Author Archives: Teachers' Resource Centre

In our role as Technical Assistance partner for the RCC project, now supported, in its third phase, by the Royal Netherlands Embassy (RNE), we were requested by SOCIETY (RCC implementing partner) to train ECE teachers for some additional schools they are working with this year.

The TRC team conducted a six-day, 48-hour workshop titled “Ibteda-e-Bachpan ki Taleem Qaumi Nisab ki Roshani Main” in Mastung, from September 03 – 08, 2007,

A total of 24 public sector teachers attended the workshop. Their knowledge was enhanced about the principles of ECE, Holistic Development, An ECE Learning Environment, Observation and Assessment, and the Learning Content outlined in the National Curriculum for ECE.

A range of methodologies were used to deliver the workshop including brainstorming, group work, role play activities, work stations and interactive group discussions.

The participants were enthusiastic and eager to incorporate knowledge gained from the workshops into their classrooms, and they said they look forward to TRC workshops in the future.

The TRC Team went to Azad Kashmir at the request of Save the Children UK (SCUK), who are supporting the development of 40 ECE Government Schools in Bagh and Muzaffarabad, in collaboration with the Education Ministry in AJK.

We conducted two concurrent workshops, titled Ibteda-e-Bachpan ki Taleem Qaumi Nisab ki Roshani Main from August 20 – 25 2007. Our 48-hour workshop module walks teachers through the National Curriculum for ECE (NC-ECE). Some of the topics covered in this workshop are holistic child development; setting up a quality, active learning environment for young children; observation and on-going assessment of learning outcomes and of course, the six key learning areas in the NC-ECE: Personal & Social Development, Language & Literacy, Basic Math Concepts, Creative Arts, Health Hygiene & Safety and The World Around Us.

The participants were excited about their new learning and found the workshop content engaging and meaningful. As always, a range of participatory and interactive methods were used to deliver the learning content, including brainstorming, group work, reflection and discussions, role play, work stations and interactive group discussions.

Some primary and some secondary government school teachers had been identified to work with young children in the newly established ECE Centres. A number of them were apprehensive about ECE and were worried that they were being demoted to teaching such young children … our team succeeded in clarifying any misconceptions they may have had about ECE. By the end of the workshop, they were really keen to translate their new learning into action.

SC-UK has discussed follow up workshops and school visits for the participants. So we may be back there in the near future.

The National Curriculum for ECE 2006-07 is now available on the Ministry of Education, GoP’s website. You can view/download the curriculum here:
http://www.moe.gov.pk/curriculum.htm

Members can have a look at the revised ECE Curriculum in the TRC library and a few copies are available for borrowing.

A 9-hour workshop entitled “Dars o Tadrees Mein Kahaniyon Ka Kirdar” was conducted in Orangi Town on August 3rd and 4th, 2007 for 8 schools run by DIL.

15 participants attended the workshop and were from DIL’s Kindergarten schools. The key components of the workshop were “How Children Learn”, “The Importance of Stories in the Early Grades”, “Using Low Cost Teaching Aids in Story Telling”.

The participants were vocal and active and found the workshop content meaningful, interesting and useful.

A range of methodologies were used to deliver the learning material, including brainstorming, whole group discussions, group work, story telling with puppets, participatory lectures and role-plays.

TRC recently conducted a two-day workshop, entitled “Importance of Observation and Assessment in ECE” at the Fatimiyah Education Network’s (FEN) Early Childhood Education Centre. The workshop, held on the 6th and 7th of August 2007, was part of TRC’s ongoing teacher training and development programme for FEN. 26 pre-primary teachers from FEN’s Britto Road and Kharadar Early Years Centres attended the workshop.

The engaging workshop content and design empowered participants to explore their roles and responsibilities in the process of observation. The participants actively participated in discussions and activities and gained hands-on experience of putting observational theory into practice.

The workshop was interactive and the participants were enthusiastic and eager to learn. It is this kind of synergy between workshop leaders and participants that results in true learning.

Download Location Map

The National Curriculum for Early Childhood Education (2007) has been printed by the Curriculum Wing, Ministry of Education, GoP. TRC has just received a couple of copies … it’s absolutely wonderful to finally see the revised curriculum in print. The Ministry will soon begin planning an ECE implementation strategy, throughout Pakistan … TRC is being kept in the loop.

We have been told that all the new curricula (from ECE – Grade 12) will be made available on the Ministry’s website. We are not sure when this will happen; we will inform our readers as soon as we know. TRC members in Karachi, can have a look at the new curriculum in our library, in August.

Next week we will introduce the new curriculum to our ECE-CP students, as part of the Play Experiences course.

