EMPHASIS III - REFLECTION

The following text about Amalaka and its pedagogy was written by a classmate of last semester.

Since we started with our degree research, there had been many things that have a special importance in our degree work and also in our educational perception, I do not know if is right to use “we” or “our” because I am talking since my point of view and I believe that my research partners believe or see the same things that I do, because we are focused in the same subject, anyway, I am referring to those subjects or ideas that are not specifically written in our research but which are between the lines, waiting to be discovered, ideas that shout its meaning and it is necessary to me explain them to increase the justification of our project and also give a path for a good interpretation of it.

One of the things that you can perceive clearly in our degree research is the critical thinking, not as way of rejection, but as a way of improvement, in fact it can be read it in some chapters, since there are parts which talk about the traditional education as a concept that need to be improve, which point our research project toward the alternative education, specially Freinet´s pedagogy. Although this is one of main subjects of our degree work, this is not the matter in which I want to emphasize, it is more important to me the idea of criticize any movement, ideology or knowledge, from which we are part, like education, politics, science. Not with the intention of finish with something that is not well received, on the contrary, it is important to reflect on the problems and try to improve them or look the mistakes and try to solve them. This exercise must be constant in that way there will be more benefits for the societies involves, for example I am trying to find a book or text which reflect and criticize Freinet´s pedagogy, in order to get information to improve it even more, but until now I didn´t find any information about it, because it is unbelievable to me that this pedagogy will be perfect, maybe I supposed that there is no information about this, because the application of this pedagogy has not been in a big scale which prevents to do a mayor investigation or maybe I am wrong and there are many books but I didn’t find them yet. The important here is that always there is a space to investigate and find solutions and obviously, a constant renovation.

Apart from anything else, I believe on the importance of freedom, our research work talks a lot about this subject, and there is interesting information to study, but the subject hide between the lines is even more important and gives us more information to think about it, for example, I am very interesting in how Amalaka promotes freedom, because there is freedom to expression, that foster self determination and at the same time creates personality, but that freedom has justifiable limits, those limits are respect and self control. Firstly the meaning of freedom have been changed in the course of time, now we see how transnational companies and powerful nations interfere in third world countries in the name of freedom and charity, destroying even more their economies and creating more dependency for the help that these develop countries provides, exerting control, also we can see examples of this bad use of self determination, for example in Colombia there are lawyers, politicians, soldiers, teachers, common people, etc. which as free humans believed that they have the right to do everything they want, like change the meaning of the laws in order to be absolve of their crimes, or take authority on others people lives or even making people suffering, for this reason, the limit that Amalaka promotes is the respect for human beings and their opinion, for nature and any kind of live in this world. Secondly, the lack of self control of powerful countries in order to amount big quantities of money in few hands, by means of techniques that are a shame is the prove that freedom is sometimes used to benefit some people and leave others with all the problems, for example, the promotion of military technology which is in fact the principal source of the technology that we used nowadays, for that reason XX century was full of wars and military intervention around the world which increased the industry of technologies and the suffering of hundreds and hundreds of people. This kind of ideologies has changed the perception of freedom in all our generation, now there is not control to get what you want, obviously if you are prepared to ride roughshod over people feelings and their necessities, For this reason and many more Amalaka promotes self control as a way of respect for others live.

By: Wilmar Andres Mendez G.
Modern Languages - 10th semester

Amalakines' pet

Our thesis group

In Amalaka school after class doing our reflection..

this is the maloca I love the most... and my loved group... 

faviola

EL AGUA Y LA TIERRA EN UN CARNAVAL DEL LENGUAJE

On April 23th Amalaka school celebrated the Spanish Language Day and also the Earth Day.

From the beginning of the morning, the students were excited and anxious for the activities they had programmed. When they arrived to school, they put around the school, some posters and pictures related to this celebration. Some of them said: “a book is your best friend”, “If you don’t have anything good to say, keep in silence”, “save the world, take care of water”. The day was sunny, and plenty of nice activities. At 8 o’clock arrived to school the students of Novirao Totoró, who were invited to share the day in Amalaka. Some of them rode their bicycles, and the others came on foot. They were amazing when they saw Amalaka, since it was the first time they did it. Then, the principal talked and gave the welcome to them, and the two schools were together into the biggest maloca, in order to start the programmed activities. A woman who was the indigenous governor of Totoró spoke in Nasa yuwe language her mother language, to thank for the welcome. Some students acted remembering the arrival of conquerors, some others singing and dancing. There were other activities like competitions and games such as bagged race, awards rod, spoon and egg race, and in some games Amalaka students were the winners. After that, the students went over the ecological path and to the river. Then they had a delicious lunch. Some students of Novirao school were recording and taking pictures. Indeed, Amalaka school is beautiful.

We could observe that in that kind of activities, the Freinet’s methodology is applied, because children felt free and happy for sharing their cultural environment. The students participated and leaded the activity, being themselves the authors of their learning.

Besides, the order and discipline were excellent and the interaction among the students was planned and expected.

Conclusion: The activity illustrated us the students in Amalaka have a good sense of sharing with others as a community; because, they showed by meaning of their behavior.

Amalakines in Novirao Totoró Cauca

On April 16th Amalaka school was invited by the Novirao Totoró school. An indigenous school situated in totoró Cauca.

At 8 o’clock in the morning the Amalaka’s students arrive to Novirao school, which were waiting for us. The principal gave us the welcome and inmediatly we were to walk into the ecological path. The walk was plenty of surprises because the path had amazing landscapes, and some signs were
written in both languages: nasa yuwe and Spanish. There were incredible bird’s sounds and exotic plants. After the walk, the students were prepared for playing a football game which contained students and teachers from the two schools. Even the smallest children played too.

Then, we had a lunch and we went back to Popayán. The landscapes contained mountains, rivers, friendly people and animals.

We could observe that in that kind of activities, the Freinet’s methodology is applied, because children felt free and happy for sharing their cultural environment. The students participated and leaded the activity, being themselves the authors of their learning.
Besides, the order and discipline were excellent and the interaction among the students was planned and expected.

Conclusion: This kind of activity teaches us the way to share other cultures without the necessity of leaving from our country. Here in Cauca we have some cultures which is worth knowing for.