Learning in a time of pandemic

January

We kicked off the school year on 7th January. Grades 1-9 enrolled on the first day back at school and no new school entries were present. On 8th January, 26 new students enrolled at the pre-school. During the following week, the school teaching staff means tested the newly-enrolled pre-school children by paying visits to their families' homes. On 30th January, Grades 1 to 3, with the help of the pre-school children, gave the school a spring clean.

February

In February, we held a parents' evening to update the parents on the teaching methods which were going to be used this year to ensure that the pupils could cover the curriculum set. A school book delivery system had been planned and certain rules and regulations for the pupils' time learning from home. On 9th February, the school ran diagnostic tests to work out where the pupils' weaknesses lay, given the material covered the previous year. During the last two weeks of February, we made sure to go over the material which the pupils were found to be struggling with and then reviewed all the homework completed on these topics. During this period, we also started preparing the pre-school pupils for the term ahead.

March

At the beginning of March, the teachers began teaching from home. Sadly, some pupils weren't able to participate in the online classes due to the lack of internet connection or devices. These pupils were allowed to go to their teachers' homes to learn and others were able to visit the educational center every Friday to receive instructions, have things explained to them and their work looked at. As of Tuesday 16th March, classes were streamed from school and pupils and their parents visited school once a week on a Friday (at staggered intervals) to hand in homework and have material from the week explained to them.

Our school project manager in Honduras reported on the home schooling situation at the time:

Sadly, although many but not all of the children had a mobile phone which they could use to participate in online lessons to begin with, the situation has worsened over time. As the lockdown, caused by Corona, intensified, many of the children's parents also bought or made use of the phones given to the children, meaning that the children often didn't have as much access to the phone or didn't have enough credit on it to attend the Zoom calls set up for learning from home. Fortunately, I have come up with a system whereby I can credit the children's phones with minutes and, that way, we ensure that they are always able to participate in every lesson streamed. All of the school's online learning material has also been secured on a hard drive, to ensure that we don't lose our most precious teaching material - that would be a disaster!

In April, the time came for the first important set of exams. The school’s Director decided that it was important that these exams take place on the school site and so, asked for consent from all parents for the children to be allowed to come into school to sit the exams. So the examinations hall was set up and the children were able to take their important exams whilst observing Corona-friendly safety measures.

On 5th May, UNICEF visited the school and delivered little care packages to mothers and their children in the run-up to Mother’s Day. The school celebrated Mother’s Day by broadcasting a virtual event online from the school. Pupils and their mothers who don’t have access to Internet at home were able to get involved on campus. Dances and poems were performed and recited by the pupils and the mothers really enjoyed being the focus of attention for a day.

Spanish Language Day, another important annual day of celebration for Hondurans, was held virtually. The pupils who had been due to participate in person managed to record all the poems and plays that they had composed themselves at home and then played them online for all to hear. Truly inspiring creativity under the circumstances!

The huge school gates at the rear of the campus were found to be rusting away and urgently needed replacing as this posed a huge security risk to the children on site. The school’s Director ensured that a secure temporary gate was installed in the meantime and that new gates were quickly on their way. It’s vital that our CFF children feel safe on campus and, as such, we’re thrilled that the school was able to sort this so quickly.