Finally … a moment to update the news!! We are acutely aware that we have been “silent” for quite a few months … but we have been really busy and short staffed! What have we been up to? Here is a very, very, brief overview for now; as soon as we are settled in our new office, (mid July) we will begin writing up the details of these activities.

We are Moving: We have been busy planning, designing, working with architects for many, many months now. We are almost ready, but the carpenter, electrician and painter are still around! As a friend said, ” they become like tenants and are just not willing to move out! ”

So where will TRC be located? We are moving out of our present premises at 67-B, Garden Road, Karachi, to the 2nd Floor, C-121, Ehtesham Centre National Highway, Defence Housing Authority Phase I, Karachi. By the end of July, you will find a map of our new location and our new telephone numbers here on our website.

Our library is all packed up, books are in labelled cartons, the office is beginning to wear a deserted look … 20 years of baggage takes days to shift and weeks to sort!

ECE-Certificate Programme: Our new office space has a section dedicated to the newly established (January 2007) Institute of ECE (IECE), where we intended to start Year-2 of the ECE-CP. It was not to be. The City Kindergarten Resource Centre, which is The City School Network’s ECE Training Centre, kindly accommodated us for a couple of weeks and then we moved the classes to the Faiz Library, in the PECHS Girls’ School. We were determined to end this nomadic existence and begin Semester 2 at the IECE. With great difficulty, we managed to get one classroom and a bathroom ready and Semester 2 began on June 06. This semester we have three courses: Play Experiences, History & Philosophy of ECE and Child Development.

Publications: Despite daily calls/follow-up with the two different printers, our publications were delayed, owing to excessive power failures … Karachites will empathise! Ilm o Amal was inordinately delayed. We apologise to the schools that closed end May; the courier returned their copies to us and we will send them again in August. The PDF version will be put on this site shortly. The other much awaited publication, Innovation in the Kachi, with a bright red cover:-) has also arrived from the printer adding to the pile of cartons at TRC!! Innovation in the Kachi is a longitudinal study of the impact of innovative ECE practices in public sector primary schools.

Curriculum Development: This has been a period of intense, extensive curriculum development! Starting with the Federal Curriculum Wing, Ministry of Education’s request to revise the ECE Curriculum we had developed in 2002, to Shah Wilayat Public School to PECHS Girls’ School. We are still working on the last one, but have completed the National Curriculum for ECE and Shah Wilayat’s Curriculum for KG 2 and Class 1.

ECE Advocacy at District Level: In collaboration with Unesco and the Sindh Education Department, we conducted two workshops, to mobilise policy level support for the promotion of ECE in Sindh, and to build capacity of district level managers and community leaders. The first workshop was held in Nawabshah and the second in Karachi at TRC. As part of this collaboration, we have also developed an Advocacy Resource Book on ECE. It is currently being translated into Urdu and Sindhi. Detaisl on all these activities will be available on this site soon.

New “Partners”: Several extensive meetings were held with representatives of American Institutes for Research. Proposals were written and budgets prepared and more meetings held and e-mails exchanged in preparation for a USAID education project due to begin in September 2007.

We are currently discussing a partnership with Unilever Pakistan to conduct workshops on play for teachers of early years’ education and to develop resources for the advocacy of the importance of play and active learning.

Affiliation of IECE: We are exploring partnerships with UK based universities for the TRC-Institute of ECE. The British Council Karachi, has been extremely helpful in this regard (Thank you Samina Khan!!) and as a result we have been in e-mail contact with several folk across UK.

Sharne Proctor, Director, International & Postgraduate Service, University of Glasgow, visited TRC while she was in Karachi for some work. We had a great, preliminary meeting and plan to meet again in Glasgow in September, with the Dean of Education and ECE faculty to move the discussion further.

The TRC Team: We have been dreadfully short staffed during this period. Lila Ram is still away in Australia on study leave, but we look forward to having him back with us soon; Sadiya Azeem is away on maternity leave; Rubina Naqvi is away for six weeks, recovering from surgery; Amima Sayeed is back now, but was away for an extended period, attending a family wedding and then a conference in North America.

In the midst of all this, an associate member, also a student, requested the use of some books she knows we have, for her final thesis. A letter informing members that the library will be closed in June and July went out in mid May. Since our library team has categorised, packed and labelled all the books, we were able to locate the books she needed.

At the behest of their Principal, teachers of the Fatimiyah Education Network visited the TRC, on February 9, 2007, for enhancing their professional exposure. At the visit they learnt more about ECE with a view to bringing about changes and improvements within their own environment.
Teachers were particularly excited to see the recycled gosha material, learning aids, and the other material on display.