By Cianna McNally
“Amazing” and “life-changing” are just two of the words a Monaghan woman used to sum up the experience of volunteering in Mexico recently.
Mary White from Cortolvin View in Monaghan town travelled to Playa Del Carmen last October to work with Global Vision International / Save The Children in a centre that provides safe daycare for street children and orphans.
Mary, who is a mother and grandmother, stayed in the country for a month and lived with seven other volunteers, who had travelled from across the world, in a gated community on the outskirts of Playa Del Carmen. Following three days of learning the rules, regulations and ethos of GVI and Save The Children, the volunteers went to the Ludoteca, a toy library, where they observed and helped children with homework and projects. The volunteers also had to deliver projects in Spanish and English and to help with this they received private Spanish lessons each day in a language college from a teacher Mary described as “amazing, kind and easygoing.”
One impressively astute observation Mary made was in the Ludoteca when she recognised the signs of dyslexia in a child being taught there. Her son is dyslexic and when he attended St Mary’s Boys School in Monaghan, Mary received a number of useful tips and advice which she then used to devise a way that the volunteers could teach the Mexican child, whose name was Miguel. This proved to be very successful.
“The difference in Miguel in three weeks was unbelievable. It was rewarding beyond words to see the progress he made and his confidence grow”.
Mary added that …..
