Continuing Professional Development, Teaching for Success Conference Held
Aconference held on March 25 presented the British Council and St. George International School joint Teaching for Success (TfS) program to teachers of other subjects and parents, as well as English language teachers and administration representatives of the private education sector.
The Teaching for Success approach follows the principles of effective continuing professional development (CPD).
CPD is a planned, continuous and lifelong process. Teachers develop their personal and professional qualities, and improve their knowledge, skills and practice. This leads to improvements in their performance as teachers, the outcomes for their learners, benefits for their schools, and the teacher’s own confidence and autonomy as a professional.
This process requires the teacher to change habits, experiment with new methods and find solutions to the challenges that developing their teaching presents. TfS leads the teacher towards being an expert who takes full responsibility for their own professional development, and is committed to continuous learning, practice and reflection.
During the first part of the event, plenary speakers talked about key features of the Teaching for Success approach, CPD concept, and implementation tools. The audience had an opportunity to hear about the joint program outcomes as well as real life case studies from English teachers who have been involved in the developmental program and eagerly shared with the conference guests what they had done over the months of being involved in the project.
“Teachers had a chance to diversify their teaching practice, to become more confident in the teaching process, and to get acquainted with methodological novelties, which of course showed in the students’ success: they became more motivated and more active during the classes,” said Maka Makharoblidze, Director of the St. George International School.
The invited teachers took away some useful tips by attending the planned activities and by simply networking throughout the day. All this raised their awareness of up-to-date, effective methods recommended to make their teaching process more productive and enjoyable for learners, as well as for the teachers themselves.
“This training helped me a lot professionally. It helped me to be more modern as a teacher. It means that I started thinking more in-depth about my classes. I’m in the constant process of searching. Being a teacher means you have to always develop and move ahead,” said teacher Sophio Gurgenidze.
In the second part of the conference, a variety of practical ‘How To’ Sessions were conducted for English language teachers.
“Within the framework of the conference, English language teachers had an opportunity to work with British experts and be involved in different activities after which they could implement new, innovative approaches in the teaching practice,” said Zaza Purtseladze, Director of British Council Georgia.