Back in September, 103 graduates from OLA College of Education entered the professional teaching world as Newly Qualified Teachers (NQTs), with Fast-track Transformational Teacher  Training (FTTT) under their belts, and armed with a memory stick holding copies of all the programme resources.

In Ghana, teacher training college graduates can be posted to any government school in the country, which means the FTTT child-centred, activity-based approach to kindergarten teaching can be spread to all corners of the country! Unfortunately, we can’t go to visit everyone, but we do carry out monitoring visits for all those NQTs posted to schools in the Central and Western Regions of Ghana, where we currently work directly.

It’s not always easy for the NQTs to implement the programme, especially when they are posted to districts and schools where the FTTT approach is a completely new concept. This year, however, we have been delighted with what we’ve seen in so many of the FTTT-trained NQTs classrooms, where they’ve been working hard to implement the programme and spread the new teaching methodology. Here’s just a few of our top finds:

Charlotte Koomson, who is now working in Akobima Basic School in Mfantseman district, Central Region, for instance, is able to implement all elements of the FTTT programme and has made her classroom beautifully print-rich and stimulating for her pupils, scoring exceptionally highly on our NQT monitoring tool.

The Central Region office also received a visit last week from Vida Dadzie, who is now working in a kindergarten complex in Twifo Ati-Mokwa with fellow NQT Dora Frimpomaa. They have been working with all teachers from the 6 kindergarten classrooms in their school to implement the programme already, but since the feedback from our monitoring was given to their Ghana Education Service office, they were sent extra funds to buy resources for their classrooms. They’ve also been given permission to run a training session for more teachers in the district next term.

In Gomoa East, Central Region, NQT Sophia Amoah was noticed by her Ghana Education Service Circuit Supervisor and brought to the attention of the district Kindergarten Co-ordinator there. They were so impressed by her work that they organised a training for all lower primary teachers (that’s KG1 – Primary 3!) in the district; at first, two sessions for the public schools, then a third for the private schools!

Hearing stories like these really motivate us here in the office, showing how big an impact we can have collectively. We’re extending a huge congratulations to all of those NQTs around the country who are working hard to implement the FTTT approach in their classrooms; you’re having a real impact on the development and up-scaling of quality kindergarten education in Ghana! Well done!