Support Teacher Trainings in rural Myanmar

4^th Report for Rural Teacher Trainings in Myanmar

December 1^st, 2014

Warmest Greetings for the end of a successful year!      

As the cool weather rapidly falls upon the small town of Kalaw, in the pine covered mountains of Southern Shan State, we are pleased to share the final news with you of our teacher trainings in Myanmar for 2014. It has been a tremendously successful year with our Teacher Training programs and we look forward to your continued support as we make plans for 2015.

Brighten Foundation Training at Shwenadi Monastic School in Dry Zone

For the second year our friend Guisseppe Martinegi from Brighten Foundation based in New Zealand, joined us for another successful month of trainings. Shwenadi Monastic School is home and school to over 400 ethnic children from Chin State on the border with India. The program was a huge success and has started an on-going relationship with the monastery as well as a newly found Montessori Pre-School started in the town of Kyaubadaung. During our time with Shwenadi we offered;

• Teacher Training
• Youth Empowerment Training
• Football (Soccer) Training for teachers and youth

Youth Development Foundation/Football for Hope and Brighten Foundation

For that last 2 years we have also been working with our Myanmar based partner U Ye and his Youth Development Foundation/Football for Hope. Together we held teacher training, youth empowerment and football training outside of Mandalay. Working with a local monastery with over 450 ethnic Palaung children, we also supported the monastic school and orphanage with basic health care and cleanliness of the compound and support better health among the children.

Inter-Cultural Education (ICE) with Pestalozzi Children’s Foundation (PCF)

Whispering Seed facilitated a 5 day workshop on Inter-Cultural Education (ICE) training for PCF participants from Myanmar, Laos and Thailand. Offering training to support ICE programs to be better integrated into their programs in the 3 different countries. Besides ICE, Whispering Seed also introduced holistic education, environmental sustainability and Non-Violent Communication (NVC) to the Pestalozzi team. The training was very successful and future collaborations are being planned together to bring more Inter-Cultural Education ideas and practices into the programs we are working with.

Holistic Education and Earthen Building Workshop in Upper Myanmar with Kachin Education Initiative Group (KEIG)

Over the next week we will be traveling to Upper Myanmar to work with KEIG in Kachin State. There we will working with teachers from various organizations who are working in different regions of Kachin State and Northern Shan State. Following the training we will designing and building an earthen building kindergarten for one of the KEIG members new project. More to come on this in the next report!

Overall we have had a very successful year reaching teachers and youth from all over the country. We are already planning workshops and trainings to start in January and continue throughout the year with our partner organizations here in Myanmar.

We are grateful for all your support and look forward to your continued support in the upcoming year!

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