Bilingual Education in Niger - ADEA

On completion of this training the teachers were promoted from
deputy primary school teachers to full primary school teachers.
The training includes theory classes and periods of practical experience
in experimental schools.
From 1979 to 1988, approximately 180 teachers with five (5) à six
(6) years’ teaching experience in monolingual French-language
schools were trained. This training lasted three months:
• One (1) month of practice in experimental schools.
• Two (2) months of theory at INDRAP and SP-CNRE/PS on
applied linguistics, general bilingual teaching methodology,
pedagogical theory for the various disciplines and the use of
the new teaching aids and new terminology.
The third approach focuses on the monitoring of the teachers in
the schools:
• Local monitoring provided by the directors of the schools and
the educational advisers;
• Supervision and pedagogical leadership tasks undertaken by
teams of teacher trainers.
• During the summer holidays, gatherings for top-up training
and retraining organised for teachers in experimental schools.
In addition to these training courses and retraining sessions, teachers
in nearby schools within a radius of five kilometres organise
professional development days.
For distance teaching, special programmes are broadcast by the
“Voix de l’enseignement” for teachers in experimental bilingual
schools.
The school manual
When these trials began, bilingual education needed to address
a major problem, the non-existence of teaching aids in general,
and manuals in particular. Various strategies were developed in
order to deal with this issue:
• The development of an integrative methodology founded on
integration of the school into its surrounding environment,
36 bilingual Education in Niger