Magical Classroom

Here at Aula Mágica we have been very busy preparing for the beginning of 2020 academic year. With more than 30 Facilitators coming from different communities. The classes will commence once again in our classrooms and we are really excited to be with our students once again!

Each year offering our program is a considerable challenge which has led us to think a great deal about what we do and to find the best strategies in order to benefit our pre-school children and families who have a great need. They live in remote communities and are often isolated and suffer from limited services and support.

In the last few years we have received committed support from various marvellous organizations who believe in and share our mission:  Miracles in Action, Go Philanthropic, Mathile Institue, Project Quetzal, MAIA, Adesju, as well as others.

One of the strategies for these upcoming months is to collaborate with as many organizations who share similar aims to ours, which will allow us to expand our work to other areas and regions of the country where we are not currently working. This will allow us to have a larger positive impact in each program that we offer.

Collaborating with other organisations will allow us to reach out to more communities with needs in areas of health and pre-school education. We are really hopeful that various organizations join with us so that we can work towards the same objective.

We are very proud to have an excellent program focusing on high quality pre-school education in rural communities. We also have our Mothers’ Groups for each classroom. They meet regularly and they are our source of strength. Each Facilitator with the support of the Regional Coordinator cover themes such as: early learning, hygiene and nutrition, which are vital topics for every home. There exists a great amount of trust amongst everyone involved which is essential for the success of this program.

We look forward to keeping you updated with the progress of our program throughout the year.

Best wishes and until the next time!

Aula Mágica Guatemala!

We have reached the end of another year of classes, and this year we have had 249 children! At the moment they are on holiday in their homes for a few weeks and will return to school in January, 2020, for the new academic year.

This academic year has certainly been very valuable and productive. All of the children who have participated in our program have received good quality teaching which has been adapted to their particular environment.

Our 31 facilitators, who are also young leaders of their communities, have done an incredible job through their teaching of each of our children. This has taken place alongside with the great work carried out by our Coordinators in each of the departments where we work.

Throughout the year, there has been a great amount of collaboration between the children, Facilitators, Coordinators, community leaders, parents of the children, and the Directors of the schools in each of the communities. We are extremely grateful of everyone involved, as this has allowed our children to receive an education that will serve as a sound base for their future education as well as their social development.

We are delighted about having worked this year in four different departments of Guatemala, these being, El Quiche, Huehuetenango, Solola and Retalhuleu, and this has covered twenty-two very rural and remote communities.

This is very valuable for us as it means that we are achieving an important objective of supporting, and offering pre-school education to children aged four, five and six years of age, who would not normally have had access to an education.

It is also important to mention the significant role played by our donors, since without them this would not be possible. We are truly grateful to our treasured donors, and especially grateful of the confidence that they have shown in our program and what we are doing. A big thank you to you all!

Best wishes,

Magic Classroom

Dear Friends,

It’s always a great pleasure to share with you what has been happening with our programme, Aula Mágica! It’s also really positive for us to know that you enjoy to hear about what we do, and this provides us with even more motivation to drive us forwards.

In recent weeks, we received different visits to our programme. Two visitor groups spent time with us and shared time with our children. We were visited by the group, Go Philanthropic, as well as the Reed family from the United States of America. These groups as well as others that support us, are an integral part of our programme and we are delighted and grateful that the Reed Family and Go Philanthropic took the time to be with us. Can you guess who were really excited by these particular visits? The children of course! After an initial shyness shown by the children, the visitors were received by the children with a lot of love and affection. Each child was eager to show what they had learnt and illustrate their talents, and every child was excited to share time with each of our visitors.

For our programme, Aula Mágica, it is important that our visitors can see the work that we do in our classrooms with each of our children and in each community which we support. It is also important that our visitors see the educational skills and knowledge that we provide to each of our children, and the significant changes that can be made through education in rural Guatemala.

We really appreciate the visitors for the time that they spent with us and we hope that they can return to Guatemala in the near future and of course visit our Magic Classrooms in Guatemala!

Our best wishes to everyone!

Aula Mágica

Magical Classroom/Aula Magica’s Second Training Session – ‘Infant Stimulation’

During this month of July, we carried out our second successful training session. Normally we complete two training sessions during the course of the year. We bring together all of our Facilitators from the different communities located in Huehuetenango, Retalhuleu, Quiche and Solola. In total, more than 28 Facilitators were present for this training session.

During the week, each of our Facilitators learnt and reinforced their knowledge on topics such as fine and gross motor skills, writing development, reading for children, learning corners, nutrition, mathematics, painting, music, emotions, art, music-therapy, and many valuable educational activities that they will be able to use in class with our children.

It was a very productive week, with lots of learning and new experiences, and our Facilitators had the opportunity to share new experiences and techniques. The training took place in La Antigua Guatemala, and for many of the Facilitators this was their first time here, since they live on communities very far away. Some, for example, live 10-14 hours from La Antigua Guatemala. It is very heartening and significant that our Facilitators have the opportunity to visit new parts of Guatemala.

We also visited the zoo in the capital city and the Facilitators were delighted and excited to see the different animals of the zoo. This was an excellent educational experience for the Facilitators, especially as for the majority of them this was their first time visiting a zoo. We had a marvellous day with each one of them! The second training session finished with a great shared feeling of happiness, and appreciation for each one of our Facilitators due to the great effort that they put in to their communities and making a positive change through the pre-school education.

Best wishes and until the next time!

Aula Mágica

Aula Mágica, New volunteer to the program, May 2019

Hello, my name is Gabryl Sam. I am a volunteer with Aula Mágica (Magical Classrooms). In the fall of 2017 I graduated from Northern Arizona University with a Bachelors of Science in Environmental Sustainability and an emphasis in Global Sustainability. I am a Native American from the Navajo tribe. Growing up on the Navajo Nation as an indigenous person I feel the importance in helping other indigenous communities. After being in Guatemala and visiting classrooms in the rural areas I have seen first hand the importance of these classrooms. 

On two separate trips we managed to visit five different classrooms in the department of  Retalhuleu and Quiché. Some classes were held at a formal school and the others were held at a member of the community’s house. The teachers are really making an impact to better their community, they are young, bilingual in both Spanish and their indigenous language, so they can communicate with the children. After seeing the children with their smiling faces eager to learn, I knew at that point that this was something special. In Magical Classrooms, we strive to assist children with fun interactive activities that will stimulate their learning. The classes will last no longer than two hours each day, Monday through Friday. In the classrooms we use different techniques from visual, auditory, and kinesthetic learning. What we focus on with the children, to name a few, is knowing their ABCs, numbers, shapes, and colors. We do this by reading to the class, singing along to music, arts & crafts, and social interactions. 

From visiting and traveling far into these rural indigenous communities, I have seen first hand the need for schools in these areas with high levels of poverty. With the lack of government support in these communities it is hard for children ages 4-6 to have a basic education before the 1st grade. Magical Classrooms assists children in the crucial time in their life to build the foundation to succeed further into their education.

 See you soon!