8,000 Teachers Trained to Deliver Literacy Programme

Seventy per cent or approximately 8,000 teachers who will be administering the Literacy 1-2-3 programme in primary schools islandwide, have been trained to deliver the programme.
The disclosure was made by Jean Hastings, Project Manager of the Primary Education Support Project (PESP), during an interview with JIS News.
The training, which was facilitated through the PESP, will enable teachers at Grades 1-3 to deliver the Literacy 1-2-3 programme through the use of the Literacy 1-2-3 materials.
According to Ms. Hastings, a face-to-face support system is also being worked out, in collaboration with the National Literacy Co-ordinator, the Deputy Chief Education Officer in charge of Curriculum Services, and the Education Transformation Team, to assist the teachers during the first year of delivery of the programme.
“We conducted training in the summer of last year, when we trained teachers on how to deliver the programme. We are now preparing for on-going support and professional development with the face-to-face in school support, as well as a web-based training programme, which will supplement the face-to-face training. The web-based training tool provides full exposure to the Literacy 1-2-3 programme and also affords the opportunity for reflection and dialogue with Literacy specialists, who will be assigned by Region to respond to any queries, or clarification raised,” she explained.
“What the web-based training will do is provide teachers with some place that they can go to get support in the [Literacy 1-2-3] delivery. The programme is designed for delivery in the Language Arts ‘Window’ of the Revised Primary Curriculum,” she added.
According to Ms. Hastings, teachers may refer to the web-based programme to seek answers to any questions that may arise or get information on literacy that they may have forgotten. She also explained that schools without internet access will get the information on compact discs (CDs).
The PESP Manager said that the Ministry is mindful, that if the teacher’s abilities are strengthened through the web-based programme, then the grades 1-3 students will stand a better chance of learning to read.
“If you strengthen the teacher’s abilities to deliver the lesson, the hope is that you will get the [students] reading and developing their literacy skills. Once a child is literate, it’s not something they will unlearn. It’s an investment for life. The programme, Literacy 1-2-3, is specially designed to take the child from wherever they are when they enter primary school and make them able to read, write and comprehend and speak standard Jamaican English,” Ms. Hastings stressed.
The web-based training programme provides materials that support both the children’s learning and the teacher’s ability to deliver the information. Other teacher-centred materials being used to support the Literacy 1-2-3 initiative are, Teacher’s Guides and Training Manuals with tutorials (on CD) that demonstrate how lessons are to be done.