Issue 2- May 2001
Other Issues

• VTTN provincial workshops
• Other VTTN events
• Contacts
 

Welcome


Iam very pleased to have the opportunity to write an introduction to the second edition of the Vietnam Teacher and Trainer Network (VTTN) newsletter. When I arrived in Vietnam as the new Country Director in June last year we had just reached agreement with the Ministry of Education and Training to launch this new collaboration, so the project is now one year old.
I was privileged to speak at the national workshop in Hanoi which formally opened the project - although, such was the enthusiasm for the new project amongst Vietnamese educationalists, one provincial workshop had already been held by this time! I was struck at the time by how well the project complemented our other work in English
language, particularly of course the operations of the British Council teaching centres in Hanoi and Ho Chi Minh City. But while these latter provide direct teaching of very high professional quality through very well - resourced centres, they cannot possibly fully meet the great demand for English language throughout the country.

The VTTN project goes much further towards meeting this need. By working with Vietnamese teachers of English we are able to develop English language teaching and training skills
which can be deployed to meet the expectations and aspirations of a much larger group of people - secondary school students who constitute the future workforce in Vietnam and who will increasingly need to operate in an international English speaking environment. The so-called "multiplier" effect is enormous, and the teachers themselves who have participated in the various workshops over the year have responded enthusiastically to opportunities for strengthening their teaching skills.

I myself was able to take part in a recent provincial workshop in Nam Dinh. I was very impressed by the commitment of the teachers involved and their willingness to share ideas - not just successful ones, but also ideas which had not worked very well in the classroom and from which everyone could learn important lessons. The workshop facilitators worked hard
to ensure that all participants had opportunities to contribute and that ideas for downstream self-initiated activities were generated.

Both we and the Ministry of Education and Training have been very pleased by the feedback from the various workshops completed to date. We are now discussing how the scope of the project might be extended:
- to cover other provinces and extend the outreach even further
- to build upon the networks of English language teachers established in the provinces in which the project currently operates.

We are sad to have to say goodbye to Lynne Heslop, who has been very active in guiding the project, but who is leaving the British Council Vietnam to return to the UK during the summer. Lynne has been a valued colleague - we will all miss her. We wish her all success in the future.
To replace Lynne the British Council is recruiting a consultant teacher trainer to work on the project. His name is Brian Stott, and he is currently working on an English language
project in Poland. We hope that Brian will join us early in June 2001, and we look forward to having him join the team.

In the meantime we all look back with enormous satisfaction on the first year of operation of the project. We appreciate particularly the work of our facilitators, the support of our partners in the Ministry of Education and Training and in the provincial departments, and - most importantly - the contributions of all the many teachers who have participated so enthusiastically in this very successful project.

David Cordingley
Director