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Education in Senegal is expanding. A publicly funded basic education is (to some extent) guaranteed, and there are more and more students enrolling every year. Hundreds of new schools are being built, with many more in the years to come. Beyond that, a good education is highly valued; people want to learn, and they want to learn well.
As more students and schools are brought into the rapidly expanding system, a conundrum has arisen: “how can Senegal continue to rapidly increase the size and reach of its educational system while simultaneously maintaining (and even improving) the quality of the education that that system delivers?” The key ingredient in resolving this conundrum is, quite simply, good teachers.
For Senegal, however, this creates another problem. There is an overwhelming demand for new teachers but the national system for teacher training lacks the capacity to deal with this staggering demand. There are simply not enough institutions, funds, or experienced teacher-trainers available to produce the number of new, well-trained teachers that the growth of the educational system warrants. It is a truly difficult situation, one that has no clear solution and that is being dealt with by the governments of many countries in Africa.
So, the government of Senegal, rather than allowing the new classrooms to sit empty and the new students to go without an education, has instituted a policy of hiring teachers, “vacataires,” who do not have the luxury of an initial teacher training. As I had briefly discussed in one of my previous blog posts, most of these new teachers have a limited academic background; some are fresh out of high school, while others have only done one or two years of college, usually in fields other than teaching. These teachers also do not have “tenure” and receive significantly less pay than their more experienced colleagues. For less pay, they are expected to just walk into a classroom and teach under some very difficult conditions; the average class size in the Fatick region is around 70 students per class and students must often share the available desks and schoolbooks. On top of that, they are usually placed in schools that are in the most remote parts of the region, making travel, and oftentimes life, more difficult than what they are used to. Theirs is a tough job indeed.
So in support of the “vacataires,” IFESH has funded and organized a series of large training seminars, Initiation à la Conception et à la Mise en Œuvre d’un Projet Pédagogique, or “Introduction to the Design and Implementation of a Pedagogical Project,” to support the professional development of these new teachers. These seminars, which are being conducted in collaboration with the Coordination Nationale de la Formation Continuée, or the “National Office for the Coordination of Professional Development for Teachers,” will take place in ten (10) different regions of Senegal, providing 500 new teachers with an extremely valuable, and otherwise unavailable, introduction to effective teaching practices.
The seminars themselves were designed to be a “crash course” in the “art of teaching,” and have five main objectives, which are:
1. To help the new teachers plan and conduct classroom activities
2. To help them develop learning objectives for their classes which meet the national standards
3. To give teachers strategies for writing well-structured and effective lesson plans
4. To provide basic classroom management strategies
5. To introduce assessment methods for monitoring and evaluating student learning and achievement
Each seminar features a number of highly informative and practical lectures, a range of participatory activities (including brainstorming sessions, group work, and presentations), as well as a pretest and post-test, which are given to document the teachers’ pre-existing knowledge of teaching practices, as well as that which they acquire in the course of the three days of the workshop. The seminar sessions last for eight intense hours a day, providing these new “vacataire” teachers with 24 hours of important pedagogical training.
The seminar here in the Fatick Region took place on February 8th, 9th, and 10th, 2010 at the Pôle Régional de Formation de Fatick. 49 teachers (originally 50 but one was too sick to come!) participated in the activities, learned a lot in a short period of time, and had a lot of fun in the process!
Here is how things went, in photos. Please enjoy!
The teachers worked hard and learned a lot
Teachers taking the pretest
Lunch after a morning full of activities
Teachers and trainers pose for a "family photo"
A group of happy teachers
Teachers lining up to collect stipends and classroom resources
Assessment tool: "Barometer of Student Moods"
The Seminar Team (from left to right): Hamidou WATT - National Coordinator for Continuing Education, Abdoulaye FAYE - Teacher Trainer, Ousmane NGOM - Teacher Trainer, Maba BA - Coordinator of PRF Fatick, Demba SARR - Teacher Trainer, and Michael LEASER - IFESH
One of the teachers presenting on her group's ideas
Teachers were expected to collaborate during the many group activities
The teachers work hard in a plenary lecture session
I conducted my first series of teacher training seminars entitled “Departmental Seminar Series: Shaping the Way We Teach English (SWWTE)” in collaboration with Ms. Susan Strand, a Senior Regional English Language Fellow stationed in Dakar, who works at the Ministry of Education in the Bureau d’Anglais. Working with Susan was just fantastic (she is an amazing teacher) and all three of the seminars were very successful and well-received by the teachers, so I feel that they warrant a new blog post. Please enjoy!
