Twenty teachers from as close to home as New Haven and as far away as Texas gathered July 8-19 at the Yale Center for International and Area Studies in Luce Hall for a two-week, hands-on, intensive institute on "The Teaching of Africa." The program is just one of several summer institutes sponsored this year by the Program in International Educational Resources (PIER).
These institutes are both intended for and taught by educators. The program's instructors include faculty and staff from Yale, master-teachers from other schools and alumni of previous Yale summer institutes. The goal of the institutes is to enhance the participants' ability to teach specific subjects to children from kindergarten through college.
The sessions in the African Studies Summer Institute examined issues in the news and provided a sense of Africa's rich cultural and social variety. After examining the prejudices and stereotypes that educators confront when teaching about Africa, participants explored such topics as traditional and modern education; the religions and languages of Africa; the arts; the role of the traditional chief; current political problems and issues of development; civil conflict in Natal, South Africa during and after apartheid; and the role of African women in nation building. Interactive workshops involved African children's games, African music and dance, and how to use artifacts in the classroom. Maxwell Amoh, outreach coordinator for the Council of African Studies, organized this institute.
Other summer institutes offered by PIER institutes were:
--"The UN in the World: Past, Present, and Future," which examined the history of the United Nations, its charter; decision-making bodies, commissions and delegations; its global role; and the role of other international non-governmental organizations. Caryn White, outreach coordinator for the Council on East Asian Studies, was the organizer of this institute.
--"Understanding Japan: Legacy of the Past, Promise of the Future," which introduced participants to the Japanese language, history, art, and culture and looked at how traditions are preserved, reinvented, and passed on in modern Japan. Ms. White also organized this institute.
"Russia and the World: Toward the New Century," which examined the enormous social and political changes taking place in the former Soviet Union, putting the issues in their historical and social context. This institute -- the 1996 Yale-Hopkins Summer Seminar, first established in 1982 -- was organized by Brian Carter, outreach coordinator for the Council on Russian and East European Studies.