Facilitating a workshop in a seminar on “Citizenship Education and Human Rights” in the rural commune of Akhfenir

On the occasion of Human Rights Day, the CSTDD organized a seminar on  “citizenship education and human rights” with participation of members of Moroccan Center for Human Rights. The seminar included a roundtable discussion and two workshops  facilitated by members of CSTDD who volunteered to move from Layoune city to the rural commune of Akhfenir (200 km from Laayoune) to head the initiative. I was in charge of facilitating a workshop on "the implementation of the new anti-torture Act"

Week Ten: Wrap-up

Week Ten: Wrap-up

This week marks the last moments in our course and I cannot believe how the time has flown by so fast. I remember like it was yesterday when we were assigned to write our first reflections about the course. I was very enthusiastic about everything in this class and by the time I started   believing that it was not going like any ordinary class I had before.  In this course, I have learned a lot of beautiful things.  I still can’t forget how happy I was when I managed to successfully complete many assignments including the  creation of my own reflective blog,  Delicious page, technology-enhanced lesson plan, my own WebQuests, Interactive Power Point slides, online survey, to name but a few. Another great achievement of this course was the class project which all the participants were supposed to submit by the end of week nine as the fruit of this interesting class. The course also has provided access to a selection of unique online resources.  In many cases, we were recommended to explore in depth various online teaching materials most of which were very interesting and seemed to be carefully chosen. I am sure; participants would not be able to find these valuable tools if they searched them by their own. Although much of the workload was sometime intense, it was motivating and manageable which helped me keep enjoying the course. The course also has offered me an only one of its kind opportunity to meet with colleagues from different parts of our lovely earth, I consider them now as members of my big family. . Let’s not forget Jodie and Sherie, the most wonderful, helpful, lovely, and enthusiastic professor I've ever had. Overall, this was a great course and I feel lucky to have taken it.

Week Nine: Very Busy Week

Week Nine: Very Busy Week

Another week has passed and it was one the busiest weeks I had ever had this year and I don’t know how I could have managed to balance between the assignments of our course and other commitments.  This week,  I was recommended by the administration of my school to take responsibility of managing a three-day cultural event which was held at our school on March 08th through 10th. The Festival provided a great opportunity for both teachers and students to revive old traditions and customs that highlight local cultures and their historical roots. Although it was a hard responsibility but an exceptional and interesting experience. Through all this hard time, I have managed to read some articles about learning styles and pop in NiceNet to post my contribution. I have to express my gratitude this week to my nice project partners Ruki and Nihmat for their insightful remarks and great efforts to have  my project draft reviewed.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JUvtd9Ao5OA&feature=share

A three-day cultural event was held by Sakia Al-Hamra high school on March 08th through 10th under the theme of “Students' Creations in the Service of Human Values”. The Festival offered a rich program of seminars, exhibitions and musical and cultural events. The purpose of this event is to promote a greater understanding of the value of local traditions and customs and construct an atmosphere of cooperation and competition among students

Week Eight: Very Rewarding Week

Week Eight: Very Rewarding Week

I can say that this week is one the most rewarding weeks in this interesting course. We have been exposed to a lot of online materials and we were assigned to choose some those tools and DISCOVER them in depth. We were supposed to build a course site or create some exercises.  Some of the online resources that I found useful for  were toolsforeducators.com and eolf.univ-fcomte.fr   which include various interesting teaching tools such as crossword puzzles, matching exercises  ,bingo games, flash cards and multiple choice activities. I really liked all the tools but I couldn’t work on them all because of time constrains. This week, we were expected to post our project drafts on the wiki class, conduct a peer review of and to exchange ideas about them. Next, we all of us are supposed to submit the final drafts as a fruit of this fun and interesting course

Week eight: Very Rewarding Week

Week Seven : Countdown Begins

Week Seven : Countdown Begins

Another week is about to close. It seems we are moving very quickly towards the end of this interesting course.  For me, the countdown has already started when we were asked to work on the project drafts.  This fact made me somehow feel discontented because I am no longer going to meet with those nice friends whom I, even we meet only online;   consider now as a part of family.
This week was also a rewarding week. We were given the chance to read some articles about the topic of learner autonomy which should be encouraged in our classes. I believe that teachers should ready to accept their new role in classrooms as  facilitators of the learning process. We were also assigned to read another article which  was about the one-computer classroom and design a lesson for a one-computer classroom.  And finally, we were asked to find a project partner to work with on exchanging the project first drafts. For some colleagues, it was a very hard job to start negotiating the matter and sign up for a partner. I am lucky I didn’t struggle too much to stumble on my project partner. I have to thank nice friend, Nihmat, whom I greatly appreciate her kindness.

Week Six : Week of Great Discoveries

Week Six : Week of Great Discoveries 

Too many things I have learned this week! I can call it the week of great discoveries . First of all, I have ever thought that I can  do a lot of great  things with PowerPoint software, that’s also what my friends used to think of me since I used to help them  design their lessons using this outstanding  software . This week, I was convinced that knowledge is a yawning ocean without borders. I still remember when Jodi told me that I would learn more things about the use of PowerPoint and I was wondering what those things would be. Now, it comes time when I have learned that I am still not only PowerPoint but also technology illiterate. When we were assigned to make an interactive PowerPoint, I was so enthusiastic to learn more and I didn’t limit myself to the reading materials that were suggested by the course but they were an excellent start for further research. This week, I learned too many great things thanks to Jodi, Sherie and colleagues’ guidance. I have also managed to create a sample WebQuest. It seemed to be a challenging task in the beginning but when I made an attempt, I enjoyed the game and was able to complete it successfully though too late. I know that both the PowerPoint and my WebQuest projects are modest attempts but I do believe that they can be an encouraging attempt for further great teaching projects. Thank  you all best friends for this new nice experience.