Category: Mexico

This workshop programme has evolved with an emphasis on the importance of emotions and the way in which both students and staff manage them in order to promote learning. It is very hard for children to focus or connect with classroom content if they feel worried, sad or over-excited. The same is true for teachers, and their management of their classroom can dictate how effectively they are able to teach their students. 

For this reason, the workshops implemented by JUCONI in preschools and primary schools have continued to provide children and teachers with the tools to manage their emotions and to make schools safe spaces to learn and work. 

The teachers who have attended the workshops are making use of the ‘emotion’s thermometer’, which is a visual tool for helping young children put a name to their feelings and their emotional intensity. Teachers have also participated in developing a ‘personal security plan’ for their schools.

During feedback, a teacher mentioned that “The workshops really make me think about my students and reflect on how their emotions might affect their academic performance.” Another teacher said “I have found the topics covered by the workshops to be very appropriate and I think that these tools will help us and our students greatly.” 

All participants would like to have more workshop sessions because they believe it is important to explore the tools for managing emotions in greater depth due to the responsibilities that they have in their roles. A teacher concluded that “This kind of workshop contributes to the security of not only teachers and students, but of all members of the school community.” 

During the past few months, JUCONI has worked with four schools resulting in sixty-six teachers attending our workshops. As a result, approximately 1041 children have directly benefitted from them.

JUCONI’s workshop programme has been successfully implemented and is now being rolled out and welcomed by teachers in other primary and nursery schools in Puebla, Mexico. The utmost importance of working with teachers in the first instance has been recognised by school principals and encouraged them to seek guidance from JUCONI. Throughout the workshops, JUCONI has helped teachers to understand what safe spaces are, the requirements for them to exist and to reflect on how change and security start with themselves. 

During one of the workshops, a participant commented that the content of the course was really focusing on teachers and helping to develop self-care tools that made them feel safe, so that they are able to replicate similar behaviour and conditions with their students. 

Each workshop includes five base sessions, with two additional sessions for case studies, which are optional. They occur on a weekly basis or once every two weeks and have a duration of 1hr. 40 mins – 2 hours. They usually take place in the mornings/early afternoons or at a time suited to school timetables and teacher availability. During the pandemic, the workshops were online, but since the beginning of 2022 JUCONI has been able to have in-person meetings. A trainer from the JUCONI team runs the sessions and is sometimes helped by a college student doing community service. 

The content of the workshops includes explanations and elements of a safe environment and a set of tools for teachers to implement in terms of their personal safety both inside and outside the classroom, alone and with their students. In addition, teachers learn that a safe school environment does not only involve physical safety, but also psychological, moral and social. Some of the tools that teachers are introduced to are; the ‘emotions thermometer’ with illustrations of emotions, a ‘safety plan’, gaining access to the community + community activities and specific plans of action. 

Five schools will have received the workshops by the end of the second semester of 2022, amounting  to a total of nine schools for the year. This includes three primary schools, with thirty five teachers undertaking the training and approximately 1064 children benefitting. The workshop has already been implemented in one nursery school, with nine teachers doing the training, and 177 children benefitting. The other nursery school will implement the workshop starting in mid-November and finishing in January 2023. 

The response from the schools has been great and the reputation of the workshops is spreading. JUCONI also provides smaller workshops for caregivers, which consist of three sessions where topics such as emotions, positive parenting, and effective communication are included. These in-person workshops aim to be dynamic and show caregivers the importance that the first years of life have on a child’s development so as to raise awareness and promote a loving, caring upbringing. In the second semester, JUCONI carried out workshops in three primary schools and one preschool, impacting a total of 352 caregivers. 

Following on from the success of this project in three schools in Puebla, we are planning to work with 12 teachers in four nursery schools and 48 teachers in four primary schools this year. This could involve 144 nursery aged children, 1,200 primary aged children and approx. 256 caregivers.

After a number of COVID-19 lockdowns, the objective continues to be to reduce the potential for violence in schools by promoting the development of safer classroom environments in order to strengthen attendance and reduce the possibility of children dropping out. Through a series of workshops, training and guidance will be provided for both teachers and caregivers that will focus on nurturing the healthy development of the girls and boys in their care.

For teachers, innovative training activities will aim to develop and strengthen their skills so that the potential for disruptive behaviour in their lessons is reduced. Furthermore, they will be given specific guidance on identifying and supporting the most vulnerable children in their classes. Workshops for caregivers will include topics such as child development and positive parenting.

Staff at JUCONI Mexico are currently in the second stage of working with teachers from three schools to strengthen the knowledge and skills they acquired and developed while participating in our series of JUCONI training workshops in May. Everyone is keen to reduce the potential for violence in schools now that they have reopened and we are monitoring the ways in which teachers have been able to use what they have learned. Within their own work spaces, teachers have been sharing ideas and reported that they have become more aware of their own emotions and those of their students. Many of the children have been particularly affected by the consequences of the Covid-19 pandemic, such as the loss of a caregiver, increased domestic violence and a reduction in economic stability.

Teachers have begun to use a variety of teaching and learning strategies and often change the layout of their classrooms to help to encourage a positive learning environment. Many teachers continue to use the relaxation exercises that they learned during the workshops and these have helped them to develop effective coping strategies when responding to difficult situations with the children. 

Furthermore, school managers and teachers have become more aware of the physical, emotional and social consequences of the pandemic on the children and have acknowledged the role of the school environment and staff in supporting them. This has resulted in more time being allocated for meetings to discuss and address complex emotional situations with the aim of developing strategies and establishing support-networks to manage them better. 

Focus group meetings that aim to strengthen collaboration between the school and the community have also been integrated into the academic year. At the same time, school managers and teachers have shown an increased interest and sensitivity in seeking external support networks to refer children who have developed mental health issues as a result of the pandemic.

The current situation in Mexico is complicated by the number of infections and deaths from COVID-19; and in Puebla the situation is no different. Due to the lockdown in March, contingency plans in relation to the delivery of health services were activated, and the JUCONI team continued to offer one to one medical appointments to the children and young people on the programme, in the newly refurbished health clinic. Information about how to stay healthy was promoted and medical problems were followed up on a monthly basis with the children and young residents; plus more than fifty extra appointments were offered to residents and families. Personal Protective Equipment was also provided to children, young people and health workers. However, since May, due to an increase in infections in Puebla, all medical follow-ups with families on the programme have had to be carried out remotely, either by phone or video calls.  

During this period, we have also run health campaigns and given talks for all those served by the programme. The topics covered have included Covid-19 and Personal Hygiene.