The Basic Facts
Activity: Pedagogical Training Seminar for Teachers of English
Location: Fatick Region – Departments of Fatick, Foundiougne & Gossas
Fatick: 84 Teachers at Lycée Coumba Ndofféne Diouf on 12/11/2009
Foundiougne: 40 Teachers at Lycée de Passy on 12/12/200
Gossas: 13 Teachers at Lycée Khar Kane on 12/15/2009
The Participants
The participants in these seminars were all in-service teachers of English from throughout the Region of Fatick. Some of the teachers are absolutely fluent in English, and have been teaching for many years. For them, the seminars were ongoing professional development, and much appreciated. Other teachers are very new to teaching, not yet fluent in English, and did not even have the luxury of an initial teacher training; they are referred to as “vacataires,” and they do not have guaranteed positions (i.e. they are not tenured). They also receive less pay than their tenured colleagues and are often placed in the most remote places in the region, thus facing the most difficult teaching conditions. So for them, participating in these types of seminars is a challenge; they do not have the English language level to fully comprehend everything that is discussed in the course of the day, and they do not have a background in teaching to allow them to take what they learn and easily apply it to their own personal teaching methods. What is more, for some of the vacataires, it was the first training they have ever had outside the classroom (because they had to “learn on their feet” and just plain walk into a classroom and start trying to teach!).
The Structure
All three of the seminars lasted all day (approx. 9:30am to 5pm), and offered six hours of pedagogical training. The schedule of each seminar was:
1. Introduction, Registration, and Pretest
2. Lecture and Participatory Activities – Subtopic 1: Reflective Teaching
3. Development of Reflective Teaching Journal and Collaborative Journal Sharing Procedures
4. Lecture and Participatory Activities – Subtopic 2: Student-Centered Learning and Learning Strategies
5. Demonstrations and practice of Student-centered Teaching Activities
6. Reflection period and Posttest
The Content
The Shaping the Way We Teach English Seminar was divided, essentially, into two complimentary workshops, one on “Reflective Teaching,” and the other on “Student-Centered Learning and Learning Strategies.”
Reflective Teaching Workshop: The teachers of English participated in a workshop designed to give them strategies to assess and improve their own teaching methods, but beyond that, it also was designed to give them strategies to cooperate, assess, and enhance one another’s teaching methods. Good teachers are always learning – they are students of their own profession – and they continue to learn throughout their careers. One of the greatest assets that a teacher has is other teachers and this workshop focused on ways for the teachers of English to interact with one another to improve their results in the classroom. To this effect, teachers were instructed in ways to document and assess their own work, and to cooperate effectively. They were instructed in how to keep a “Reflective Teaching Journal,” how to efficiently and effectively setup peer observations, and how to participate in “Collaborative Journal Keeping,” where teachers select an aspect of their teaching practices to focus on, record their individual activities in regard to this area of focus, and then, as a group, share their documented experiences with one another. The purpose of instructing on these three activities was twofold: all of them encourage reflective teaching practices, which are essential in limited resource environments, and, ultimately, they set the stage for “study groups” among the teachers, which is a stated goal of Ministry of Education of Senegal.
Student-Centered Learning and Learning Strategies: The teachers of English also participated in a workshop designed to give them strategies to incorporate “student-centered” activities into their lessons, and to develop and promote “self-learning” among their students. Student-Centered Learning is a type of educational approach that puts the needs of the students before the goals of teachers and administrators; it requires that teachers become facilitators and coaches rather than the “leaders” of their classrooms. This is difficult for many teachers to accept because the “traditional model” of education is that teachers give students information and instructions – and the students receive this information and perform tasks that meet the teachers’ expectations. However, the teachers in the Fatick Region were very receptive to the idea of a student-centered approach (as they use the “communicative approach” to teaching English, a very student-centered way of teaching language) and together we worked through a wide array of techniques and activities that support collaboration and that recognize that students have ideas and experiences. Once a “student-centered” approach came to be widely accepted, the teachers were also very responsive to the idea that in many ways, students can direct their own learning – all they need are strategies that help them “learn how to learn,” which was the second major idea in the workshop. In support of this need, we did some demonstrations of activities that require students to organize their own strategies for accomplishing an education task.
