Who teaches the teacher? Lessons on teacher support from Africa, Asia and Latin America

In this blog post, Joy Nafungo, senior program specialist at Canada’s International Development Research Centre (IDRC), explores different ways teachers learn in early childhood education.

Drawing on lessons shared at a recent peer-learning dialogue organized by the Global Partnership for Education Knowledge and Innovation Exchange (GPE KIX), she reflects on experiences from several GPE KIX projects in Africa, Asia and Latin America.

Earlier this year, I visited an early childhood education (ECE) classroom in Kigali, Rwanda, supported by GPE KIX as part of the project Scaling Inclusive ECE and School Readiness Through Sign-Language-Rich Environments for Deaf learners. I watched from the back of the classroom as a deaf teacher and a hearing teacher guided a class of deaf children. Children happily participated throughout the lesson through sign language, stories and classroom activities. To them, this was simply how learning happened.

What caught my attention, however, was not only the children's learning. I found myself watching the teachers too. They collaborated naturally, each drawing on the other's expertise throughout the lesson. I even found myself learning a few signs.

Later, I realized I had not simply been observing an inclusive classroom. I had been watching teachers learn from one another.

This experience brought me back to a cohort exchange — a peer-learning and cross-project dialogue organized by GPE KIX — that had taken place a few weeks earlier. The exchange explored teacher support models in early learning. Three projects from across Africa, Asia and Latin America shared lessons learned; although from diverse contexts, their experiences all pointed to one question:

The answers showed that sometimes it is another teacher. Sometimes it is a parent. Sometimes it is the community. And sometimes, it is the children themselves.

The stories shared at the GPE KIX cohort exchange also challenged one of the most common refrains in teacher support: "Teachers need more training." While training remains essential, GPE KIX projects are showing that the most effective and sustainable teacher support models are those that go beyond equipping teachers with new knowledge. They create opportunities for teachers to share and co-create existing and new knowledge, and experiences — with colleagues, families and communities.

My classroom visit in Kigali helps to illustrate several lessons shared during the GPE KIX cohort exchange. Launched to strengthen the capacity of teachers to teach deaf and hearing children, The Scaling Inclusive ECCE and School Readiness Through Sign-Language-Rich Environments for Deaf Learners project shows that learning among teachers is happening every day inside the classroom. Not only are hearing teachers supporting inclusive learning environments, but they are also learning sign language from their deaf colleagues. 

The project also shows that the presence of deaf teachers contributes to results that extend beyond the classroom. Deaf children have grown in confidence, participate more actively in extracurricular activities and remain engaged in school. Parents are also learning sign language, which helps them to communicate with their children and support them at home. During my visit, I heard these experiences echoed in conversations with teachers and saw them reflected in the confidence and participation of children in the classroom.

In addition, deaf teachers are not only supported, but they are also helping other teachers. Teacher support, therefore, is not only about professional development. It is also about recognizing the expertise that already exists and creating opportunities for it to be shared.

At the same time, the project highlights some challenges. Despite their central role in teaching and learning, deaf teachers face limited employment opportunities, insufficient recognition of sign language, and inadequate access to accessible teaching and learning materials. What I learned by visiting the project in Rwanda is only one of the many lessons that emerged from the GPE KIX cohort exchange.

In Ghana, a project called The Impact of Culturally Responsive Teaching Practices on Social and Emotional Development in Diverse Early Childhood Classrooms is generating evidence on how to adapt teaching to make it more effective and inclusive. Lessons are emerging on how teaching practices grounded in the cultural assets of diverse ethnic groups can boost children's social and emotional learning in pre-primary education.

Teachers are integrating local languages, storytelling and culturally familiar learning materials into their everyday practice. The project shows that children learn to relate to others and manage their emotions better in classrooms where teachers implement fewer practices well, compared to classrooms where teachers attempt to implement many practices at once. Rather than introducing more strategies, the project focuses on helping teachers deepen and refine practices they can confidently sustain.

Language is also emerging as a key element to the classroom, not simply as the medium of instruction but as a child’s foundation for learning. Local languages, bilingual learning materials and opportunities for children to express themselves in their home language encourage children to participate confidently.

In Honduras and Guatemala, The Gender-Inclusive Pedagogy for Community-Level Early Childhood Education project challenges another common assumption about teacher support: “Expertise sits outside the classroom and must be transferred to teachers.”

Rather than separating professional learning from everyday teaching, the project connects support directly to teachers' lived experiences. It does so by creating opportunities for them to reflect on their practice, learn from one another and respond to the realities of their classrooms, families and communities. Teachers also explore how they are addressing gender equality and inclusion, recognizing families as partners in children's development and learning. They engage parents, and encourage fathers in particular to play a bigger role in early childhood care.

The lessons from this project remind us that teacher support is not simply about sharing knowledge. The project recognizes teachers as knowledge holders, whose experiences, languages, relationships and understanding of their communities are valuable sources of learning. Teacher support creates opportunities for teachers to learn with one another, while drawing on the knowledge, experiences and relationships that exist within families and communities. In doing so, teacher support becomes a collective, rather than individual, endeavour.

There is a lesson that surfaced across multiple GPE KIX projects: Learning happens collectively, not individually.

The Scaling Inclusive Home-based Early Learning Initiative implemented in Uganda, Liberia and Ghana shows that parents are children's first teachers. Stronger partnerships between teachers and families are supporting learning by boosting children's social-emotional development and tapping into local languages.

The Adapting and Scaling Early Learning Outcomes Assessments in the West and Central African Region initiative approaches teacher support from a different angle. To address the lack of localized, scalable tools that measure all skills for all children, teachers have stepped in by adapting assessment tools into local languages and shaping how they were used in practice. Not only has this strengthened teachers’ ownership of the tools, but it has also helped them to improve their own teaching.

The lessons and stories shared across these GPE KIX early learning projects left me with a different set of questions.

1. How can systems better identify, nurture and spread the specialized knowledge that teachers develop to make learning more relevant to their local contexts? 
2. What would change if systems invested as much in strengthening relationships and collaborative teacher support as they do in formal training? 
3. How can different forms of teacher support be recognized, encouraged and sustained so that they strengthen not only individual teachers, but education systems as a whole?

Looking back on my field visit in Kigali, I realize I hadn't just been watching children learn.

I had been watching teachers learn too: through one another, the children they taught and the communities around them.

The GPE KIX cohort exchange offered two important take-aways. First, teacher support goes beyond formal professional development and can also happen through other teachers, everyday practice, families and communities. Second, the strongest teacher support may not always come from adding something new. Sometimes it comes from recognizing, connecting and strengthening what is already there.