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| The first session teaching health care providers SDM, or in Kreyól "Metod Kolÿe" |
This was the first day of fieldwork. We taught the Standard
Days Method to over 80 people in a couple of different sessions. The first
group that participated in the study consisted of 12 providers, who were health
agents, nurses, and physicians. This lesson went really well. The enthusiasm of
the group was palpable and the discussion was enlightening. Many cultural
barriers to the study were identified as well. For instance, the formal teaching
language is French. I had previously translated all of the pretests and
posttests to Haitien Creole, which is not a language commonly read by formally
educated people, though it is the language that is spoken. With some coaching
and translation, we were able to work through these barriers without
compromising the study. Each provider indicated verbally after the lesson how
much it meant to be educated in matters that are so important to them, such as
fertility, because the town is rural and does not have resources to provide
other methods of contraception. Each indicated that the pace and the layout of
the lesson plan made it easy to understand and grasp the concept of fertility
awareness, something of which each had heard, but did not fully understand.
After this lesson, the whole town of Robillard had heard we were there to teach
a form of natural family planning and was interested to learn. After teaching
the providers, we taught about 70 members of the community, including high
school students, teachers, and “wise-women,” who are the towns’ traditional
midwives. The response to the teaching was overwhelmingly positive, and it was a
lot of fun teaching the women and hearing how each planned to use the
information in her life.
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| Teaching high school students age 14-21 the fertility cycle |
School teachers and "wise-women," the towns' traditional midwives
