Our vision is ‘Helping all children succeed, by giving them the best possible early education’. One of the ways we achieve this is through transformational teacher training. We work with a team of trainers who are either Ghana Education Service officers or experienced teachers and we provide them with the skills to train teachers, head teachers and Ghana Education Service officers to deliver the Ghana governments curriculum through activity and play.
We call the training transformational because teachers are totally transforming the way they teach. Traditional teaching in Ghana is often rote-based/chalk and talk, with four and five-year-old children expected to sit still in rows and recite what the teacher is saying, in classrooms with no teaching resources, such as story books or games to play with.
Our programme includes nine days of intensive training workshops split across the three terms that make up a school year. Teachers are trained to transform their classrooms into child-centred learning environments, full of bright, colourful and fun resources to play with and learn from. This month an incredible 1,244 teachers, head teachers and Ghana Education Service officers attended their final workshop, meaning they are now ready to transform their own classrooms into inspirational places for young children to learn.
The workshop covered a range of important topics including how to provide equal opportunities for children with additional needs and the importance of involving parents in understanding play-based learning so that they can continue this approach at home.
Naomi Addo, a kindergarten teacher at Trom M/A school shared the following “As a result of the training we received from Sabre, we are now very confident, because we have all it takes to go out and teach the next generation of children. Before this training I did not know about inclusive education and when to refer children with additional needs to the Special Education Department. I actually have two children with additional needs in my class and going back to my school I will know how to support them.
Solomon Tettey Amartey, head teacher at Nana Kweku Boateng School shared “thank God for Sabre, for training us in how to deliver the play-based curriculum. Let’s resolve for the good of Mother Ghana to pass this knowledge to the next generation. If this is scaled up nationwide, Ghana in 20 years will be seeing people who are innovators and critical thinkers to solve our nation’s problems. Thank you Sabre, thank you facilitators, God bless you”
Teachers will now spend time practicing what they have learnt in the training workshops and will also receive additional one to one support in their classrooms. Congratulations to all of the amazing teachers who have completed the training- you are the future of education in Ghana.