Brazil Project background
2. Key features of the context
1. Description of the partners
BRAZ-TESOL Public School SIG The Public School Sig was created in July 2012 to support English teachers working across Brazil in public school with training and development, in English language and teaching methodology. One of their aims is to build a national community of practice. The main contact for this project was Maria Valésia Silva da Silva, President of the BRAZ-TESOL Rio Grande do Sul Chapter and Leader of the BRAZTESOL Public School SIG She was the driving force behind the project at the Brazil end and submitted the original project application. Bell Educational Services Ltd Bell is a language education and teacher training provider based in Cambridge. Bell’s Education Programmes department (through whom this project was delivered) also provide educational consultancy services and work with partners around the world to offer teacher training and English language tuition. The main contacts for this project were Kristina Smith (Trainer and Course Developer) and Tom Beakes (Academic Manager for Bell’s Education Programmes). Kristina acted as the main project coordinator for the project.
Brazil consists of five regions, each with its own characteristics. Since 2017 English has been the mandatory foreign language taught across Brazil. The new national curriculum – Base Nacional Comum Curricular (BNCC) – is project-based and needs a good level of English to implement. Although a huge, diverse country, the following features are found across the country: • Public school English teachers often have under-developed English skills • English is generally taught mainly through Portuguese • Public school learners tend to come from monolingual backgrounds and may not see the relevance of English to their lives • Large class sizes and high teaching hours are typical • Teachers are not connected with colleagues across the country unless they belong to a group like BRAZ-TESOL, which most public school teachers do not • Internet availability is patchy, especially in rural areas
3. Outline of the course and rationale Course objective (as agreed with BRAZ-TESOL): to support Brazilian teachers of English with a language level of around B1 at Public Schools to use English more confidently in their classrooms. The course consisted of: • Three two-week blocks of study, with one-week breaks inbetween each block • Approx. 25 hours of study inc. self-study tasks and webinars • Four self-study topics in each block • Eight live webinars on Zoom (six weekly classes, one welcome/orientation webinar and one ‘ bonus’ Carnival webinar)
Partnered Remote Language Improvement (PRELIM) project report
199