The Results
The results of the “Shaping the Way We Teach English” seminar were very straightforward; teachers were extremely pleased with the training and gained valuable knowledge and teaching strategies that they will apply in their work for years to come. I had a lot of fun, learned so much from working with Susan Strand, and provided some really valuable training to the teachers. It was a very positive experience, and I am looking forward to the rest of the workshops I have planned for this academic year.
I have started a “Cours de Formation en Anglais” (Training Course in English) here in Fatick. So far it has been a huge success, and so I thought I would share a little bit about it.
The Structure
“Cours de Formation en Anglais” is open to nonprofit professionals, educators, civil servants (including workers in the sectors of health, safety, and administration), and other Fatick community members who would like to improve their ability to speak English. The course is for learners with any level of English, but it is intensive and stresses spoken and professional English. Participants must attend as frequently as possible, be highly motivated, and be ready to cooperate, with me and with one another, to improve their English. In all, there will be 29 two hour courses, so I am providing 58 total hours of English-language training. Here is the calendar:
November: 17, 19, 24, 26
December: 1, 3, 8, 10, 17
January: 26, 28
February: 9, 11, 16, 18, 23, 25
March: 2, 4, 18, 23, 25, 30
April: 1, 6, 8, 13, 27, 29
Classes are held on Tuesdays and Thursdays from 7-9pm at the regional headquarters of the Agence Nationale de Conseil Agricole et Rurale (ANCAR), the National Agricultural and Rural Advisory Council. The Regional Director of ANCAR, Mr. Jean Charles Faye has given me access to the ANCAR conference room as per an in-kind contribution to my efforts here in Fatick. (He is also one of my most avid and enthusiastic students!)
The Process
I started this course by doing some “grassroots” advertising. I wrote up a course description (in French; it took me a while) and used it to make a simple poster. I then went around to nonprofit organizations, government offices, the public services, and schools and got permission to advertise my course. I hung about 30 posters in total, and I now have about 35 students, so I consider my advertising campaign to be a success.
One of the posters at a local NGO
Each participant has to register for the course and take a pre-test the first night they attend. The pre-test serves to determine their English level and gauge their pre-existing knowledge of project management, HIV/AIDS, and gender issues. With the exception of classes on project management, HIV/AIDS awareness, and gender equity, I did not have a fixed curriculum for the course. Instead, I devised a simple needs assessment, and the participants, coming from a variety of sectors and backgrounds, expressed their academic and professional needs. Basically, I asked them how I could help them (aside from “speaking better English”), and what they wanted to get from the course, especially for their professions. Using the information they provided, I devised a “potential curriculum” for the course and then presented it to the class. They happily accepted the curriculum on the very first draft! (Needless to say, I was rather pleased.)
Participants discussing the course syllabus
During the final classes, the participants will take a post-test to determine their gains in English ability and knowledge of project management, HIV/AIDS, and gender equity. They will also learn a little about Obama and MLK, as per their request! Here is the curriculum:
Introduction Unit – November 17th to December 17th
International Development Unit – January 26th to February 11th
Community Development Unit – February 16th to March 4th
Human Rights and Health Unit – March 18th to 30th
Business Unit – April 1st – 13th
Final Classes – April 27th – 29th
The Participants
The participants in the course come from a wide array of professions and backgrounds. There are nonprofit professionals of all types, in-service and pre-service schoolteachers, merchants, journalists, soldiers, policemen, healthcare professionals, restaurateurs, and businesspeople, all collaborating and learning about one another’s occupations in English. It has made for a lively and diverse learning environment. Here is a selection of the sectors and the workplaces that are represented in the class:
Rural and Agricultural Development Organizations
Public Services
Community Development Organizations
Education
Communications
The Method
Most everyone who attends the “Cours de Formation en Anglais” speaks fluent French (except me!), and the French language, as you may or may not know, is often an exacting and formal language. Here in Senegal, it is taught to schoolchildren with a focus on precision, accuracy, and grammar. This stands in sharp contrast to the English I am teaching, professional as it may be. So I have had to ask the participants to break their habit of immediately correcting any and all “mistakes,” which is what was done when they learned French, and to “just speak English.” That is, to let some of the mispronunciations and errors fix themselves over time, as comprehension increases. For the first few sessions, many people would not speak out loud for fear of making a mistake. But then, I reminded them of the class motto: “Le Lion, il a peur de rien” – “The Lion is Afraid of Nothing.” Everyone has gotten on board with this idea, and now the participants encourage one another to speak as much English as possible, with or without some errors.
