Teachers' Training Lab
LBD is a programme not only for the students, but also for the growth of the teachers, parents and others who may participate in the guiding of students. It will build a solid learning community which helps spreading of good practices.
A mindset shifter: For this project to be a repeatable and scalable model, the key issue is the mindset of the teachers, and knowledge and skills that encourage self-directed learning, because at some point all the outside support will not be there and the school teachers will be left on their own. This is why Finland, a country which excels in education, puts so much focus and resource to finding and training the best teachers. The ability of the teachers to observe and monitor each child on a continuous and formative basis and give timely feedback is a theory that a lot of teachers cannot put into practice here for a number of reasons. For those who have the passion, they are very likely faced with a restrictive and hurried teaching environment that puts achieving exam results as a top priority. For those who don’t, they may not have the mindset at all, and hence the skills necessary to teach properly.
A real school environment that allows creativity: The value of this programme lies in the fact that teachers can learn to teach in a different way, without the pressure to relentlessly achieve exam results, so they can experience the positive side and creativity in education, which may help retain them in the trade to continue contribute in building people.
‘Walk along’ with teachers: Our partners will also provide instructors and train more trainers to lead the classes, and to ‘walk along’ with incumbent teachers instead of dumping them with a new curriculum and leaving them to find their own ways to teach. “Walking along” with them will give incumbent teachers reassurance and help them ease into the new mindset and ways of doing things without feeling threatened.
This is very important, as one of our partners CreativeKids, which has extensive experience in doing art programmes and teachers’ training in kindergartens, relate their experience of a 3-year teachers training programme that they recently did. They describe how teachers in the school resisted ‘aliens’ like them at the beginning, and how teachers started to ‘open up’ only after the first year, because “they have personally experienced that it is possible to do things differently.” The click comes not from seeing others’ changes, but their own first-hand experience that they also can do things in a different way. They say nearing the end of the third year, more teachers finally saw that change was possible and were willing to try. They said this would not have been possible if it’s only an occasional training programme. Resource was available to keep them there for 3 years, and they were there to walk with the teachers, design curriculum and conduct some classes together.
A mindset shifter: For this project to be a repeatable and scalable model, the key issue is the mindset of the teachers, and knowledge and skills that encourage self-directed learning, because at some point all the outside support will not be there and the school teachers will be left on their own. This is why Finland, a country which excels in education, puts so much focus and resource to finding and training the best teachers. The ability of the teachers to observe and monitor each child on a continuous and formative basis and give timely feedback is a theory that a lot of teachers cannot put into practice here for a number of reasons. For those who have the passion, they are very likely faced with a restrictive and hurried teaching environment that puts achieving exam results as a top priority. For those who don’t, they may not have the mindset at all, and hence the skills necessary to teach properly.
A real school environment that allows creativity: The value of this programme lies in the fact that teachers can learn to teach in a different way, without the pressure to relentlessly achieve exam results, so they can experience the positive side and creativity in education, which may help retain them in the trade to continue contribute in building people.
‘Walk along’ with teachers: Our partners will also provide instructors and train more trainers to lead the classes, and to ‘walk along’ with incumbent teachers instead of dumping them with a new curriculum and leaving them to find their own ways to teach. “Walking along” with them will give incumbent teachers reassurance and help them ease into the new mindset and ways of doing things without feeling threatened.
This is very important, as one of our partners CreativeKids, which has extensive experience in doing art programmes and teachers’ training in kindergartens, relate their experience of a 3-year teachers training programme that they recently did. They describe how teachers in the school resisted ‘aliens’ like them at the beginning, and how teachers started to ‘open up’ only after the first year, because “they have personally experienced that it is possible to do things differently.” The click comes not from seeing others’ changes, but their own first-hand experience that they also can do things in a different way. They say nearing the end of the third year, more teachers finally saw that change was possible and were willing to try. They said this would not have been possible if it’s only an occasional training programme. Resource was available to keep them there for 3 years, and they were there to walk with the teachers, design curriculum and conduct some classes together.