Project to improve English in rural schools

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KOTA KINABALU: CfBT Education Trust, in close cooperation with the Sabah State Education Department, and through the generous support and sponsorship of HSBC and Hap Seng Consolidated Berhad, announced the launch of the third phase of a four-year programme in Sabah to substantially improve the quality of teaching among primary English teachers in Papar.

Fifty-five teachers from a cluster of 20 schools have been selected to join the programme, which will run through to the end of the school year. The programme training centre is located at SMK Takis. The opening ceremony was held at the Beringgis Beach Resort, Papar.

CfBT Education Trust is one of the top 50 charities in the United Kingdom, operating in over 20 countries. They are a none-profit organization, supporting educational reform, teaching, advising, research and training.

CfBT has been involved in education in Malaysia for more than 30 years, particularly in English language teaching, teacher training and classroom innovation.

It has been working closely with the Malaysian Ministry of Education for the past nine years, as part of the Government’s strategy to narrow the urban-rural gap, by helping to improve the quality of teaching English, and Maths and Science through English. From 2001 until 2007, CfBT managed a team of 30 teacher trainers based in district and state education offices, who worked directly with English teachers in rural schools, to develop their confidence, fluency and proficiency, classroom organization and teaching methodology.

This was achieved through a range of specially designed courses and workshops. The programme was well-received by teachers however, it was felt that a more focused approach was needed and it was with this in mind that the PIERS Project was designed.

Over the past five years, more than 550 teachers of English, Maths and Science from rural Negeri Sembilan and Sabah primary schools have benefitted from the intensive 10-month programme.

PIERS has been remarkably successful, and there is great potential for the PIERS model to be replicated throughout Malaysia to raise standards of English in schools.

Dominic Morley, South East Asia Business Development Director for CfBT Malaysia, said, “This school-based in-service training approach, developed by CfBT, is unique and has been proved to be remarkably successful. The model could be adapted to raise standards throughout Malaysia, as part of its ambition to achieve developed nation status.”

PIERS focuses on a student-centred approach to learning where students are actively involved in their own learning by participating in pair and group tasks. There is a shift away from teacher fronted, passive learning to more practical tasks in discovery learning, interacting with peers and opportunities to use the language and skills being taught. In short, learning by doing.

Students have responded enthusiastically to this new way of learning with teachers noticing an obvious increase in the levels of student motivation and a greater interest in the content and language of the lessons.

It has long been acknowledged that conventional in-service training, involving intensive and expensive hotel-based courses, has limited success in supporting teachers to transfer new ideas to the classroom. In addition, such training often requires teachers to be out of school for several days at a time.

PIERS delivers sustainable, continuous on-the-job training with in-school support and measureable outcomes over a school year without removing teachers from their classes.

The Papar course will be conducted by senior trainer Gary Smith. Gary has more than eight years experience of teacher training with CfBT as the English language coordinator in Kelantan and Kedah and for the last three years, as the PIERS trainer in Jempol, Negeri Sembilan, and in Tawau and Lahad Datu, Sabah.

The PIERS participants will receive 10 modules of face-to-face training sessions on weekday afternoons on English proficiency and teaching methodology.

Gary will visit and observe the teachers in their classrooms offering one-on-one training, tutorials, team teaching, guidance, monitoring and evaluation. Headmasters and mistresses and their deputies from the participating schools are also invited to attend the course. Through the senior trainer, CfBT submits half-year and end-of-year reports to the Ministry of Education and the sponsors.

Last year’s PIERS project in Lahad Datu was very successful with results far exceeding expectations in proficiency and methodology, and with attendance approaching 100 per cent.

A summary of results:

• Forty-five teachers from 18 schools

• Three headmistresses, five deputies and the Lahad Datu PPD language officer also completed the course.

• One hundred and twelve hours of face to face workshops; 36 hours optional content; three-four classroom visits with feedback

• Overall attendance for the 45 teachers was 97.4% over the year. Targeted attendance: 80%

• On average, teachers increased their proficiency band level by 1.51, far exceeding the predicted band level improvement of 0.5.

• The average lesson observation on the grading scale started at 49.0% in the first round of observations. This increased to 83.7% at the final round of observations

• 100% of the teacher participants evaluated the PIERS training programme to be good or excellent.

• Participation in and motivation for the afternoon training sessions was very high. Teachers steadily became more confident, relaxed and outgoing throughout the programme.

Gary has proved his outstanding skills in nurturing the teachers to reach a standard of English and English teaching that will have a direct effect on their students.

His approach and focus are ideally suited to the needs of rural primary school teachers in Malaysia and he has recently written an easy to understand, ready reference for practicing English teachers.