Let’s break it down: The education.

The second part of my National Geographic project is education. Education is one of the most important parts of Para La Tierra. We understand that if people do not understand nature, they are not going to care about it. And if they don’t care, why would they want to save it.

PLT’s education program is called Voces de la Naturaleza, run by Joseph Sarvary, Jorge Ayala and Bridget Tam. Voces is a program of Eco-Clubs were children can come and learn about nature through games, arts and crafts and stories, participatory activities where they learn that it is ok to question, to think outside the box and to gain confidence in their own abilities.

 In 2016 I was award a grant from the International Primatological Society (Lawrence Jacobsen Education Development Award) that allow me to develop a series of primate conservation focused lessons for the eco-club curriculum including a children’s book about a baby monkey stolen for the pet trade, games with monkey costumes and art activities.  When I was awarded the National Geographic grant this provided the means and opportunity to take these lessons to even more children.

During this project I will visit 23 schools in three communities bordering San Rafael “National Park”. In April 2018 (before the project officially began) I carried out a set of lessons at seven schools in Alto Vera, the community closet to or field site Nueva Gambach. I visited these schools with Jaime, a forest guard from MADES (the Paraguayan ministry for the environment) and Gustavo, a forest guard with PRO COSARA. In each school, Jaime gave the children a presentation about San Rafael and then I played two games with them, one about the effects of deforestation and one about water contamination. Both games had a message that linked back in to the important of protecting San Rafael.

Learning about water contamination through games.

These lessons also acted as hands-on training sessions for the forest guards in our participatory education methods. They both quickly realised how much easier it is to engage children (and keep their attention) when teaching in an active manner, rather than sitting them in front of a power point in a 36C classroom!

One school in particular was a particular challenge for me. While I can teach in Spanish, Mberu is an indigenous community where the children only speak Guarani. I have been trying to learn Guarani and this was my first attempt to teach a lesson in this incredibly difficult language! With a bit of help from their teacher (Claudio, an ex-forest guard from PRO COSARA) I did manage it and the kids seemed to fine me hilarious and appreciate the attempt at Guarani.

Trying my best at teaching in Guarani.

In September and November we carried out our first set of primate conservation lessons in the first community at the northern end of San Rafael. Stay tuned to hear about how it went!