art – Food for Thought Mondo

Drawing wildlife with Mukambi Primary School students

Published on August 10, 2017May 6, 2019 by eleonoresusiLeave a comment

In January NGO Mondo volunteer Olle Kaidro and WEFOCO school coordinator Sophia Malaha visited different schools in Uganda and Kenya, among them Mukambi Primary School. During their visit, students drew pictures of various plants and animals that could be found near their school.

Students were given drawings made by the students of Pärnu Rääma Basic School. They were fascinated to see some Estonian animals and learn their Estonian names.

After seeing the drawings students were eager to draw their own.

Students were inspired by the surroundings

Everyone were excited and had lots of fun. Especially commenting on each other’s pictures.

They wrote down the name of the animal in English and in their language, suahili.

All of the drawings were gathered to send them to their partner school, Pärnu Rääma Basic School.

Every one were active and really enjoyed the day. Hopefully the pictures will be as well received as the pictures from Estonia!

European Sustainable development week

Published on June 11, 2017December 1, 2017 by maimikkelsaarLeave a comment

The celebration of European Sustainable Development Week in Estonia lasted from May 1st until June 6th 2017. It was a cooperation project between AIESEC in Estonia and NGO Mondo, Estonian National Coordination of UNESCO Associated Schools Project Network (supported by UNESCO National Commision and Estonian Ministry of Education and Research).

The two AIESEC volunteers, Amy Corcoran and Wentao Pu both came to Estonia from Canada. In cooperation with Mondo’s experts we developed the following workshops:

1) Multuculturalilty in Canada

2) Orienteering game on SDGs

3) Comics on SDGs

4) Sustainable consumption

Project was devided in five stages:

2-5 May – Cultural preparation and introduction to #globalgoals

Arrival
Introducing SDGs
Global Education seminar day

8-12 May – School related preparation

NGO Mondo’s school workshops
Planning and preparing ESD workshops for schools
Call for visits for the schools

15-19 May – School visits

Finalizing ESD workshops
05 Multuculturalilty in Canada at Paldiski Ühisgümnaasium – Grades 9-11, 35 students, 2 academic hours, contact teacher Riina Talvik

22-26 May – School visits

05 Multuculturalilty in Canada at Ülenurme Gümnaasium – Grades 9-11, 110 students, 2 academic hours, contact teacher Milvi Tisler
05 Orienteering game on SDGs* at Nissi Põhikool – Grades 5-9, 100 students, 3 academic hours, contact teaher Day-Lee Holm
05 Orienteering game on SDGs at Narva Soldino Gümnasium – Grade 8, around 100 students, 4 academic hours, teacher Tatjana Okuneva. Overnight stay in Narva.

Mondo koomiksite töötuba ÜG 6.-7.klassidele from Ülenurme Gümnaasium on Vimeo.

29 May -6 June – School visits

05 Orienteering game on SDGs at Pala Põhikool – Grades 4-8, 80 students, 3 academic hours, contact teacher Grete Stina Haaristo
05 22.05 Comics on SDGs at Ülenurme Gümnaasium – Grade 7, 70 students, 3 academic hours, contact teacher Milvi Tisler

06 Comics on SDGs at Jüri Gümnaasium – Grade 8, 40 students, 3 academic hours, contact teacher Kristi Mänd
06 Sum up meeting between AIESEC and Mondo

Altogether the ESD week activities reached over 550 students in differenet parts of Estonia adding up to 21 academic hours of workshops, exchanges and positive thinking!

Photo Essay – Munganga and Tamsalu

Published on March 20, 2017March 20, 2017 by maimikkelsaarLeave a comment

Munganga Secondary School and Tamsalu Gymnasium have a long history of partnership. As the latest activity, NGO Mondo volunteer in Kenya and Uganda Olle Kaidro and WEFOCO school coordinator Sophia Malaha organised a fun workshop for Munganga pupils and Anne Kraubner from Tamsalu gather her students to discover the pictures sent!

Step one – Receiving letters from Tamsalu’s students

Step two – Answering to Estonian partner school

Step three – Receiving letters from Munganga’s students

St. Stephen´s Eshiakhulo Secondary School – Wild Nature

Published on March 16, 2017August 10, 2017 by maimikkelsaarLeave a comment

MINOLTA DIGITAL CAMERA — Pupils in actions – reversed classroom

Hello! We are St. Stephen’s Eshiakhulo Secondary School in Kenya. Our WILD Nature activities involved groupwork around two tasks – messages of plants and making dolls with reused materials and natural materials. All students could work on the project they liked!

