Every class from 1st to 8th has two 35 minute modules of ‘Physical Education’ per week. The role of the volunteer interested in it, is to prepare and lead these sessions to make the best out of the time, adapted to the age and development of each group/ child.

Teamwork, initiative, cooperation, the understanding of games rules, sportsmanship, tolerance to frustration and self-confidence are just examples of all the skills that kids can easily develop through sport. The kids from Korando don’t have a lot of experience on playing new games, explained and lead by an adult. For this reason, you will have a lot of room to teach them new sports that will challenge them.

The Kenyan curriculum is extensive, therefore the children need many hours of study to learn the subjects covered and pass their exams. Physical Education can be perfect to relax from the pressure of standard classes and learn some out-of-school skills.

We recommend you to create a professional environment with a structure of activities and games. Starting with some easy games as warm ups, yoga exercises, simple songs with choreographies, introducing the children/group to team games while improving their motor skills with any material you can find available; ropes, balls, tires... This is one of the moments of the day the children enjoy the most and creativity is the key.

Kids in our school, from 1st to 8th class, also have two modules of 35 minutes per week dedicated to Creative Arts. Children always expect this lesson with a lot of enthusiasm. Sadly, when there isn’t a volunteer to organize something for the group, the lack of resources (material, but specially human) leaves them to spend that time doing homework for other subjects, or just chatting around the classroom.

At Better Me, we really believe that creativity is an essential skill to be developed in every human being. The ability to find new solutions relies more on creativity than just on a big amount of theoretical or technical knowledge. Specially here, where the lack of resources is an everyday concern, being able to think of new solutions can be a great advantage for our pupils in the future.

Art can also be a perfect way to develop self confidence, to learn how to express emotions, how to recognize them and deal with them. Art can educate tolerance, respect, multiculturality or equality.
Through art, kids express their feelings and thoughts, and makes any conversation related much easier than a traditional approach of asking them to express themselves with words.

Keep in mind that by Creative Arts, you are not limited to plastic arts. You can teach them about music, theater, dance and corporal expression. During this lesson, you can share with the children any knowledge you have or introduce any subject you are interested in through a creative path. They are not used to have access to many materials, so a few stickers, colored papers, pencils, or almost any small material you can bring, will have a huge impact in their motivation to learn from you. Most materials can be easily found in Kisumu town, where we go at least once per week. However, we encourage you to be a creative and use recycled materials, to create as little waste as possible.

You will be provided with resources built by our previous volunteers, so you will have an idea of what to expect and how Korando reacted to different experiences in the past, and support and advice during the design and implementation of your project. This way, we want to guarantee that you make the best out of your volunteering experience, and we all learn something new from it.

We have had a theater group with classes 4th to 8th, which delighted both pupils and teachers. The kids that participated took the big step of putting themselves in front of the school, and brought up some really interesting topics. Theater is a great way to open up discussions about society , how to improve it and about what worries them. After a month of work, they started to prepare, almost on their own, a second play, this time involving a few more classmates.

Bring your ideas, try to involve the teachers in them, and help us to make Korando a more creative place.

One of the achievements of this year, has been the creation of a computer room in the Korando Educational Center. 10 computers are available for the use of pupils and teachers. Each laptop is equipped with an open source software to support learning, including an offline version of Wikipedia for schools, textbooks, typing software, an interactive world map, and many short courses organized by subject with mainly audiovisual content.

For most of the kids, including the older ones, this is their first contact with a computer. For that reason, you won’t need a big or professional knowledge about informatics to be able to teach them something new when it comes to using them. Learning how to use the touchpad, how to type or how to organize folders are really basic skills that will be essential in their future.

Some of the kids, specially the ones living at the center, are really motivated every time we come to the computer room. They are already learning how to type by writing letters to the volunteers who had to leave, and learning how to use the touchpad by drawing in paint or playing the games that some of the computers include.

Some of the older ones already started to learn how to make small presentations with Powerpoint, and we hope to teach them how to use Excel as well. The possibilities are endless, and for now, we can just imagine the potential of teaching them a bit of programming or graphic design!

Our teachers would also improve the quality of their lessons if someone could teach them how to introduce the use of laptops in the classroom, complementing the explanations and exercises in the traditional way with multimedia and interactive contents. We are working on the creation of a schedule on saturdays, break times, etc., to start teaching them the basics.

The computer lessons can be held during school hours, but you can expect to work on it mainly while the kids are having free time. For this reason, the attendance would be voluntary, which will let you appreciate their motivation and interest to learn. You will be able to structure the sessions the way you feel more comfortable with, and adapt it to the level of each kid or group.

The volunteer interested in helping with our nursery pupils, will work in close partnership with the current teacher to educate the more or less 30 kids that attend her lessons.

The pupils from the Nursery Class are 3 to 6 years old. They divided in three levels, baby class, middle class and final class, depending on their age. This three groups need to share the classroom and the attention of the teacher until they are 6 years old, and start with their primary education.

We have to recognize the amazing job that Norah, the nursery teacher, is doing with the youngest kids of our center. The number of kids and their age differences are a big challenge when preparing them for their primary school classes. It makes the lessons a daily challenge for one person alone.

Therefore, the help of a volunteer willing to add value to the classes and innovate would make a huge impact on the learning process of the kids. To have the possibility of splitting the class, organizing different activities adapted to the different ages, working with smaller groups and spending some time doing outdoor activities would improve our nursery class .

We would really appreciate volunteers that come with songs, games and new creative ideas to implement in the class. Nursery class pupils are still learning English, but they understand pretty well and generally behave showing good manners. Your presence, speaking to them in english, will also have a positive effect on them and their adaptation to primary school in the future.

The class already has materials such as flashcards or posters, but they lack storybooks and other learning materials. As always, only your creativity to create the lessons is the limit, but bringing some extra materials would surely facilitate your labour.

To make the most of your time, if you are interested in volunteering as a primary teacher in a particular subject, please inform your Coordinator in advance.
He/she can than arrange your participation in the classes.

After being introduced to the Korando Educational Centre staff, we recommend you spend the first few days observing in the class that you have selected. This will allow you to gain a better understanding of the current class structure and teaching style. It will also give you a chance to get to know your pupils, helping you to identify those who might need more assistance or who are more advanced. You will then have opportunity to work with the teacher on planning the appropriate lesson that you can teach together.

Working closely in partnership with the teacher gives you a chance to learn from them, while ensuring that any new ideas and interactive learning techniques you are able to introduce will continue to benefit classes after you leave.

You can make the most prominent and sustainable impact in the classroom by working alongside the teacher to create lessons which are engaging, interesting and fun. It will be up to you and them to decide how you will approach your classes. Expect a lack of structure and a very repetitive teaching style – come along with games, ideas and plans to teach the teacher, so that learning can be fun.

By volunteering as a teacher, you can help local teachers with classes, ensuring that pupils receive more personal attention and tutelage. By setting an example of English pronunciation and grammar every day, you will create an improvement in your pupils’ language skills.

You may be able to teach lessons in English, Maths, Science, and Social Studies. You won't be teaching the Kiswahili classes, obviously, but learning a few phrases can go a long way towards earning your students' respect.

Games are a fantastic way to teach children of all ages. Word games, like hangman, crossing words and puzzles are constant favorites, which also develop the children's spelling and concentration.

These games can be difficult when English is your second language, so providing words from a particular theme can help the kids along.

Most importantly, don't be afraid to use your imagination and initiative when teaching: the more exciting you can make classes, the more information your pupils will retain.