This method, where people are encouraged to speak as much as possible and let errors fix themselves as comprehension increases, is called the “communicative approach” to teaching English. I believe it is a very appropriate way to help my students improve in using Anglais, because most of them can read English with some proficiency; what they need is to learn how to speak English, and this is precisely what the communicative approach is best at doing – helping people learn to speak a language. I have chosen to teach this way because it is the recommended methodology for the teachers of English in the public schools of Senegal. It is a very collaborative style of teaching and learning, and with a large class in a small place, it is very important that the participants cooperate with one another, because I am not able to give each participant a lot of time individually. Those who have stronger English skills help those who do not, and part of each class session is spent in small groups, reviewing presented materials or performing various learning activities.
The Results so far. . .
Teaching is the easiest thing in the world when you have good students. When your job is just to show up with some relevant and useful information and your fluency – and the students really just teach themselves – there is no finer work in the world than teaching. I can promise you that.
Teaching this course has proven to be a lot of work, but also a lot of fun. I really enjoy the classes because the participants are very enthusiastic about learning and very grateful for the opportunity to build their English-speaking skills. I also take pride in the fact that long after I have left Fatick, the professionals and teachers that are participating in the course will use their English skills to help improve the nonprofit, education, and public service sectors in the Fatick Region, and maybe even the nation of Senegal on the whole.
Please do not get me wrong: “Cours de Formation en Anglais” has also proven to be a training course for me. For each class session, I am forced to research and translate a lot of information for the topics to be covered. I am not just teaching; I am learning French too, and this is how I have presented the class to the participants – as an exchange among learners. They help me and I help them. It has made for a wonderful arrangement.
Hello Everyone,
Welcome to my blog. I have been here in Senegal for one month, and so I decided it was time that I started blogging. I hope you enjoy my posts, which will focus on my work here in Fatick, Senegal. I look forward to your questions and comments.
However, before I report on what is happening here, I would like to take the opportunity to say “thank you” to those of you who have given me so many kind wishes and so much support in this endeavor. It was not easy for me to decide to come here, even though I have always known that I would work/live in Africa for a time. I am lucky to have a great family and many good friends, so it was very hard for me to give all that up, if only temporarily. In fact, I would not have been able to come here at all without the help of three individuals: my step-dad Russ, my mom, and my girlfriend Shari. The last few years have been tough for me, and I would not have had the means or the strength to do this, to be here, without them. Russ, thank you so much for letting me come back home when I needed to. Mom, thank you for always believing in me and telling me that I can do anything I put my mind to. Shari, thank you for being there for me when things get tough, for supporting me as I chase my dreams, and for never letting me forget who I really am. I love all of you very much, and please know that I am eternally grateful.
Now, for the first edition of my blog, I will start with the basics, “what am I doing in Senegal?”
Where do I live?
I live in an apartment in a place called Fatick, which is:
So technically, I live in Fatick, Fatick, Fatick, Senegal (which is kind of like saying “Sandusky, Erie County, Ohio, USA”).
Where do I work?