We hope our partner school, Toila Gymnasium will see them and organize their project work around the same topic.

Here you can see the pictures we draw. The most important plants in our nature are sugar cane and lemon tree with local importance and coffee tree as an international export article.

MINOLTA DIGITAL CAMERA

The second group worked on making dolls. We used materials that we could easily find – plastic bags, seeds, plant fibers. It was really fun to get creative and make something with our hands! The ready-made dolls we brought to our younger siblings.

You can see the process from these pictures and the video:

One group got very artistic with their poster while using the colors of Kenyan national flag!One group got very artistic with their poster while using the colors of Kenyan national flag!

MINOLTA DIGITAL CAMERA

One group got very artistic with their poster while using the colors of Kenyan national flag!

Zanlerigu Primary School and plants in our yard

Published on November 28, 2016January 2, 2017 by marijogisteLeave a comment

Classes 4, 5 and 6 from Zanlerigu Primary took part of different school linking activities. From 7^th to 11^th of November.

Our friends from Estonia sent us a presentation about plants in their school yard. We looked at it with classes 6a and 6b and the Mondo teacher from Estonia was explaining the uses of these plants and some things about the climate and nature of Estonia. For us it is quite difficult to imagine a place than can be so cold at times. We made herbal tree from linden tree flowers and drank it together.

With class 6b we then went around our own school and talked about the ways we use the trees that are found here. The trees that we saw were Neem tree, Kapok, Flamboyant tree, Mahogany, Eucalyptus and Acacia. The most obvious benefit of all these trees is that they provide shade and coolness for us and our animals when the weather is very hot outside.

Some trees also have very special value for their beauty. For example in the beginning of rainy season the Flamboyant tree bears very decorative red flowers that are pleasing to look at. Flamboyant tree and Acacia belong to the the bean family of plants which means that they bear fruits that are stored on pods. These pods of seeds can be used to make different sounds and play music. These trees also have fern-like leaves that are made up of many small units attached to one leaf-stem.

The trees that have medicinal value are Neem tree and Mahogany. We can make tea from neem leaves, which can lower fever, clean blood, support liver function and much more. Around here people often use small sticks of neem tree to clean their teeth (the bark of neem is antiseptic and anti-inflammatory). The seeds inside neem berries can be used for making oil, which is widely used in production of cosmetics. This oil also has a use as natural insect repellent. Because neem is a fast growing tree it is also often used as firewood. Growing neem trees also makes the soil more fertile because the roots can grow very deep and bring minerals back to the surface of the ground.

Mahogany is a tree that is prized for the beautiful colour and texture of it’s wood. That is why it’s often used to make luxury furniture. Mahogany is a slow growing tree. We use the bark and sap of mahogany tree for medicine, especially to cure stomach pains. That is why when you see mahogany here, their trunks have many scars and holes in them. People routinely go to the tree to cut it and get medicine.

The Kapok tree has fruits that contain cotton like fibre. We use it to make pillows.

Eucalyptus is a tree uses up a lot of water from the ground, so people plant it to irrigate very wet areas.

After seeing all the plants and talking about them each student chose one tree and drew a picture of it also stating some of the uses of this tree.

With both classes 6a and 6b we read the letters from our friends from Kuristiku Gümnaasium and wrote letters about ourselves back.

Presentation Primary School: Trees around our school

Published on November 28, 2016January 27, 2017 by marijogisteLeave a comment

A group of students from classes 1-6 from Presentation Primary School learned about the different trees that are found near our school. Our teacher David was telling us about the uses that these trees have.

The trees that we talked about were: Jatropha, Mahogany, Fig tree, Shea tree, Neem, Dawadawa. Red and yellow berry trees.

Jatropha is a plant that can be used to produce oil. Mahogony tree has very hard and beautiful wood and therefore is used for carpentry, but besides that it also has medicinal value in easing stomach pains. Neem tree is also used as medicine to lower fevers. Dawadawa tree fruits are very nutritious and we use it in many dishes (like soups, stews and rice dishes).

After seeing all the trees we went to the library and everybody chose one tree to draw. We made picture of the trees and wrote uses of them next to our drawings.

