SUKOHARJO

In Solo in February 2006 the MBE team were able to visit a number of schools that are showing progress in Sukoharjo district, which is near Solo.

. . . (photo 5). The children of grade 3 at SD Gayam 1 were drawing rectangles with the exact measurements in the mathematics lesson (photo 1). Wati is working watched by her teacher Ibu Mariani (photo 2). Ika, a student in grade 5 is reading a story to her teacher, Bpk Suyanto (photo 3). The children in grade 6 have been enthusiastic and creative in making a funny and interesting display. One of the pieces of writing is titled ' Football in Heaven' (foto 4) written by The Sweet Girls (foto 5).

At SD Sukoharjo 1 the children in grade 5 helped by the teacher, Ibu Tati Widyaningsih, are finding acronyms and their meanings in the newspaper (photo 6). The classroom environment is attractive and interesting. At SD Sukoharjo 2 the children in grade 6 have written a school newspaper which reports on interesting events (photo 7).

Their teacher, Ibu Diah (photo 8) is an MBE facilitator who also took part in the workshop in Probolinggo to report on the development of PAKEM in her class (see her article on Page 21).

DBE 2 Visit to Magelang

As part of the field staff training for their staff which was taking place in Yogyakarta, the DBE 2 program from Central Java, West Java and North Sumatra made a visit to MBE schools in Magelang on 14 March 2006.

The aim of the visit was to help staff of the DBE 2 program to understand the kind of teaching that takes place in schools which are following the MBE program. The participants observed lesson management and the teachings learning processes in class. There were 100 participants in the visits.

They were divided among ten MBE partner schools. Visits like these motivate school principals and teachers to keep on improving the quality of teaching in their schools.

The schools were very enthusiastic to show what they had learned from the MBE program. One noticeable fact was that all the teachers in the schools visited routinely make lesson plans.

In addition the pre-sence of the school committee and the parents groups in the school added to the impression of liveliness. During the visit the guests observed lessons in class, while trying not to interrupt the teaching learning processes.

MALANG: Remote School not to be Left Behind

SDN 1 Wadung in Pakisaji sub-district is a school situated in a remote village a long way from the town. Since working with MBE the school, which used to be just ordinary, has become special. The school environment is used as a learning resource, the class-rooms are attractive and happy places.

Through the parents groups the com-munity has become much more involved. "Now the parents groups look after things like repairing classrooms, buying materials for PAKEM and helping in class," said the School Principal of SDN 1 Wadung, Ibu Ngatemi. "It has become easier to teach the pupils because we can concentrate giving good lessons."