Provide Quality Education for 850 Youth in Panama

HOLA AMIGOS! Thank you for your important contributions!

Today more than ever, Enseña por Panamá works to promote quality education in every corner of the country.

With the experience and learnings of five years, we transformed ourselves to respond to new challenges through three lines of action:

• Distance education for students
• Virtual training for teachers from all over the country
• Early Childhood Education Initiative

In this report, we would like to focus on our “Strengthening of capacities of the educational system that contribute to greater educational access, development of skills and learning of boys and girls at the preschool level.”

The main purpose of the seminar "Preschool Education: integrated approaches to teaching and learning" was to promote the importance of this educational level as a key element in the comprehensive development and learning of girls and boys from 3 to 6 years of age by providing a space of co-learning to strengthen the knowledge and practices of preschool teachers and, with this, guarantee quality pedagogical interventions based on the playful educational approach.

Rationale

Preschool education contributes to the comprehensive development and learning of children in their psychomotor, cognitive, and socio-affective areas through the use of pedagogical strategies and styles appropriate for their age and stage of development (Ministry of Education, 2014). Thus, girls and boys are considered competent learners, that is, subjects of rights, protagonists, active, thinking beings and with the ability to learn from the environment that surrounds them (Secretaría de Educación Pública, 2017). Therefore, it is necessary to provide quality environments and interventions, where there are adults who are co-responsible and committed to promoting their maximum potential and acquisition of skills through significant experiences, according to their needs and interests.

Therefore, the awareness and continuous training of preschool teachers who provide education and care at this educational level is essential. This entails the strengthening of their pedagogical interventions by promoting: a) the recognition and integration of the key elements for meaningful learning; b) the importance of their role as facilitators of this process, and c) the use of integrated approaches as a playful strategy to guarantee effective and quality access to this fundamental right of children.

Thus, the main objective of the training "Preschool Education: integrated approaches to teaching and learning" in this second version, is to impact more than 80 preschool teachers nationwide through 40 hours of training for 11 weeks. For this, more than 150 teachers were summoned and the registration of 133 participants was carried out. Within the opening sessions, that is, the first session of the seminar, 110 teachers attended, and 100 experienced the complete training process. At the end of the course, 91 preschool teachers passed the seminar.

Analytical programming

The training had a total of 40 hours, of which 22 were dedicated to the synchronous virtual modality and 18 were allocated to asynchronous work. The seminar was made up of 4 training modules, in which the importance of Preschool Education and the role of the teacher as key elements for the integral development of girls and boys were studied in depth; the knowledge and practice of preschool educational agents was enriched by knowing and incorporating integrated approaches to teaching and learning in their pedagogical interventions; and a continuous action plan was carried out that was put into practice with the use of support tools such as observation and recording, pedagogical planning and evaluation rubrics focused on the needs and interests of their students, their families and reflection on their role. All this was done with the purpose of promoting the guarantee of quality care and interventions in the different educational communities served by the participants.

Conclusion

The implementation of the seminar "Preschool Education: integrated approaches to teaching and learning" in this second version is a joint effort on the part of UNICEF, MEDUCA and Enseña por Panamá to continue forming and strengthening a co-learning community that, up to date, Today it has 269 preschool teachers, who provide care to 6,033 girls and boys from 4 to 6 years of age in the different regions and contexts of the country, who have a fundamental role in promoting and continuing their integral development and learning.

During this version of the seminar, the participating teachers had the opportunity to put into practice content and pedagogical tools that enriched and consolidated their teaching experience in the implementation of quality interventions with their children.

Throughout the course, the preschool teachers reflected on the importance of preschool education, reconnected with their teaching vocation, and identified strengths and areas for improvement in their role through constant observation of their pedagogical work, implementing video recordings and rubrics. of evaluation directed to the analysis of the learning processes instead of their results. At the same time, there was continuous recognition of the needs, interests and particularities of the girls and boys in their care, which allowed them to discover valuable information about them to design and implement more and better meaningful learning experiences. The integration of integrated approaches and the facilitation of the game was also promoted as a key element to promote the acquisition and development of skills in this school and life stage. Likewise, the central role and work with families was resumed as a fundamental part of shared upbringing and the learning processes of girls and boys inside and outside the classroom, sharing and co-creating various strategies to foster the bond and involve the active participation of caregivers in pedagogical interventions.

At the end of the seminar, the participating teachers expanded their knowledge and strengthened their pedagogical practice by: a) recognizing and making the importance of preschool education part of their daily life; b) review the relationship between the brain and learning through neuroscience; c) deepen and reinforce the characteristics of a good learning facilitator in their role; d) integrate the game as a main tool and means for their pedagogical interventions; e) enrich the design of their educational planning with the support of different integrated approaches, and f) promote the alliance with mothers, fathers and caregivers with the purpose of strengthening their educational community.

For its part, the implementing team obtained learning related to the adjustment and continuous improvement of the evaluation instruments and pedagogical work, which ensure the implementation of quality training. Likewise, work will continue to prioritize the identification of the needs and demands of the participants, with respect to their contexts and diversity of girls, boys and families to whom they provide care, in addition to continuing with the creative proposal in the design and implementation of each co-learning experience. These efforts are necessary since through the teachers who are part of these spaces, we reach more children in Panama, other educational agents and key actors that make possible the search for well-being and comprehensive development of early childhood in the country.

If you would like to reach one of our new teachers or our summer schools students, or, please access our website, www.ensenaporpanama.com or write to us at info@ensenaporpanama.com.

Links:

• Website