With most schools still closed due to the pandemic, Jamaican school teacher Taneka Mckoy takes the risk of teaching students by write lessons on blackboards painted on its walls.
Parents and children of primary school age take photos on their phones of the lessons or write them down in a notebook. Later, the children pass by Mckoy’s home to hand in or pick up their homework, wearing face masks and respecting social distancing measures while they stand in line. Mckoy, said she felt compelled to start the project when the new coronavirus reached Jamaica seven months ago and the government closed down its schools in order to contain infections.
“I said that if we don’t meet them and bring them (to learn), the family would have lost this opportunity that lies within these inner-city community children,” she told. “I said I have to do something.” First, Mckoy got her husband to paint nine blackboards, then she started getting up before dawn to plod through a warren of muddy lanes and potholed streets to write numeracy and literacy lessons on them in green, purple and white chalk.
“Right now the community we are living in is very violent, and it affects the kids, so if they can come and see the work on the board, at least something can occupy their time,” said a local mother. “For some, teaching is a calling, and she exemplifies this,” says the education specialist at the Jamaica branch of United Nations children’s agency UNICEF. “We… are liaising with the government to see if, and how best, her innovative and practical process can be scaled up.”
Post Your Comments