knowledge to create engaging and authentic cultural experiences for my French students in Chapel Hill.
So thank you for your support. It would not have been possible without you.
All my love and hundred times "MERCI!!!"
- Jaci
PS - Just in case anyone was wondering, I taught French in Haiti. Haitians speak Creole as their native language and learn French in school. A student's academic success can be determined by their command of the French language, although many Haitians leave school with little proficiency in the language.