Congratulation to the eight teachers from preschools belonging to the Catholic Church who participated in the third module of the Training on Preschool Pedagogy and successfully completed it.
Those preschool teachers followed the 3rd Module of the training for 18 days, from 2nd to 26th of May 2022. This training was organized by the ECRC’s team of KrY, located in Phnom Penh.
The training course aimed to improve the teaching skills and pedagogical knowledge of the teachers and build on the specific skills that the teachers strengthened during the two previous modules. Moreover, some days of the training focused on giving the participants time to practice the new skills and knowledge learnt in real life teaching situations. Indeed, the teachers had the opportunity to test their skills by teaching at Somersault kindergarten. This also helped the trainer be able to evaluate their understanding of the knowledge provided during the 18 days training.
Mr. Mao Linh, a preschool teacher from the preschool of Takmao belonging to the Catholic Church, said that thanks to the third module of the training, he could get a lot of new special skills on some topics that he did not understand well before such as how to make a lessons plan, how to create teaching materials, as well as technics and strategies to manage the students.
He added that, after he finished the third module of the training, he understands clearly all the above-mentioned topics and will be able to help improve the children’s education in the community.
Ms. Sam Chanteoun, a preschool teacher from the preschool of Ponlok Thmei from the Catholic church in Cambodia, said that after following the third training module, she understands the children better, and she added that: “It is very important for every preschool teacher to know about preschool pedagogy, because it can help them to prepare the lesson appropriately according to the curriculum, understand how to manage the children, prepare the classroom as well as what are the best ways to communicate with the children to teach them.”
Ms. Iek Kimleang, ECCD expert of KrY, said that the content of the third module of the training is not much different from the content of the previous modules. However, for the first module, the trainer introduces the concept of pedagogy and teaching skills to the preschool teachers according to their actual knowledge (content is tailored to the teachers’ needs and gaps). Indeed, during the first module, pedagogy is a very new concept for the preschool teachers, and they need to understand the basics first.
So, the trainers cannot go very deep into the concepts as they need to focus on the basics for the teachers to build strong foundations first and learn through practice. During the second module of the training, the trainers start with a refresher training where they revise the content of the previous module with the teachers and then start providing them deeper knowledge and skills and provide them advice from their own experiences. And during the last module (the third one), teachers can understand clearly all the content of the lesson, so they can build confidence in their skills and capacity to teach preschool children. Indeed, teachers who completed the three modules and then keep learning on their own and do more research, will be able to transform themselves and become better teachers in the future and possibly be able to train other teachers.
