Student teachers from
the University of Fort Hare come to George Randell school twice a week as
part of the THRASS Absa TalkTogether Project and the THRASS lessons start
immediately after devotions. In some classes there are three students and in
others four. The students do whatever the class teacher does but sometimes
the students have ideas for lessons and it is the teacher who then becomes
the student.In the video we are treated to a
talent contest with a THRASS SING-A-LONG theme in which we see enthusiastic
performances of ‘Disco hair’, ‘Been sitting on my chair’, ‘Riding along in
the bus with ‘u’’, ‘Treasure have I’, ‘Get outta bed’ and ‘Give me a high
five’. And the winner is……’Treasure have I’.
The student teachers then explain how they have been
working with the children. One has muddled up the Phoneme-Grapheme Cards and
the children are having to sort them into the sequence of the words in the
THRASS raps. A student who has been working with the children using the
words from the THRASS chart, is amazed at the words that the children are
able to build, and not only the THRASS words.
Another student has been asking the children to
locate the keygraphemes from words found on the THRASS chart in other words
and also to put the words into a sentence. Other children are being asked to
solve a riddle by referring to their Picturecharts.
One of the teachers working with the students tells
us how they give the students ideas and then allow them to explore and to
really get going teaching THRASS. THRASS gives teachers so much space and
the children are so excited that they get involved and that is what she
really likes. She finds it really encouraging to watch how the students
grow, especially with THRASS.
Hilton Williams, the Headteacher, explains that they
have already seen the improvement as a result of THRASS but now they want to
see it carrying right through to all different areas of the school. THRASS
is working well but he knows that it can work even better. The first year it
wasn’t time-tabled into the programme but it is now time-tabled into
everyone’s class so that no-one can say that they did not have time to do
it.
Lisa de la Cornillere-Schutte, a lecturer at the
School of Initial Teacher Education (SITE) within the Faculty of Education
at the University of Fort Hare, explains that it is the second year of the
TalkTogether Project with George Randall school but before that the
University and the school had a long history of school experience where
students go to classes and are mentored by their host teachers.
The students attend the two-day THRASS Accredited
Certificate course and also a two-hour THRASS SING-A-LONG workshop
(presented by Janine Plunkett, the South African music teacher who wrote the lyrics
and composed the music for the 44 phoneme songs). Before that they do quite
a bit of language training but because they are focusing on an integrated
approach to language training they try and introduce aspects of THRASS
throughout the year in the different subjects.
Lisa has seen a marked improvement in the students’
confidence and is very grateful to Absa and THRASS UK (and also to Pritt,
who with Absa, are principal sponsors of the THRASS SING-A-LONG resources)
for the THRASS Absa TalkTogether Project. Without their financial support
many of the students would not be able to afford to do the THRASS training
and it has opened up opportunities for many students. Education is the key
to success and they really have helped.
The video finishes with children performing a THRASS
rap to a traditional African musical accompaniment.
Watch the videostream
