Today, we were able to visit the Colegio Codema, another public school in Bogota. Like yesterday's school, this school is in a working class part of town with less resources in general. But today, I saw great teaching. The school had a much more structured feel, students in classes and learning.
We started the day with an overview of the school and our indicidual schedule. Janneth Gomez, an English teacher in the primary school.
We were able to observe a few classes and I saw great, interactive, creative teaching strategies and lots of dialogue with students. The first class I watched was a fifth grade class and students were making presentations. Students were articulate and their teacher asked them two or so probing questions after each presentation. The topics for the presentations went from James Rodriquez (the Colombian soccer star) to human rights but the teacher treated each topic with interest and worthy of discussion.
We ended the day with a round table discussion with teachers and students on Colombian and US education. Many similar issues came up- how do we measure success? What strategies do we use for learning and behavioral issues? How do we make education more relevant to our student's lives? We found many common themes between the two country's educational issues. But differences that also came up including the use and access to more technology in the US classrooms and the issue of more diversity of languages and needs in the US. The teachers at this school were very engaged in trying to improve their work and school and that engagement really showed in the classroom!