TWI for the Children
Training Workshops
 Kosovo

March 4 – 6, 2006

The purpose of this page is to provide a record of the three Training Workshops held in Kosovo during the period March 4 - 6, 2006.  The Workshops were taught by Mrs. Bonnie Miller and sponsored by TWI for the Children, Inc.

Date

Activity

March 4, 2006

(Saturday)

• Seminar at Gjakova, Kosovo for teachers
  
  

  On Saturday, March 4, Bonnie Miller presented a full-day workshop for 156 teachers from the Gjakova area. Power point presentations, video, small and large group discussion, and hands-on activities were methods of demonstrating how subjects can be taught to students using a variety of approaches.

   

  The morning session presented material on accommodating children with different needs and learning styles and using active learning methods to make education interesting and relevant to children’s present and future lives.  Ways of designing classroom climates and school environments that foster children’s self-esteem, creativity, adaptability, and motivation were also topics of discussion. The section on "Emotional Intelligence" discussed how teachers can help children acquire crucial “people skills” such as: self-awareness, self-confidence, resiliency, coping with stress and emotions, communication, empathy, social skills, responsibility, and conflict resolution.

   

  The afternoon session focused on learning disabilities and attention deficit disorder.  Symptoms of these syndromes and their effects on academic, family and social lives of children were discussed.  Hands-on activities to simulate learning problems, videos demonstrating symptoms and teaching methods, and power point presentations were used to enhance the written materials provided for participants.  A variety of ideas were presented on simple techniques that teachers can use to help children with special needs in the regular classroom.  The importance of parent-teacher communication was stressed, and suggestions for encouraging home-school teamwork through parent-teacher conferences were presented.

   

  In addition, all participants received the following materials, especially updated for these seminars:

  ·   “Connecting with Children in the Classroom:  Manual for Teachers”  
  

  • “Communicating with Children: Manual for Parents”
    
  • “I Can Learn” – DVD on learning disabilities and attention deficit disorder  -- one per school
    
  • “I Can Learn” – accompanying guidebook for teachers

   

  At the end of the seminar, teachers were given time to discuss their plans to enhance their teaching methods and relations with their students in accordance with what they had learned at the seminar.  In addition, they were asked to write down ways that they would share the material and knowledge from the seminar with their school colleagues.

   

March 5, 2006

(Sunday)

• Seminar at Peja, Kosovo for school administrators

 On Sunday, March 5, eighty-four school directors and Ministry of Education officials from the Peja area gathered for a full day seminar.  Bonnie Miller’s topics of presentation were similar to those of the previous day’s seminars.  In addition, ample time was given in the afternoon for small group work to brainstorm methods for implementation and integration into the school system of knowledge and skills gained from the seminar.  Each group included a facilitator from the Ministry of Education, and all suggestions were presented to the larger group and recorded.  In addition to the materials listed above, which were distributed to all participants, a CD-ROM containing all five power point presentations was given to all of the school directors in order for them to become trainers for the personnel at their schools.  

March 6, 2006

(Monday)

• Seminar at University of Prishtina, Kosovo for students

In the middle of a blizzard on Monday, March 6, over a hundred education students attended Bonnie Miller’s 3.5 hour seminar at the Philosophy Faculty of the University of Pristina .  Topics were the same as the previous two days and used interactive methods and props to demonstrate teaching methods.  The eager and enthusiastic students gave the seminar very high marks.   

 

See additional pictures of the Training Workshops in Kosovo.