By Adama Kone, Teacher Project Manager

Earlier this month, Mali Rising hosted one of our Teacher Peer Meetings – gatherings of 7 or 8 teachers from different schools who learn from each other for the day. Teachers volunteer to present a sample lesson and their peers critique their work – providing both positive and constructively negative feedback. After this most recent Peer Meeting, I talked with one of the participating teachers, and recorded his thoughts on the peer meeting and his work:

“My name is Boubacari Tamboura and I teach English at Tim Gibson Middle School. I am forty years old and married to a beautiful wife that I love very much! I have four kids…three boys and one girl.  Three of the kids go to school and one is in pre-school. They love school but the little one always whines in the morning before going to the pre-school.

 I just started working Tim Gibson Middle School this year. I have very friendly colleagues and villagers are nice. [Before this] I have been working as an English teacher for about ten years. I worked in four different villages before but I had never participated in a teacher peer meeting. I attended a few trainings, but nothing like this!

I really liked this peer meeting today because it allowed me to see my peers presenting lessons. As an English teacher, I enjoyed observing another peer English teacher doing his lesson today. Moreover, the great thing is that he presented a lesson that I sometimes struggle with while teaching in classroom. Therefore, I learned from him how to better teach a survival dialogue. I personally think that peer meetings are even more useful than those trainings I previously participated in.

The difference between those teacher trainings and this teacher peer meeting is that our trainers at the trainings just read things with short comments but had no materials for us. I did not learn much and think the trainings at that time were not very useful to me.

To me, this teacher peer meeting is the best way to make teachers learn from each other because we get to actually to see lesson presentations. In addition to that, I myself can present lessons too. This activity from Mali Rising Foundation not only allows me to notice my colleagues’ weaknesses in actual classroom practice but also gives a chance to my peers to help me with my own weaknesses and then encourage me in my strong areas.

Honestly, this is the best thing in terms of helping teachers learn from each other I have seen since I have been teaching. The way I have seen teachers providing feedback to their peers today proves that joining more peer meetings could will be wonderful to me. After this peer meeting, I believe I will be able to serve students better. I think the same is true for many other participants in this peer meeting.

I am thankful I was sent to Tim Gibson Middle School, which allowed me to join this teacher peer meeting. I also just want to say that I am more than grateful to Mali Rising Foundation for giving me this opportunity improve my teaching skills through discussing with my peers and learning from them. “

Learn more about the Teacher Project’s work.