Enseñar África

Casa África presents, before the media and the educational community, the Show Africa project, undertaken in collaboration with the University of Las Palmas de Gran Canaria (ULPGC), the  Ramón Areces Foundation and the Government of the Canary Islands and who after many years of work has produced teaching materials aimed at secondary school students to know about and work on the continent from a positive perspective.

Under the direction of teachers from ULPGC Ignacio Nadal (Geography) and Ezequiel Guerra (Human Geography), a team made up by Secondary Education teachers from the Canary Islands and Senegal and teachers from the University Cheikh Anta Diop of Dakar (Dakar, Senegal ),  Abdelmalek Essaadi University (Tetuan, Morocco), Eduardo Mondlane University (Maputo, Mozambique) and the University of Las Palmas de Gran Canaria (Canary Islands, Spain), a teaching unit has been designed that addresses eight topics of great interest to understand African realities, and, in turn, are very useful as supplementary material for the work of the authorities in the development of Secondary school curriculum.

Africa is the closest physical reality to the Canary Islands and yet ignorance and stereotyping are the most common features that accompany our perception of the continent. The negative view of what happens there is almost the only one that exists, especially from students, such that the plurality of situations is a trait that is rarely taken into account, together with the positive progress that African societies have made in many respects. That is why the Show Africa Project is presenting a plural and diverse Africa which, without hiding the problems, stresses its positive developments.

The Project consists of a Student book and Teacher book, the latter as a CD, to be received in all IES of the Canary Islands during the month of November 2013.

Furthermore, the project will be implemented in the secondary schools who wish to do so, with the relevant certification for the coordinating and participating teaching staff, under the terms in which the resolution adopted by the DGOIPE are set out, and will be carried out in three phases:

1. An introductory workshop and work with teaching materials Show Africa, which will last three contact hours and will address the following contents:
1. Dissemination of the results of previous research to when the Didactic Unit was carried out, to get to know about the students' previous ideas on Africa and also, the content included in textbooks about this continent.
2. Presentation of the didactic model that is expressed from the teaching materials Show Africa: Unit structure, type of activities, etc.
3. Proposal of the work to be undertaken in the centres.
2. A development phase of the Project in the classroom, where teachers will set up a research process from the implementation of one of the subtopics of Teaching Unit Show Africa, which will result in a final product (mural , photographic exhibition, comics, art, drawings, text, etc.).
3. Exhibition at Casa África of those materials produced by students which have been previously selected at the school itself and later in the CEP of their scope.

With regards to the Introductory workshop, this is open to all teachers, so that, although they may not be working with the material in the context of the project's development, they can get to know about it from its authors and get the most out of its use.

All secondary schools in the Canary Islands will receive copies of this publication so they can start working with students during the 2013/2014 year.

More information:

• Project presentation at Casa Africa:
• On Monday 25th November 2013 at 10:00 a.m. before the media
• On Wednesday 27th November 2013 at 7:00 p.m. before the educational community
• Resolution of the Directorate General of Planning, Innovation and Educational Development, which approves the "Show Africa" ​​project for its implementation during the 2013-2014 school year in public secondary schools.
• Annex. Certification
• Photos of the project's presentation at Casa África
• News Casa África on the presentation
• Video of Casa África on the project
• Check the training materials at Casa África's Kuwamba Portal