# Another teacher’s experience

Abdul was in his seventh year of teaching and was participating in a school-based in-service course for teachers.

The course focused on different ways of working in the classroom to make teaching more interactive. Abdul was nearing the end of the course, which he had found really interesting and at times challenging, and now he wanted to ask one of his classes about their perceptions of the changes he had introduced.

He chose a JSS 1 class he taught, with whom he had tried out more of the strategies. He decided to use some simple questions for them to answer. He organised the students into groups, (each group made up of two pairs) with each group having a chosen scribe to write their agreed responses down. They did not have to put names on the pieces of paper as Abdul felt that if he made the activity anonymous, the students would feel freer about giving their responses.

He then wrote the following questions on the board and asked each group to discuss their answers and write down a summary of the main points about the strategies that had been introduced.

- What new ways of working did you like most?
- Why did you like each of these?
- How do you think they helped you learn better?
- How could these ways of working be made even better?
- What ways of working did you not like as much? Why was this?
- What could be done to improve some of these ways of working that you do not like as much?

Abdul allowed about 20–30 minutes for this before collecting the responses. When he looked at their responses, he was pleased to see that most of the class felt that the new strategies that Abdul had introduced, such as working and talking in groups, had helped them think about topics more deeply. They also said through this approach they had learned from each other. However, some students said that at first they found the organisation of the groups confusing and that moving into groups was noisy and took too much time out of the lesson. They suggested it would be best to have a fixed group to work in as this helped them move more easily.

Abdul noted that working in pairs was also popular and the students reported how they liked working with different class members in the pairs. They felt they had made more friends in class because of this and they could help each other without feeling embarrassed.
One aspect the students were not so happy about was when they were asked to give feedback to the whole class on their discussions. Some were nervous that they had to speak in front of the class and worried that others might not like their feedback. Abdul thought about this and realised that maybe he had not given enough help in reporting back to the whole class, especially in the early stages. He had also not considered that some students would find it harder than others. He thought he could help in the future by giving more direction to the groups as they worked, and also support each reporter more by asking relevant questions to help them structure their feedback and also be more encouraging.

Abdul found the students’ insights really helpful and he made sure he noted them down to help him develop his practice more. He also felt that they raised issues for him and he needed to really think about the strategies that he had tried to develop, such as asking questions. He remembered that he had seen an article about asking open-ended questions in a science methodology book in the library and decided he would take it home to read. Abdul also thought he would discuss his concerns with his colleague Akin, who had often talked about the importance of questions in helping to support thinking. Akin worked in a teacher-training college and Abdul felt he could help him greatly. He resolved to contact Akin at the end of the week to arrange a meeting.

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