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| English courses: Building bridges in English |
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ONE of the challenges of teaching English, mathematics and science that a teacher in a rural school faces is a lack of confidence to do so. CfBT Malaysia, part of the CfBT Education Trust, a leading United Kingdom-based education organisation, ran a pilot programme last year for a few schools in Rantau and Seri Menanti in Negri Sembilan. With the success of the pilot course, HSBC has stepped in to expand this programme, called the Project to Improve English in Rural Schools (PIERS), to more schools this year. With a HSBC sponsorship of RM1 million over the next four years, 70 teachers from 15 rural schools in Negri Sembilan have already started seeing results from their training. Lailee Shahabudin, the assistant head of students at SK Chuah at Port Dickson, feels this programme has really helped the participating teachers. In the few months that it has been running, she has seen a difference in the teachers. "The six teachers from my school who are involved are more confident, know what they are doing in class and make an effort to implement what they learn," she adds. Parimala Muniandy, from SJKT Ladan Sagga in Remban, who teaches Year Five science, says before attending the course, she was not confident of teaching the subject in English. After undergoing the programme, she feels more confident speaking English, and she shares what she learns with other teachers. Her students now enjoy her lessons more with methods she has learnt from the programme. Mark Baldwin, senior PIERS trainer for the Port Dickson programme and overall PIERS project manager, says this is a tremendous programme with proven results. Most other training sessions would require teachers to be out of their classrooms, which would have an adverse effect on the students who are left without a teacher or with a substitute. PIERS takes place after school hours with in-class observation throughout the school year. "There has been a marked improvement in the teachers’ confidence, which also benefits their students who find their classes more interesting and easier to follow," says Baldwin. He says this programme had a few key results from its pilot run – teachers maintained more than 90 per cent attendance; they had improved their IELTS score over one band, double of what was expected; the effectiveness of teachers observed in classrooms also increased by 30 per cent; and student understanding of the subjects increased by 20 per cent. The emphasis of the programme is on the individual, as teachers face varied challenges in different environments. Baldwin says CfBT Malaysia started with the programme in Negri Sembilan because it had strong connections there and it had a lot of support. He adds that it hopes to expand this to other states, should it prove successful. |
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