I work at a place called the Pôle Régional de Formation à Fatick (PRF). Loosely translated, it is the “base for travelling trainers of middle and high school teachers in the Fatick Region.” I work with 16 travelling pedagogical trainers (Conseillers Pédagogiques Itinérant [CPIs]), plus our Coordinator, a security guard, and a driver. Each CPI is the trainer for one of the subject areas taught in middle and high schools here in Senegal. There are two CPIs for French, Math, and Physics/Chemistry at the PRF in Fatick, and one for the other subject areas. Here is a list of the staff:
Maba BA, Coordinator of PRF Fatick
Lamine DIOUF, Chauffeur, PRF Fatick
Moussa DIOUF, CPI, Mathematics
Mouhamed EL MOCTAI DIAYI, CPI, Arabic
Lansana GOUDIABY, CPI, Spanish
Oumol Fadly NDIAYE BA, CPI, English
Abdoulaye NDOUR, CPI, Earth and Life Sciences
Cheikhou NDOUR, Security Guard, PRF Fatick
Diokel NGOM, CPI, French
Ousmane NGOM, CPI, History and Geography
Mamadou NIANG, CPI, Physics and Chemistry
Demba SARR, CPI, Philosophy
Bassirou SENE, CPI, French
Elisabeth TRAORE, CPI, Art Education
Abdoulaye WANE, CPI, German
Not Pictured:
Abdoulaye FAYE, CPI, Physics and Chemistry
Birame FAYE, CPI, Physical Education and Health
Moussa FAYE, CPI, Mathematics
What do I do at the PRF?
First, get a bit of background info here: http://www.ifesh.org/news/25/59/Alumnus-to-Train-Teachers-in-Senegal
Then please read the sections that follow:
Support: Complementing and supporting the activities and trainings already planned for teachers of English in the Fatick Region for this academic year. In this regard, I will travel with Madame Ba, CPI, English to schools, meetings, seminars, and trainings. I will help her prepare and analyze documents for the scheduled trainings (pretests, posttests, questionnaires, informational handouts, etc.), and conduct teaching pedagogy and English-language usage workshops. I will be a travelling trainer of teachers.
Expansion: Increasing the number and the impact of the trainings and activities for this academic year by securing additional external funding and planning multiple-day workshops for each of the three departments of the Fatick Region. I will seek funding (in the forms of grants, awards, and other financial resources) to expand and complement the activities planned for this academic year (including class and cell visits, organizing a “festival” for the English Clubs, conducting seminars and trainings, and providing teaching and l earning materials for the teachers of English). As required by IFESH and USAID, I will seek to ensure that at least 160 teachers of English will receive a minimum of 24 hours of pedagogical training through these activities and additional resources.
Capacity Building: Researching, developing, testing, and refining a guide that will allow teachers of English to better utilize the “national curriculum for teaching English” (a rough translation) in their lesson planning and teaching. I will collaborate with Madame Ba, CPI, English to assess the needs of the current teachers of English with regard to improved use of the national curriculum. I will then analyze the collected data and develop a draft document that is intended to close the gap between the “theory and practice” of using the national curriculum. The document will be a tool for teachers to use in developing their own teaching and learning materials, specifically those that will allow them to pull from the ample information available in the national curriculum. Strategies to use locally available materials as teaching and learning materials will be an area of primary concern. I will then conduct a workshop (or series of workshops) to test the effectiveness of the draft document. Then, after testing, I will revise the document according to the collected feedback. Although I will initially create this document to support the work of teachers of English, the underlying framework will be widely applicable, so that the guide can be translated into French and then used for training in other subjects.
Community Outreach: Collaborating with a community outreach specialist and an environmental scientist to support and provide knowledge management services for a project to create a community-managed nature preserve in the mangrove forests along the rivers in the Fatick Region. Part of my requirements for IFESH and USAID is that I must participate in activities that support the work of community-based organizations (CBOs). I have agreed to provide English language documents that will expand the potential pool of partners and resources for this very important work. I will seek to incorporate elements of HIV/AIDS education and gender-mainstreaming in this work as well.
Teaching: Organizing and conducting bi-weekly English-language training sessions for nonprofit professionals, educators, local government officials (including health, safety, and administrative employees), and other interested parties. These sessions will focus on spoken English, as many of the people who will receive this training already read English with proficiency.
I am very excited about all the different work I will be doing, and I believe that with the help of my colleagues here at the PRF, I can make a positive and meaningful contribution to the training of teachers in Senegal, and be an agent for positive change here in Fatick.
Thank you for reading, and I hope you find time to comment, ask questions, and share this blog with others.