MTCNE launches first International Satellite Location in Vietnam

MTCNE and the Center for International Education (CIE), University of Humanities and Social Sciences as part of Vietnam National University in Ho Chi Minh City (HCMC), have partnered to bring the first AMI diploma course to the country of Vietnam.

CIE has hosted several AMI Primary Assistants Courses in the past but to offer a diploma course there must be an AMI affiliate in the country. Vietnam does not yet have an affiliate so after discussions with AMI, MTCNE agreed to act as the affiliate in Vietnam to open a satellite Primary Diploma Course.

The course began on September 16, 2019, with a lovely opening ceremony! Photos can be found in our Vietnam photo album. There are 60 students enrolled in this inaugural AMI Primary Diploma Course. The course is being directed by MTCNE trainer Ms. Diwo Lhamo Pemba.

The course lectures are being delivered in English with simultaneous Vietnamese and Chinese translations using native speaking translators in booths with a student headphone system. Securing a translator with Montessori background is one of many obstacles MTCNE and CIE faced in this multilingual, multicultural experience. Finding album readers to read albums in Chinese and Vietnamese has been the most challenging. If you or someone you know speaks Vietnamese or Mandarin and is Primary Montessori trained and would be interested in assisting in this effort please contact us at MTCNE.

Creating the practice room was another major feat and we are most appreciative to the Tiny Flower School in HCMC assisting Ms. Pemba and CIE with this set up. CIE renovated two existing university classrooms to accommodate a large beautiful practice room with spill over space to accommodate such a large number of students. Tiny Flower provided Nienhuis materials for the classroom and has assisted Ms.Pemba in purchasing practical life and classroom artifacts unique to the Vietnamese culture. A few of these can be seen in the photos on our link. Montessori books translated in Vietnamese have graciously been provided by another school in Vietnam, Shining Star, located in Hanoi.
The course is running in two modules; the first concludes this month on December 20 and the second will begin on June 23 Vietnamese language materials are being developed as the course unfolds and the Chinese language materials will be introduced at the beginning of the second module for the 15 Chinese students. Between Module 1 and 2 students are expected to complete most of the required observation and practice teaching hours. Some hours will continue to take place in Module 2 which concludes on September 25, 2020.

As a result of the assistant courses, the many Montessori support schools in Vietnam and the first diploma course, interest in Montessori education within the country is quite high. MTCNE Managing Director, Tim Nee met with many individuals from the National Ministry of Education during his September visit and will return to Hanoi in January and Ho Chi Minh City in April to continue to assist in bringing Montessori to the public and private sectors throughout the country.

We are so grateful to Lhamo Pemba for her extraordinary work on assistant courses and now the diploma course. We also are appreciative of Megan Trezise and Kay Urquhart for providing additional assistant courses in Vietnam through MTCNE. Of course, this groundbreaking course could not be possible without our great partners at CIE and the supportive Montessori schools and their leaders within Vietnam.
It is a challenging and exciting venture that truly embraces our global connections and promotes our international theme of “Montessori for All Children”!

Visit the MTCNE interactive world map on our website to learn more about MTCNE’s additional international projects.