What started as a classroom experiment for kindergartners has grown into tech training for teens and parents alike.
Every year, my ministry changes to some degree. All of my work is tied to education in one way or another, which means there’s a consistent annual cycle to it as each school year comes and goes. The delineated beginning and ending mean there’s an element of reinvention to each new year, and that reinvention fits well with the increased language and cultural understanding that I gain over time.
Therefore, every year looks different as the interests and needs of students get reevaluated along with the context of changing resources and my own changing abilities. The newest additions have been a response both to observed needs and what the community has asked for.
The mobile library
Opening a local library was 2024’s major project. That succeeded, but with some observed complications. The primary complications were accessibility and encouraging people who don’t come from a culture where reading books is common to start reading.
The latter is a complicated issue that cannot be solved in one way or at one time. Accessibility, however, is part of that larger issue. While the new library, located at the kindergarten run by the Daughters of Charity, is convenient for some people, it is not centrally located in the community.
Few people have cars, and public transportation can be tricky, so those who live further away from the library, especially kids who can’t go places on their own, simply couldn’t make it to the library to borrow books.
The solution was inspired by a previous ministry of Rick Dixon, who used to walk a wheelbarrow of books through his community in Cojutepeque. El Cedro is a bit too hilly for a wheelbarrow, so this year, every other week, I bring boxes of books to the local primary school (kindergarten through ninth grade) so that kids, and some parents, can borrow and return books without making any extra trips.
So far, around 20 to 30 kids are borrowing books every time I come. Even a few teachers have borrowed books. A local university student has been helping me with the project, and I am training him to be able to do it on his own.
Computer classes
Much like the library, 2025’s computer class project was partially brought from wanting to utilize contemporarily unused resources that already existed at the kinder. Many years ago, as part of someone else’s efforts at the kinder, a computer room with old tube-monitor, Windows 7 computers was created and used. For a variety of reasons, including not having anyone with the time and know-how, that room and those computers were left dormant when I arrived in El Cedro.
In 2024, the teachers of the kinder asked if I could start giving weekly computer classes to the little ones. I first had to get as many of the computers working as possible and ask Sor Ana Rosa to get a new air conditioning unit installed so that the computers and the kids wouldn’t fry in the small, ventilationless room full of human bodies and old, running computers.
Finally, about halfway through the school year, the classes started in more of a trial version effort. The classes went well, and have become a full part of the curriculum in 2025. The main goals are getting 5 and 6 year olds who have only used touch-screen devices familiar with the set-up of a desktop computer, the function of a mouse, and the basics of the keyboard. As kids usually do, they’re picking it up pretty fast, although double-clicking is still proving a bit difficult.
With the success of the trial version in 2024, a few adults in the community asked if I could also teach some computer classes for older kids. A number of parents have hit glass ceilings or encountered difficulties in their jobs when asked to start using Microsoft Office programs that they’ve never used before, and want to help their children avoid similar stumbling blocks.
As of May 8, we are three weeks into our first computer classes for teens and adults. It’s a small group, as only six of our 8 working computers have Microsoft Office, consisting of five eighth graders and a young mother. The students will receive an eight-lesson course covering computer basics, touch-typing, and lessons on Word, Excel, and PowerPoint.
Once finished, we’ll see how it went. Try to improve it. And do it again with a new group of students.
Josh Wetmore joined Maryknoll Lay Missioners in December 2021. He teaches and tutors in the rural community of El Cedro, near Planes de Renderos, El Salvador.
