Opening Minds, Improving Lives: Education and Women's Empowerment in Honduras

Appendix: Examples from SAT/PSA Textbooks

169 Appendix Examples from SAT/PSA Textbooks The lessons in this Appendix come from two SAT textbooks that have been translated into English for use in the PSA program in Africa (in Honduras and other Latin American countries, the students study these texts in Spanish). The first two lessons, “The Gastrointestinal System” and “The Nervous System,” are extracted from a language textbook entitled Primary Elements of Descriptions: Systems and Processes. This book follows in sequence a book called Elements of Descriptions. Each SAT text begins with a “To the tutor” section that explains the main goals of the lessons. In the note to the tutor at the beginning of the Systems and Processes text, the authors explain the main goals: In order for individuals to act in the world with efficacy and promote constructive change, they must be capable of perceiving the reality around them and describing it at higher and higher levels of sophistication . The two units that make up the text Primary Elements of Descriptions were designed with this in mind. Together they seek to develop in the students the capabilities required to describe the world they see and experience with increasing clarity. . . . The present unit builds on this understanding to introduce words and concepts needed to speak about the many processes that continually unfold in the world and the systems in which they occur. The next two lessons, “Addition and Subtraction” and “Values and Ethics in Business,” are extracted from the third book of a sequence titled Basic Arithmetic. In the note to the tutor, the goals are described as: This [“Addition and Subtraction”] and the next unit, “Multiplication and Division,” are dedicated to the twofold capability of performing the four 170 Opening Minds, Improving Lives arithmetical operations quickly and accurately and applying them to reallife situations. . . . Emphasis is placed on clarifying concepts, on developing skills and, above all, on the application of knowledge. . . . The latter lessons offer an overview of the principles of accounting. . . . Apart from the opportunity this affords to show participants one immediate application of what they have studied, the discussion and exercises in these lessons make it possible to seamlessly weave elements of knowledge about social and spiritual reality into the course content. Individual initiative, honesty and truthfulness, transparency and accountability—these are examples of issues raised throughout the lessons and addressed explicitly in the last one. The lessons included here illustrate some of the main features of the SAT curriculum, including: • an interdisciplinary approach • the explicit discussion of spiritual principles and values, with an emphasis on justice • an attempt to link academic content with the practical application of knowledge to improve individual and community well-being • use of informal language (“imagine you are eating an apple”) to draw out what students already know, or generate local-level knowledge • gender equality as an explicit component of the curriculum • emphasis on critical thinking, discussion, and debate Appendix: Examples from SAT/PSA Textbooks 171 The Gastrointestinal System 75 13 Imagine you are eating an apple. What would have to happen to the apple so that, ultimately, the cells of the body can use its nutrients to carry out their functions? It has to be broken down into its very small building blocks, does it not? When you first pick up the apple, it is whole and hard, and you cannot fit it all in your mouth, let alone swallow it. So the first thing you do is to take a bite and chew it. The mouth is the first component of the gastrointestinal tract, in which begins the process of breaking down food into smaller and smaller pieces. Once the pieces of apple are small enough, you swallow them, sending them through the esophagus into the stomach. There the apple stays for a while to be broken down further and further. The stomach produces a substance called hydrochloric acid that works on the apple and dissolves it. There are also other substances called enzymes that are produced in other parts of the body and sent to the stomach to help break down food. By the end of this process, the apple you ate is part of a liquid that can now pass to the small intestine. In between the stomach and the small intestine there is the pyloric sphincter. The sphincter is like a valve. There are muscles all along the gastrointestinal tract constantly pushing the food downward. This downward push causes the...