Cultural performances in Zua Primary School

Published on November 28, 2016January 2, 2017 by marijogisteLeave a comment

Boys and girls from Zua Primary School are very good at dancing and singing. On 20^th of October 2016 we had a cultural performance day at the school to show different local dances to our friends in Estonia and other countries.

In front of the schoolhouse boys did the traditional War Dance. It is a dance usually performed on funerals. The tradition comes from old times when different tribes of our area were always fighting. When a person who had married to a different tribe died, their family members would suspect that somebody from the new tribe might have killed this person. To make sure if this had happened, they would dress in menacing war costumes, take weapons like bows and arrows with them and go to the funeral. There they would perform a dance to threaten the people of the new family and see if somebody gets scared of them. It was believed that he who shows fear might be the killer. These days the dance is performed as a traditional ritual, not out of necessity and is an important part of every funeral. Of course we did not have a funeral at the school, but because students have seen the dance done many times, they could show everybody what it looks like.

Then we gathered under the baobab tree where boys and girls showed different local dances.

Later in the day Godfred from class 5, who is a very talented musician, built a Kolog (local guitar). To do it he used a calabash, goat’s skin, pins, string and wood for the handle. When the instrument was finished we could sing and dance some more. We also learned to play one of estonian traditional instruments, the Parmupill (Jaw harp).

PS! We will add videos of the dances later, in December 🙂

Making figurines out of natural clay in Kon Yome Monastic School, Shan State, Burma

Published on October 13, 2016January 2, 2017 by Viktoria RudenkoLeave a comment

On a fine day of August 6, 2016, all of the students and teachers of Kon Yome invested some time for School Linking activities to send their first message to Tallinn, Estonia. The students walked into the jungle to get some clay for crafting. Once the got the material, everyone found a suitable place in front of the school building in the shadow of the big tree and creativity could start flying.

Sai Zin Pha, 8, showed the greatest mastery and productivity: he started by making a buffalo, then a hippo (or was it and elephant?) and then went on to create other creatures and cars. Some other boys were taking tips from this little fellow.

Nang Zarm Pang, 9, made a beautiful flower and was really pleased with her creation.

Three older girls: Nang Kham Aeng (10), Nang Swe Ing (11) and Nang Khin The (11) had an idea to print leaf patterns into clay and when they got praised for their originality, they gathered some more plants and started to share their original idea among the rest of the kids, especially the younger ones.

Sai Zai, 5, kept very quiet and serious all the time and probably decided to wash clay in a bucket with washing water rather than create any kind of figurines.

Sai Zom One, 10, showed great knowledge of architecture and engineering: he modeled a house with clay walls and a roof made of beautiful purple leaves. He naturally confessed that he had copied the idea from the real houses around him and that when he grows up, he would like to build more houses in his village. This little architecture immediately got a follower: Nang Kham Zang, 8

Nang Si Warn, 8, thought that making just a regular flower was not enough, so she created a picture that one can hang on a wall as soon as the clay gets harder.

After crafting was over, the kids showed us some dancing and singing and then went to have a school break.

I guess now they are eagerely waiting for a reply from Tallinn Pae High School students!

A song by class 4 of Dasabligo Primary School

Published on October 12, 2016January 27, 2017 by marijogisteLeave a comment

The 4th grade students of Dasabligo Primary created and performed a song about animals living in their village. The name of the song is “Animals feed on grass”. The song is about goats, cows and sheep who all roam freely around the school and our homes. It explains how these animals live during the rainy season when there is plenty of green grass around so they can eat a lot and grow very fast. Rearing of animals is one of the main activities that people do in rural areas of Ghana. We love our animals very much!

After performing our song we also made drawings of these animals.

Lyrics of the song in Nabt language

Lyrics of the song translated to english

Dasabligo Primary class 4

Drawing the animals

A drawing of a cow

A drawing of a goat

A drawing of a cow

A drawing of a sheep

A drawing of a cow

Drawings of animals

Class 4 boys

Class 4 girls

Wild animals of Ghana by 5th grade of Gorug School

Published on October 12, 2016January 27, 2017 by marijogisteLeave a comment

5th class of Kong-Gorug Primary School made an art project about wild animals in Ghana. We made sculptures of native animals of Africa (elephants, crocodiles, zebras, lions). We collected clay from the field near our school and each student made their own animal. When all the animals were finished we placed them on the classroom floor and drew a water hole on the ground for them to drink from. Then we sang a song about the same animals. Our friends from 4th grade made drawings of our sculptures.