SUMMER PROGRAM 2022

The PYP Summer Program for the year 2022 held between the 11th of August to the 20th of August 2022 at the PYP Guild Centre in Festac Town. The annual PYP Summer Program is focused on mentoring students on life skills that they would find useful in their new journey through secondary school and in life in general. This year, the program was held for two weeks (Thursday through Saturday per week), consisting of six life studies courses taught by invited facilitators and a project. Older PYP alumni served as teaching assistants or what we call Guides. Guides were responsible for various learning activities for each of the courses. The goal of this was to help students digest and demonstrate what they have been taught by the facilitators. The first week focused on the courses while the students worked on their project in the second. During the learning activities, the students were divided into two groups,  with two Guides each assigned to facilitate the learning activity. The Guides were also there to assist the students with the Summer project when needed.

Invitations had been sent to thirty selected students from our just concluded Tutorial Program, informing them that they were qualified to attend the next stage of the PYP annual Summer Class. However, only eight students responded to the invitations and registered for the Program. We believe it might be because most of the students already had plans to attend Summer School elsewhere. 

Summer Program courses

Day One was scheduled to be an introductory class, originally, the classes were scheduled to start at 10am, but because it was the first day and we needed more time to orient the students about the program, and to introduce them to their guides, the class started an hour earlier, 9am. Students were divided into two groups to enable them get to know each other, discuss expectations and goals for the program and were given a task to design a logo for their group using cardboard, pencils/markers, tape, etc. The students also had a discussion with their Guides on how to ask good questions, share their opinions, and ideas.

After this activity, we proceeded to the first course for the day. The students were taught Confidence and Self Identity and this class was facilitated by a representative of Elovia Initiative, Miss Omotola Taiwo. She taught the students the importance of believing in oneself and always celebrating their achievements no matter how small it is. She ended the class by teaching them positive affirmations and encouraging them. After the class, the students were engaged in another learning activity where they gave feedback from the class. Then they had a discussion within their learning groups about what they like about themselves. They created a “self bubble” with words/adjectives that they thought truly describes their personality and discussed it among their peers. Before we began the second class for the day, the two groups came up with names for their group; Success Team and the Confident Team

Day Two was another interesting day. The students were taught about Leadership and Teamwork and Peer Pressure and Bullying. The first class was facilitated by Mr. Isioma Ekpu, who taught them the concept of good leadership and how teamwork is important when one aims to achieve a collective goal. They were taught effective approaches needed to handle tasks timely and efficiently and demonstrated this with a hands-on activity (Bridge building) after the class. Each group was to work together as a team and build a newspaper bridge. The Confident Team was able to accomplish this within the time given.

For Peer Pressure and Bullying class, Miss Aisha Akinboro facilitated this. She admonished them to be careful of what and who to emulate because bad communication corrupts good manners, and she encouraged them to be a good ambassador of their family, the country and PYP. The class activity for this class was a Skit presentation on how to recognise and avoid negative peer pressure, drawing from what they learned in class, they were successfully able to replicate this in the presentation for that day.

Day Three had the students learning about Sex Education and Career Development. Miss Joke Aganran did a great job facilitating the Sex Education session. She gave all the children free copies of her book “What Every Child Must Know” with which she facilitated the class. She informed them about red flags to watch out for, how to defend themselves against sexual predators, etc. 

For the second session, Career development, Miss Benita Bulley and Miss Damilola Akanmu coordinated this class, we had the kids tell us what they would like to be in future, after this, they were taught factors that influences one’s career choice, they were at the end of class asked to list out activities they enjoy doing that can be turned into a career they can earn from. For the class activity for this course, the students were to research and curate a list of future jobs that do not exist currently and pick one as a team then make a presentation of this job in class. They were not able to finish this on that day because they had difficulty coming up with the career list. Since it was a weekend, the Guides took time to further explain the activity to them and instructed them to use the long break before the next class to come up with answers and with this, the final class for that day/week was brought to a close

On Day Four, with both teams now equipped with more information, we continued with the learning activity for Career and Development class. The Confident Team presented about a Robot Operator where they explained the need to have someone operating a robot/machine to enable them carry out their specific functions while the Success Team presented about a Home Animator Contractor, they explained that this would be the person who sets up and updates machines in a home to carry out specific functions like security, maintenance etc. Overall, both teams did very well with the presentation.

After the presentation, they began to work on the project which they would present on graduation day which is the last day of Summer Program.

The two teams had been informed of what their project would be about the previous week, the project was to pick one food item(Corn and Groundnut), research about the existing products gotten from the food and then create a new product of their own from it, and all they had to do for the next two days was bring their ideas to life. They continued putting together their project preparation on Day five and rehearsed their presentation, adding the finishing touches.

Graduation event(Summer and Guild Program)

Day Six of the Summer Program was the graduation event. The event combined the graduation of both the Summer students and students from a another PYP program; Guild Program for building computational competencies (read more about the program here). Prior to this day, parents of the graduating students were sent letters of invitation. 

At about 11:30am, the program commenced with an opening prayer from Miss Dami. The program started with a recap of the Tutorial Program, shared by Miss Dami. She shared with the parents the various activities of the Summer Program, after which the students made their presentation. 

For the presentation, the Confident team(corn), presented their product; a balm made from corn. They started their presentation with a short advert and then presented the product; sharing about the process of production and how the balm works. The Success Team(groundnut) presented after them. Their product was groundnut juice, a juice produced from groundnut. During their presentation, they advertised the groundnut juice with a play, after which a representative of the team came out to talk about the nutritional value of groundnut, and the process of production.

The two teams were commended for doing well in their presentation and also received some feedback from the Judge, Mr Onotu Andah. Judging was done based on clarity of points, time management, and teamwork. The Success Team had the highest point because they were able to explain the nutritional value of groundnut better than their counterpart. 

At the end, we presented certificates to all the graduating students, took group pictures with their parents and called it a day!

Conclusion

We are grateful to God for a successful Summer School Program and a successful PYP Academic year. It has been a wonderful time with the students, watching them learn to bring their ideas to life! A special thanks to all our volunteers who made these programs a success, thank you for your commitment, time, and patience, we look forward to working on more impactful projects with you. May God bless you!

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