We arrived in Zambia late last night and our colleague Mikala was at the airport to greet us. Three hours of sleep later and we were up and ready fir a meeting at the Ministry of Education. It was great to see Grace Banda (who was a member of the first team trained at U of MN) but even greater to hear the new administrator talking about her leadership and the progressiveness of Mikela's program. Our conversation was focused mostly on encouraging transition with more formal focus and purpose, testing accommodation for special education children and the need for early intervention. We also discussed the need to better prepare teachers to provide support to special education students in inclusive classrooms. Joel Kamoko, District Board Secretary, at the Ministry of Education emphasized the need to teach life skills and he seemed very committed to supporting children with special needs. Mikala and Grace seem very positive about Joel's ideas.
We had lunch with Sandy and Father Patrick. It was fun to catch up and hear about their new project in Milawi.
Tonight is a quiet night at Beulini. We'll have dinner and singing with Mikala and her family then call it an early night. Tomorrow we are spending the day in Chitwema village and will meet with a few families who have children with autism then work with Mikala on autism assessment. Lookingnforward to it.
More later
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