Skills for Kids - a place of great value

Randomly, one day browsing over facebook, I saw a post from Skills for Kids. Their post was about their new classrooms, I got curious, saw the pictures, checked out their facebook page and wrote something like: "Great initiative - would love to see the place one day. Good luck". Before I knew it I was invited.

Skills for Kids is a new school with the beautiful mission of educating special needs children in group sessions as well as in one to one therapy sessions, all taken care of pertaining to the individual child's needs.   

"We empower children who face challenges at school and in their daily lives, and prepare them for inclusion in the community and mainstream education." From skillsforkids.ae

It was the most fantastic villa, furnished and decorated as a mini school. Even though I was visiting outside school hours, I could easily imagine a creative, non stressful atmosphere creating a fantastic learning environment for special needs children. I was impressed by the education quality I felt prioritized in the different rooms and clear ambitions for the future.

Skills for Kids is unique especially of its size, since the center will only host a minor numbers of students at the time. Other than that they have a high priority of letting students learn in a group, if at all possible. I my opinion the best part is the focus on including the students, maybe it will not happen in a mainstream school, but that will not stop this place from including the students in the society.

"From a world of exclusion to wonderful participation"

Skills for Kids webpage - Please have a look www.skillsforkids.ae/

I wish Skills for Kids the best start in their first school year and look forward to follow your journey.

The Link

I finally found it. The link! The link between my education and job, the connection between my professional and personal life, the bridge to my ongoing development.

I love professional as well as personal development, I constantly challenge myself and I'm searching for a new place or role as soon as it makes sense- sometimes too soon.

I have joined a mentoring program here in Dubai called "The Link" with a vision as ambitious as I am:

"Our vision is to have a generation of women with more confidence and leadership capacity to reach their goals and contribute to the growth of the UAE." the-link.org

I will attend as a Mentee and will get a Mentor to support me in achieving my goals and develop my potential. We will both learn more about ourselves through honest conversation and reflective questions - I hope!

I'm really hopeful about the program in general. I'm wishing to get a goal for the future, for my career, to find the right track for me,  and most importantly all the steps of the "how-to-get-there-process". It's maybe a little ambitious, but hey, that's how I'm.

I have already attended the introduction program, which was a full day of different tasks getting a ground level knowledge of mentoring and especially the mentoring we will experience in "The Link". I walked away with a really good feeling inside: This will be the beginning of my future journey.


  

Edmodo - the new Facebook

I just got to know about Edmodo.com - Facebook for schools is the easiest description.

Every school have to be registered, every teacher creates a profile and a group for their class e.g English 7a. The teacher simply give a code to their students and they can easy join the right group.

You end up with a group very similar to a Facebook group, where teachers can post homework or other information as well as a quiz and register assignments with a due date. Students can post a question or write a comment.

My school has replaced their own (and a bit old fashioned) intranet totally and are now fully using edmodo.com for homework posting supplied by email newsletters.

It is possible for more than one teacher to join the same group, even possible to create groups with teachers only. Parents can create their own profile as well and be able to look at their child's homework or comments. 

Edmodo also allows teachers to share articles or 'favorite' teaching resources with other professional. 

Tommorow it is...

Excited, nervous, prepared with a new wardrobe and an information level equals to zero I'm looking forward to my first day at work. Tomorrow I'm having my first day at GEMS Welling Academy (WA) as a Learning Support Specialist (LSS)! 

I'm expecting that I in the upcoming school year will work with 2-3 students with some kind of special needs. I could be general concentration problems and learning disability among students, could be kids with diagnoses like ADHD or maybe Autism/Asperger - that is at least my understanding. I'm expecting an established team and a professional organization from my experiences with GEMS WA so far. 

I'm looking forward to motivate and support students who is academically behind their year-group average, to help them structure their daily school life and follow their progress. I'm looking forward to know how this school system is working, what about the teaching methods, teachers and different policies? Who will be my new colleagues and how will I fit in? Do I personally agree or disagree with the schools way of handling different situations and how will my own opinions develop through this meeting with one of the biggest school systems in the Middle East?