Teachers Learning English in Rwanda
The Government of Rwanda has mandated English as the official language for schools beginning with the earliest grades. They seem to feel that command of English is one of the requirements for Rwanda to become a major economic force not only for Africa but for the world as a whole.
One problem with this decision is that the majority of their teachers do not speak English. The Ministry of Education has, therefore, established the Rwanda English Action Program (REAP) charged with enabling some 40,000 or more elementary school teachers to become fluent in English and the teaching of English as a Second Language quickly.
Jacques Murinda, Executive Director of OLE Rwanda is working with the Ministry to adapt the TeacherMate learning system for use by teachers for learning English. Working in cooperation with Innovations for Learning OLE Rwanda and the Ministry is developing a proposal for a two-phase REAP program. The first phase will pilot the use of the TeacherMate device and software as an ESL learning system and the second will scale this effort to all elementary school students in Rwanda. It is hoped that his effort can be underway before the end of 2009 with a full scale deployment sometime in 2010.
For more information on this effort to to OLE Rwanda.
