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On 9 January, the 6th English Teacher Training Programme (ETTP) commenced.  Making this teaching training programme different, the Academy of Continuing Education (ACE) has teamed up with the English Language Center (ELC) to cooperate with International House London to provide a Cambridge Certified English Teacher Programme, otherwise known as CELT-S. One of the reasons for this cooperation is due to the demand for worldwide recognizable certificate from Zhuhai Education Bureau. By cooperating with International House London, UIC will have a higher standard of ETTP that meets Zhuhai Education Bureau's favour to be the prior partner for future cooperation. In the long term, this will lead UIC to become the powerhouse of providing English teacher training not only in Pearl River Delta but also the whole China. So far there is no such institute available in Mainland.

The Cambridge Certificate in English Language Teaching - Secondary (CELT-S) is a 120-hour blended learning course, comprising eight online modules and a practical component, plus optional tutored material that can be delivered face-to-face or online. CELT-S is a qualification that aims to help participants improve the quality of their classroom practice by developing and extending teachers' knowledge and skills.  Also to allow them to focus on the strategies, methods and materials teachers need to teach language effectively as well as helping teachers to manage and motivate large classes. 

Joel Sundstorm from the ELC demonstrates teaching techniques

A lead trainer (Martin Oetegenn) from International House came from London to Zhuhai to train up and supervise the local trainers for delivering the actual training a few days before the introduction.  The local trainers consisted of three teachers from ELC (Jessica Steinbauer, Joel Sundstorm and Edward Martin) and one teacher from ACE (Mark McCallum).

Jessica Steinbauer from the ELC explains to the teachers how to use the online course

Thirty teachers from local Zhuhai high and middle schools attended. The day began with opening speeches by Ms Li-Ya Kuang from the Teacher Training Office in the Zhuhai Education Bureau as well as Mr Michael Ching, Director of ACE. Following this Martin Oetegenn gave an introduction to the programme. After lunch, the groups were divided and split among the four local trainers and were given time to socialize.  The trainers then were given the opportunity to make the teachers familiarize with the online content before having a try themselves.  Once the tea break had ended there was a question and answer session followed by a group photo.

Ms Li-Ya Kuang was asked if there was a demand for worldwide recognizable certificate from Zhuhai Education Bureau. She replied "I think there is a great demand for that, especially for our high school English teachers. For a long time, English Language education has been a brand of Zhuhai. CELT-S can be another brand of Zhuhai. This certificate sets high requirements; teachers have to go through an interview, personal statement, etc the whole process to be selected to be one of them. The selected teachers are the elite of our group. We would like them to be the pioneers in this field of language teaching and gradually influence and lead other teachers. As for now, education is more and more international, we want our teachers to see more, learn more to broaden their horizon. As you know the special location of Zhuhai forces it to walk forward faster than the other mainland cities with the advance concepts imputing from Hong Kong and Macao."

She was also asked her thoughts on United International College being the only institute in Mainland China to make this course available. Her response was "Zhuhai is fortunate to have UIC. UIC indeed brings a lot of benefits to not only local students, but us teachers as well. UIC possesses highly-qualified faculty with international background which makes it more suitable to this kind of training. Zhuhai Education Bureau has been cooperating with UIC for a long time on various projects and those work quite well. The training provided by UIC has been recognized by more and more teachers in UIC. Our teachers have won some very important awards in Education which in my opinion, comes a lot from UIC's teaching training. The teaching concept, teaching theory and their way of thinking have brought good influence to teachers."

Lastly, Ms Kuang was asked what she likes to vision will happen with the teachers after participating in this course. She said "I think it will bring beneficial changes to Zhuhai English teachers. Like what I said before, those teachers we select are elite in Zhuhai English Teaching Team, I believe after the training, those teaches will improve not only themselves on English Teaching but they will also influence the other teachers. They will bring back what they learn through our CELT-S to the classroom and apply them to the students and share with the other teachers."

She continued "I believe the international certificate will help our teachers to know more about English teaching internationally, through the learning process, they get to know a totally new concept they might know nothing about, a concept that has been proved to be successful for a long time. We are open to fresh ideas and exotic styles to enrich our class. Moreover, English language teaching has always been very important part in teenager education, and all those years we have been used to our traditional teaching way, it is now time for us to make some changes. If our NCEE English test style can be changed, we can definitely do something to make English teaching more tailored to the growing need of our students on really using this language, not only to focus on class and scores. Our old way to teaching English should be changed."

She also mentioned "This training and the teaching will be combined together, teachers will still go back to his/her work place to teach and he/she can immediately use what he/she learns through the training. Whenever he/she meets any difficulties while applying the new method, he/she can still go back to our trainers in UIC, which will help them better understand the new concept timely."

She finished off by saying "We have a big goal, that is, like what I said before, to make our English teachers another brand of China. In future, our teachers will really walk out to other countries to exchange education ideas, and show the Chinese education style to the world. Due to the global environment, we have to know the world and learn from each other. I believe our teachers will make a good use of this international certificate training and make them more competitive with a broad horizon."

CELT-S is a qualification that aims to give English language teachers the opportunity to refresh and build their knowledge and skills so that their students can achieve their potential. CELT-S will give teachers the skills and confidence to successfully implement the curriculum as well as apply their learning to classroom situations.  Also the programme will improve their classroom teaching and their students' learning experiences.

Reporter/Photographer: Samuel Burgess (MPRO)
Editor: Deen He (MPRO)