TEACHER TRAINING
Second-grader Amima Shahi in the HIO/Intel computer lab at the Loyalty School.
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For the past 25 years, HIO has been working to improve the quality of education in Nepal, not only for the 150 girls directly sponsored by HIO, but also for the several thousand other students who are a part of a broad literacy network in our partner schools.
By using volunteer teachers in the classroom and introducing computers with early-learning software, HIO is implementing a curriculum to better help our Nepali students grasp the basics of the English language. As English is the world’s language of commerce, the better our students can read, write and converse in English, the more opportunities they can have for advancing their futures. In our three partner schools, English is the main curriculum language. Though children pick up language skills quickly at a young age, it's very difficult for them to comprehend what they read in English. It is important to teach critical thinking skills at this early stage, instead of requiring rote memorization, which is common practice in Nepali schools. |
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Our curriculum initiative contained several actions. The first was to provide hands-on classroom time, with trained teachers from the U.S. traveling to Kathmandu to spend short, concentrated periods working directly with our colleague teachers. The second was to enhance our teacher-training efforts with the use of the internet for real-time, long-distance learning (LDL) using video conferencing.
Intel Corporation employee volunteers have helped set up several computer labs funded by HIO at our partner schools. With Maida McKenna and Linda Liss-Bronstein, both leading experts in training teachers for early-learning readers, guiding us, our dream of a LDL initiative took shape. Twice a month, we video-conference live with 25 Nepali teachers. |
Maida McKenna, a long-time volunteer teacher-trainer, models reading methods.
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Laura Gladding traveled to Kathmandu from the U.S. to volunteer as a teacher-trainer.
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In conjunction with our LDL sessions, a key tool is the Word Scientists website (www.wordscientists.org), a non-profit global education project that offers free literacy resources for beginning readers and their teachers. Our goal is to make the Word Scientists website a hub for teacher training in Nepal, as well as a place for teachers to access resources and reading materials for students. Parts of the website can be downloaded and made available to those without internet access—a key feature in a country where internet access is limited.
The LDL sessions are available to teachers at all of our partner schools throughout the Kathmandu valley. The Word Scientists website is now a major learning tool for our colleague teachers in Kathmandu and, potentially, for the farthest regions of Nepal, wherever there are schools, teachers and students. The outcomes from our LDL tutorials have been remarkably beneficial for the teachers involved. |