Montana State University recently hosted 20 Pakistani teachers for six weeks at part of the Teaching Excellence and Achievement program through the U.S. State Department. A.C.E. Language Institute was tapped to provide a series of professional development activities.
A.C.E. teachers at MSU met with Pakistani teachers initially to learn about their teaching contexts and talk shop. Three A.C.E. teachers also presented best practices that Pakistani teachers could take back with them. In a separate workshop, lead ESL instructor Valley Peters introduced reflective practice activities including collage, metaphor, and a journaling approach. Pakistani teachers produced colorful and engaging collages demonstrating their teaching beliefs and aspirations. In their final session with A.C.E. teachers, Pakistani fellows presented a 10 minute mini-lesson highlighting a new technique that they had learned during their program. They received feedback on the strengths of their lesson and ideas for improving it. Both A.C.E. and Pakistani teachers learned a great deal from the exchange!