By: Sultana Rajia, Assistant Teacher, ChorJangla Model Government Primary School, BholaSadar, Bhola

Just a few years ago, I used to teach in traditional style like any other teacher. I was struggling to attract the young learners and to include all in the lesson, to make them understand properly, and most importantly to make them able to interact in English. After 2013, the situation has changed dramatically. I have found even students of class 1 are able to understand different instructions in English and are able to speak in the target language.

English in Action training and materials completely changed my style of teaching. It played a vital role in keeping students attentive in the class. The motivation of doing something new in the classroom has come to my mind through the training. Nowadays, I am the exemplary practitioner in our school and I have been selected the best teacher in BholaSadarUpazila. Very often, I get calls from other teachers for help.

In the best teacher selection process, teachers were nominated by considering different criteria and I also had to go through an interview process. It took a lot of preparation and, at the end, the interviewer asked me about different classroom techniques. I answered with those which I do in my class and it was from my EIA experiences.

Fouzia Mahmud (Bonny), a student of class 3, said about me, “Our teacher play songs every day. We enjoy it very much.”

The URC (Upazila Resource Centre) Instructor of BholaSadar, Md. Anowar Hossain, has shared his comment, which inspires me so much. He said, “Sultana has been using communicative approaches in teaching most effectively as I have seen so far”.