Renowned as one of Thailand’s longest-established foreign language institutes, the British Council isn’t just expert in linguistics. Using the cultural resources of the UK, the British Council nurtures friendship, knowledge and understanding between the people of the UK and other countries all over the world.
Now, in support of Thailand’s drive to develop a creative economy, British Council Thailand is focusing on a 2020 mission to raise levels of English proficiency in schools and colleges throughout Thailand to international level. More than ever, the UK language specialist is providing key catalysts for driving Thailand’s socio-economic development ahead.
The British Council’s roles in raising levels of English language proficiency are being accentuated in cooperation with the Ministry of Education. This is being achieved by promoting innovative English teaching methodologies among English teachers in Thailand under the British Council’s Regional English Training Centre (RETC) project.
“Initiated in March 2016 with a pilot project in Pattaya, RETC aims to transform English teaching in Thai primary and secondary schools in line with the Ministry of Education’s policy to significantly raise the standard of English teachers in Thailand,” explained Mr Andrew Glass OBE, British Council Thailand Director.
“Using the Common European Framework of Reference for Languages (CEFR), a tool to evaluate language skills, RETC has found high levels of language inequality among teachers. Some 75% of participating teachers were found to be at just the elementary A2 level or below. Only 20% were at B1, or intermediate level, and 5% at B2 and above level, or upper intermediate.”
In the project, participants benefited from the British Council’s teaching methodologies, techniques, and cutting edge education technology, all of which boosted their confidence, both in using English themselves and teaching it.
When they returned to their schools, they were required to apply the techniques in their classes and video themselves teaching. The videos were sent to the British Council’s trainers for appraisal and they gave their feedback and tips for improvement.
“We found that after trying our methodology and techniques, participants quickly become more communicative and able to engage and motivate their students to learn and speak English.”
The project also created a support network among the teachers themselves that encourages them to share their ideas, challenges, solutions, and best practices with each other. Moreover, the teachers become part of the British Council’s global network of English learners and educators.
RETC offers primary and secondary teachers three-week, 90-hour courses covering lesson planning, lesson management, speaking activities, teaching, vocabulary, teaching reading, teaching grammar, and other areas. Each week of the courses involves teachers in planning and delivering microteaching lessons to their peers. To ensure the most effective results, supporting units are available through online forums, social media and online platforms. As part of the programme, Thai Master Trainers are developed so they can spread their increased confidence and proficiency among other teachers so that the whole project becomes naturally expandable and sustainable.
Since its inception, RETC, supported by over 30 Thai Master Trainers, has trained 17,000 of the targeted total of 40,000 teachers at 15 centres nationwide.
As for feedback from the courses, a resounding 90% of RETC participants report increased confidence in using English and teaching English, and 94% report an overall increase in confidence.
Building on the project’s success, the British Council is now discussing with the Ministry of Education how to develop assessment methodologies, training, and formative tests for lower secondary education levels (Mattayom 1 to Mattayom 3).
“This is the kind of large-scale project that the British Council in Thailand has never done before. We feel very grateful to have the opportunity to be part of Thailand’s education development in line with our expertise and ideals,” concluded Mr Glass.
