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25/04/2014

From the 6th till the 12th of April 2014, a delegation of the University of Leuven (KU Leuven) made a visit to VVOB Cambodia. They trained the VVOB team and a selected group of primary teacher trainers and officers of the Ministry of Education, Youth and Sport (MOEYS) on how to measure the effectiveness of mathematics education. Crucial, as VVOB Cambodia and MOEYS are together working on improving mathematics education in the Primary Teacher Trainer Centres and practice schools in Cambodia.

Improving mathematics education in Cambodia

From 2014 till 2016 MOEYS and VVOB work together on improving mathematics education in the Primary Teacher Trainer Centres and practice schools in Cambodia. Specifically, the focus will be on improving the Pedagogical Content Knowledge (PCK) of teacher trainers and model teachers. PCK is a combination of content knowledge and methodology. It includes knowledge of instructional strategies, representations and students’ thinking. Improving the PCK of teachers is important as there is a clear link between the pedagogical content knowledge level of the teacher and the learning outcomes of the students. This makes clear that improving PCK of teacher trainers and model teachers is an important goal and that is why the new programme of VVOB in Cambodja focuses on PCK. But how do we know whether this programme is effective? Therefore, VVOB asked for the expertise from KU Leuven.

Expertise from KU Leuven

Two staff members and one student of KU Leuven came to Cambodia to assist VVOB Cambodia in the process of monitoring and evaluation of mathematics education. Patrick Van Roy (researcher) had experience in designing PCK-oriented rational number lesson series in Belgium and was involved in the pre- and post-test to measure the effectiveness of the given training. He shared his experience with the VVOB staff and with a selected group of teacher trainers and ministry staff during a one-day input training. First he gave an overview of the research done around PCK and specifically in the field of rational numbers. This helped to make clear that the VVOB programme is not just focusing on pedagogical content knowledge based on its own preferences, but that it is something considered important in a wide range of literature.

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