The African Institute for Mathematical Sciences Cameroon, Teacher Training Program, in partnership with Mastercard foundation, hosted AIMS-TTP trained teachers on Friday, October 4, 2019 at AMPHI 300, in the Higher Teachers Training College, Yaoundé. This gathering was in commemoration of Teachers Day celebrated internationally on October 5. This year’s theme is “Young Teachers: The future of the Profession.”
AIMS-TTP, regrouped its trained teachers in the Centre region to encourage them to keep learning and teaching differently, reflect on their pedagogy growth since they received the AIMS-TTP training, and to introduce them to the Cluster strategy that’ll will boost their peer-to-peer interactions.
Mr. Sama Robert, an AIMS-trained teacher, a Master Trainer and principal in one of our pilot schools, gave a talk on the importance on the Teacher’s attitudes, behavior and manner of teaching in the classroom which is instrumental to piquing students’ interest and increasing the pipeline for them especially, girls in the STEM field. Ending on a high-note, Mr. Sama advised the Young professionals, to”Be kind but firm, students appreciate kindness and they’ll always return to your class when they perceive a certain comfort and homeliness”.
Kenyan Hunter, AIMS-TTP’s program coordinator, introduced a new peer-to-peer strategy called the Cluster Strategythat’ll increase collaboration for the advancement of individual teaching practices.
The Cluster strategy is a group of Mathematics teachers from the same school or from schools within the same neighborhood, who work together with TTP Cameroon and interact regularly among themselves to learn and teach Mathematics differently. TTP is therefore, creating these clusters with the aim that teachers will gain more knowledge, skills and attitudes from each other, so as to improve in their classroom practices. It is through the process of peer assistance, sharing information and experiences, that these teachers will learn from each other and also have opportunity to develop themselves professionally
The day ended with a plethora of testimonials from teachers who spoke about their classroom experiences, post-AIMS training.