TWI for the Children
Training Workshops
  Kosovo  
Bonnie Miller

October 11 - 13, 2008

The purpose of the Training Workshops is to help young people be adaptable lifetime learners as the world situation and the demands of the marketplace change. In the three-day workshop,  various teaching methods were used to introduce educators to new teaching skills.  

      Instruction  emphasized the importance of helping children learn through various modalities:  visual, auditory, and kinesthetic, including active learning methods. The instruction   stressed taking into account the individual differences and needs of students. Participants   discussed ways to make schools into stimulating and caring centers of learning by transforming classroom and school climates and encouraging teachers to develop nurturing relationships with their students.  The workshops  also stressed that schools can be  primary sources of teaching emotional intelligence also by building competencies in communication, stress management, conflict resolution, and problem-solving skills that students will need in their adult lives. Workshop activities   concentrated on children with learning disabilities and attention deficit disorder. The program  discussed how to identify these problems in children and techniques to help them become successful learners and confident students.  

Summary of Workshops in Kosovo  

Sponsored in part by TWI for the Children, Inc., Bonnie Miller  returned to Kosovo for the second time in 2008 to present in  a three-day weekend, three Training Workshops. This was Mrs. Miller's eleventh trip to Kosovo.

On 11 October 2008, Mrs. Miller  hosted a workshop in Podujeve (north eastern part of Kosovo) for 76 teachers, school directors and education students. The topics dealt with new methods of teaching and how to identify and help children with Learning Disabilities and Attention Deficit Disorder.  The government head of the region and regional head of education spoke at the seminar, and the former promised to make education in his district a top priority.  Mrs. Miller's educational materials were distributed to all participants.

On 12 October 2008, Mrs. Miller presented a seminar in Prizren on the same topics for a multiethnic audience of 86 Bosnian-speaking educators (Bosniaks, Turks, and Gorans).  The presentation was in Bosnian language, and participants received Mrs. Miller’s parenting manual, teacher manual, video, and guidebook on learning disabilities in Bosnian language.

On 13 October 2008, Mrs. Miller presented a short workshop for 55 students in the Faculty of Education at the University of Prizren .  With this series of seminars, Bonnie has trained well over 3000 educators and education students and has presented 24 workshops all over Kosovo, including all of the university faculties of education in the country.

All seminar participants  received Bonnie Miller’s book, Communicating with Children, and guidebook on Learning Disabilities and Attention Deficit Disorder, I Can Learn.  They will also received the newly published updated version of Connecting with Children in the Classroom, underwritten by a grant from USAID.  

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Updated: 10/15/2008