Monday, April 30, 2007

April 10, 2007
Knock on wood that I won’t be screaming in frustration next week, but the Cluster unit seems to be taking on more of the shape that I want and I’m starting to have an occasional sense that the work I’m doing now might be a little bit sustainable. I think working with the college staff is very important to the sustainability and real improvements in teaching, as they are the ones (hopefully) training the teachers. It can be very frustrating, though. A group of college staff have gone out this week to observe teachers at schools, and a few of them have already called and said that exams are going on (there’s a serious case of testing taking the place of learning here, but that’s another issue) … oh well, Meressa, my colleague, whose calm attitude will hopefully rub off on me, responded by saying it’s a learning experience and next time we should ask the schools for their exam schedules in advance… good idea.
Also, the frustrations extend to the college staff skills: from the work we’ve done so far, it’s clear to me that my ideas of active learning and their ideas of active learning are not the same, and despite the orientation we did, I worry about the kind of feedback they will give teachers. Anyway, it’s really all a learning experience.

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