USAID – Read Liberia conducts teacher training in Bong

USAID – Read Liberia in collaboration with Liberia’s Ministry of Education has begun a five-day Teachers Training Workshop for 1st and 2nd Grades teachers and principals from selected public primary schools in Gbarnga, Bong County.

Our Bong County correspondent says the workshop aims to equip primary teachers, principals and district education officers with the relevant knowledge and skills to improve early grade reading instruction, using materials developed by USAID and the Ministry of Education under previous joint projects.

The workshop is being conducted simultaneously in six counties including Montserrado, Margibi, Grand Bassa, Lofa, Bong and Nimba, according to the lead facilitator Mrs. Chris Davies.

Madam Davis says enhancing the ability of public primary school students to read and comprehend grade level text in English after two years of schooling and the development of their lexicon required for emergent literacy skills as major goals of the training.

She explains that a total of 1,920 participants, drawn from 640 USAID and MOE selected public primary schools for the Read Liberia project are expected to participate in the sessions.
According to her, 63 trainers including 15 master trainers from MoE, 40 newly hired coaches and eight staff from USAID – Read Liberia will facilitate the workshop.
Madam Davis adds that her institution will not only train and abandon those teachers and principals, but will continue providing monitoring services to ensure that their training benefits the students in the classroom.

She believes that if the foundation of students is built from the beginning, the means to cope with other lessons cannot be overemphasized.

Madam Davis furthers that her organization will remain committed to working with the government of Liberia through the Ministry of Education in order to ensure a vibrant education system.

Read Liberia is a five-year USAID-Funded Project with the goal of ensuring that public primary school students will read fluently and comprehend grade level text in English after two years of schooling, and that pre-primary students will develop the oral vocabulary required for emergent literacy skills.

By Joseph Titus Yekeryan in Bong–Edited by Winston W. Parley