The 3rd English Teacher Training

In September 2018, 22 teachers graduated from the 3rd English Teacher Training (ETT) at the Studer Trust Teacher Training Center (TTC). During this 10-week course, participants attended approximately 3-4 hours of English classes and activities a day to work to improve their English language proficiency, and they also studied a variety of teaching methodologies in order to increase their students’ ability to speak, listen, read, and write in English.

ETT teachers also had the opportunity to select from over 224 leveled English books to read throughout the training. After 10 weeks of training, the teachers read 498 books in English, an average of over 49 books per week. TTC is proud to report 95.45% (21) of teachers meet their goal of improving at least 1 reading level with 17 of the 22 teachers improving 2 levels or more.

Furthermore, participants were also assessed on the progress of their speaking ability. Every teacher participates in a one-on-one English interview with one of TTC English language instructors on 3 separate occasions during the training. 86.36% (19) of the teachers met their goal of improving their spoken English by at least 3 sublevels, i.e. beginning low, beginning mid, and beginning high, by the end of training. Several teachers even started at a beginning low speaking level and tested into intermediate high after only 10 weeks!

Participants felt that they gained a great deal by completing the training. 100% stated that they would be able to use the knowledge they gained from ETT in their classroom and also encouraged TTC to hold the training again in the future. One teacher explained that before attending our course “[she] didn’t know how to teach English.” She only knew how to teach English by drilling and rote memorization. “But now [she] knows how to teach English speaking and vocabulary.” Another graduate noted that she enjoyed the practicum teaching conducted at Salay Monastic School, where TTC is housed “because [she] could practice teaching English and get feedback and have time to modify [her] lessons before [she] teaches her class in school.”

Finally, TTC would like to express our gratitude to our partner schools and especially our generous donor the Wai Yin Association for the opportunity to conduct this successful training. Without their support, Studer Trust would not be able to continue its important work to improve teachers ability to address the learning needs of the students at their schools.