Teacher Training Program

AIL has dramatically expanded its teacher training program inside Afghanistan. To date, the Afghan Institute of Learning (AIL) has trained 13,000 teachers in student-centered teaching techniques, immediately improving the quality of education for about 390,000 Afghans. Interactive, student-centered teaching is a radical departure from traditional teaching methods in Afghanistan, which emphasize dictation, rote memorization, and recitation. Using the new teaching methods, teachers are able to teach students to think critically, use logic for problem-solving, and interpret and evaluate information.  

The result is that students are able to learn quickly. Many students who are taught by AIL-trained teachers are able to read after only 3 months of instruction compared to the typical three years students need when taught under the old methods. Some students have been so energized by their ability to learn quickly that they have accelerated their education, completing multiple grades within one year. With AIL’s teacher training, teachers in Afghanistan are learning from each other and students are learning more in classes. These new patterns hold promising implications for the future of education in Afghanistan.

 Because of the success of AIL’s teacher training the Herat Ministry of Education has asked AIL to train all of the teachers in that city. Many other communities, especially rural villages, have also heard about AIL’s teacher training and its impact. They are eager for AIL to train their teachers so that their children can benefit from these educational opportunities too.  

Much of the curriculum in Afghanistan has been lost and destroyed because of the war and civil strife. Also, the old curriculum did not incorporate interactive, student-centered lessons. In order to improve educational opportunities for children and youth, Afghanistan urgently needs updates to existing curriculum subjects as well as new lesson materials for teaching important topics like peace, health, human rights, gender issues, and life skills. AIL’s teacher training staff develops curriculum, training seminars, and workshops with 16 seminars and dozens of workshops developed to date. Recently, AIL teacher training staff developed 16 life skills workshops in topics like peace, health, psychology, and manners.