The 6th Pan African Reading for All Conference took place at the University of Dar es Salaam from August 10th thru the 14th. Teachers from all over the globe converged on the campus to strategize how we can create meaningful and effective opportunities for students to become more literate.
Here are some questions I took away from the workshops that I attended:
* How can you remain effective in teaching class sizes of 40, 50, or more?
* What is literacy? And how do we make it accessible to all communities globally?
* How do you educate a child that has endured severe human conflicts and still motivate them to want to learn?
* What does professional development look like for African teachers versus the rest of the globe?
* What will it take to get Africa on the same common ground, educationally, as many of the other nations?
As I spoke with many African teachers and listened to their stories, I realized that many of them wanted the government and communities to support them with parental involvement, supplying adequate textbooks and spaces for children to learn, and opportunities to empower teachers with effective practices that are appropriate for the children they serve.
One of the biggest statements or questions that I took away from my time in the conference was:
Who's Voice Are We Going to Listen To?
Our children have so many obstacles to learning. They wake up in their own experiences and fight for survival; enter our classrooms and are expected to absorb material that is foreign to their identities; and go back to their own multi-layered lives wishing that someone would take the time to just listen to who they are and what they want for their own world.
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