CIE TAA' PI'T ONG
Comunidad intercultural Educativa
OUR WIDER IMPACT
Alongside our three main programs for children, mothers, families and the community, our commitment to Mother Lake Atitlán and Mother Earth calls us to extend our Education for Life mission through participation in our local municipality and public schools.
Learning for Life Curriculum for Television –
Taa’ Pit’s COVID-19 Response
"Aprendo para la vida" was a television program created and broadcast during the COVID-19 pandemic. Naturally, it represented our reinvention of Taa' Pi't in response to the "stay-at-home" mandates implemented nationally and internationally. Our students could no longer attend school, and the quality of their education declined further. Consequently, we had to learn how to produce these programs; we took on the task of learning scriptwriting, voiceover work, format design, and video editing.
We produced 19 30-minute episodes featuring five sections: an introduction to vocabulary regarding garden produce, vegetables, fruits, or root crops in our Tz'utujil language. This was followed by a main topic—for example, "The Carrot"—and its specific benefits for the body or particular organs, including questions to reinforce the main theme.
The second section covered "Preparations" for the food in question, also accompanied by an assessment. The program then pivoted to pedagogical break featuring a spiritual, cultural, or ecological song, The third section introduced a home experiment, focusing on planting and growing the featured food followed by a segment reviewing the vocabulary used throughout the program.
Additionally, there was a section on Mother Lake Atitlán presented in Tz'utujil, and a closing segment that provided solutions to the previous class's worksheets, along with a section congratulating students who had sent in photos of their experiments or prepared dishes.
As soon as authorization for in-person classes was granted, Taa' Pi't implemented the necessary measures to allow children to attend our physical space, as well as mothers participating in cooking workshops. For both programs, we installed partitions on desks and kitchen tables. We also provided face shields for the mothers and thermometers to monitor body temperature. And, naturally, all hygiene measures were implemented.
At a social level, during the pandemic, we proposed investing in social programs rather than infrastructure projects.
Educational Games Workshops for Public School Teachers
Naturally, children love to play—and they love to learn through play. Educational games have proven to be quite successful for our after-school programs. They help synchronize, relax, and socialize our students, improve attention, concentration, decision-making, and teamwork.
We are proud to have expanded this way of teaching to public school teachers in our municipality with the aim of providing tools for better education and, consequently, to benefit more children in San Pedro through these games.
All of this is made possible thanks to our friend Louis Blatmann, who has provided the expertise, the games themselves, and the workshop planning.
The Municipal Development Council and Derecho Ecológico de Abuela Lago Atitlán (DEAL) Regulations
Taa’ Pi’t has consistently participated in the Municipal Development Council (COMUDE) in compliance with the Law on Urban and Rural Development Councils. We have also served on the COMUDE environment commission and currently sit on the education commission. In this capacity, we were invited to join a technical working group tasked with analyzing a regulatory proposal regarding the municipality's lakeshore zone and drafting new regulations to protect Lake Atitlán.
In this way, Taa’ Pi’t actively contributes based on our experience with our programs and our understanding of San Pedro’s sociocultural context. Our most significant contributions included the regulation's cultural philosophy—starting with its title, "Ecological Rights of Grandmother Lake Atitlán"—as well as the agricultural section, which aims to avoid agro-toxins and genetically modified seeds while promoting ancestral (organic) farming and native seeds.
It also includes the “Grandmother Lake Atitlán Festival” and its comprehensive definition in Article 48, Grandmother Lake Atitlán Festival: “To revitalize the spirit of these regulations, one *Ab’* calendar month—coinciding with the month of March—is declared a time for a spiritual, cultural, ecological, agricultural, gastronomic, academic, scientific, artistic, and athletic festival in honor of Grandmother Lake Atitlán.”
The regulation aims to protect Grandmother Lake, the beach area, the agricultural zone adjacent to the beach, and the streets, alleys, and public spaces from pollution. It is a regulation that qualifies as “three times good”: good for Grandmother Lake Atitlán, good for society, and good for the economy.
The credit for this regulation belongs to the people of San Pedro.
Festival for Abuela Lago Atitlán
Within this context, Taa' Pi't participated through its own installation for eleven of the twenty days the festival ran, and welcomed 852 children from eight public schools through three educational activities: Science Corner, Storytelling, and Ancestral Agriculture.
Taa' Pi't also participated in the International Women's Day observance connected to the festival, on the theme: The role of women in socio-ecological change within the family.
The purpose throughout was to help people know, care for, and respect the life and the rights of Abuela Lago Atitlán.
The second Festival for Abuela Lago Atitlán will take place in March 2027.
