Bridging the Gaps
Graduate training program participants! I had the opportunity to take part in a graduate training program for recent graduates from University here in Nigeria. The program is a three-month program sponsored by a school in Lagos, Nigeria. They had over 5,000 applicants and 30 were accepted into the program. The idea is that they will train these teachers in “modern” teaching methods and the sponsoring school will then hire the best teachers. The remaining students will then get recommended to other schools around Nigeria. Not only is the program providing quality teachers for their own school, but they are also developing teachers to teach all throughout Nigeria. One of the struggles for me teaching in Sierra Leone was to bridge the gap between modern teaching methods and the traditional teaching methods. Traditional teaching methods simply consist of the teacher writing on the blackboard, and the students copying and memorizing. We struggled together to figur