Method

Constructivism Theory

Our educational system is based mainly on the Constructivist Theory and socio-cultural theory of the educational philosophers Dewey and Vygotsky. According to these theories, the student has an active role in his learning process and constructs knowledge from his experience.

Constructivism recognizes the student’s uniqueness and encourages him to contribute to the learning process and reach his own version of truth. At the same time the student in our school is trained to recognize his personal responsibilities to the small community to which he belongs: his English, French, German, Italian or Spanish class.

Blended Learning

Blended Learning – Flipped classroom: It is a new educational model that offers many advantages such as:

  1. The active participation of students
  2. Providing initiatives and interaction of class members in conjunction with the development of autonomous learning

Bloom’s Taxonomy 

The flipped classroom is a form of Blended learning that is based on Bloom’s Taxonomy

Lower Order Skills at home                      Higher Order Skills in class

Higher order skills = students discuss, analyze and evaluate in class with peers and teachers                                

Lower order skills = students need to learn basic things and remember to do things at home and then go to the classroom for higher order skills 

CONNECTIVITY the magic word for flipped classrooms (reverse class) this concerns and makes it difficult for the majority of teachers. We want students, the tasks they remember and understand at home to be able to apply, analyze, evaluate in the classroom!

Here the role, the personality, the relationship, the enthusiasm, and above all the consistency and reliable monitoring of the teacher is everything!

Teaching Method of our School- the same for all 5 Languages

Dual Method

The teaching method in our school is called Dual Method according to which the British or native speaking teacher together with Greek teachers undertake the teaching of all grades. Native speaking and Greek teachers share the same class and each has specific roles. The benefits of this combination are huge! For example, the authentic pronunciation and culture, the practice of oral and written speech with the native speaking teacher in combination with many other activities with the Greek teachers.

How British teacher trainers evaluate our School

Dear Agnes,

The following points emerged during our conversation yesterday and therefore they are still fresh in my mind. They are clear indicators of the culture at the Katsianos school. The points are not in any particular order of importance.

  1. During our conversation you brought up the concept of the child’s identity. A framework against which you benchmark is Howard Gardner’s Nine Types of Intelligence. Children at your school are encouraged to think independently. This is done through the development of their critical thinking skills and not by imposing knowledge upon them. You encourage the child to be self-motivated, never through the use of coercion. In the school the staff are there to support the child. This is on all aspects of the child’s life – a practical example is the remedial classes you offer which you mentioned yesterday.
  2. High quality teaching can only succeed through high quality personal engagement between the teacher and the pupils and I am sure that is the philosophy of your school.
  3. The fact that you don’t change books every 6-7 years is different from common practice where schools change every 3-4 years. As you say, that’s because you create a wealth of material around them. To me this indicates that you steer clear from an over-reliance on course books. You personalize your materials, bringing variety and new items that work for your pupils. I would imagine all these materials are tried and tested, so their success is more or less guaranteed. This emphasizes the importance of tailor-making the teaching that you offer, so that you offer the best.
  4. I was impressed that you make a point of nurturing relationships with the state school language teachers. That indicates that in all areas you encourage collaboration, and not confrontation nor competition. This encourages a more serene and productive learning environment.
  5. The importance of values (cooperation, compassion, respect, etc.): this clearly indicates you have “higher” aims in your teaching. As you indicated during our meeting, your aim is indeed to teach English but even more importantly, the aim is to create whole children, who have a balanced, happy personality, who can be creative and interact well both at school and in the family and develop skills which will be useful to them in their future lives. And this can only be done when you stress the importance of values.
  6. The fact that you yourself are studying for a PhD is of key importance: this is related to the concept of lifelong learning. It means you are always open to new ideas, to making changes/improvements to what you already know, to have the humility to say “I could know more”. This also allows you not only to review but also to refresh the way you do things. With adults the idea of challenging one’s assumptions, which is what lifelong learning is all about, is unfortunately all too often lost; they like to get stuck in their ways, not budging from their comfort zones. The concept of continuous learning connects appropriately to that of personal creativity (that is, the need to constantly recreate ourselves). Indeed this is what lies at the heart of the minds of children, your primary stakeholders.
  7. The above point is also linked to your emphasis on continuous teacher training with your teachers. Schools in Greece who invest in training their teachers are a mere handful. To quote your words, “I’m not looking for experienced teachers, I’m looking for experts” – you want them to be at the cutting edge of ELT. By doing the PhD they will see you as their role model for so that they can also become experts. Role modelling is one of the key aspects of successful leadership.
  8. I imagine that you make a point of ensuring that all your teachers are right behind you on all the above. I imagine you place great emphasis of having them as a “corps de ballet”, so that whether you are there or not, they speak with one voice on things like key values, classroom methodology, child development, etc. I imagine you have a flat structure to help you manage more effectively, which means that any teacher with an issue (methodology, assessment, discipline, etc.) can come directly to you for advice, and not necessarily go through intermediaries. That enables you to have direct influence over the school’s shared values.

To conclude, from my personal experience of knowing you for so many years, I believe the cultural paradigm of the Katsianos school includes all the above. A good simple definition of the word culture is “the way you do things” and I’ve listed a few items which describe this.

As you mentioned in your email, different schools have different philosophies. I reiterate, for most schools unfortunately English language teaching remains too much of a business with the priority being sadly just to make money.

The word which has been constantly coming to mind as I have been writing this piece is mission. For you the school is very definitely a mission, with an intense sense of passion permeating everything that you do. That was reiterated yesterday when, touch wood, you said your aim is lead the school until you are 85!

 

Best Regards,

F.B