Fund Isaan at Surindra Rajabhat English Camp for Freshmen 2017

In november 2016 Fund Isaan asked an education specialist to assess the level of English teaching in the Isaan region. Surindra Rajabhat University and Fund Isaan worked closely together during this project. One observation was that by the time students complete Mathayom 6, their last year of high school, they still have only very basic English skills. A lack of proficient English language skills by the teachers at secundary school attributes to students’ low performance. Students are taught to memorize vocabulary and grammar, but they are not shown how to use the language in practice. This puts the university for a major challenge. As an action point it was agreed to organize an annual camp for Freshmen at the beginning of the academic year to give them a quick refresh of basic rules.

In late June, between 19-23 of June 2017, the English Camp for Freshmen was set up for the first time at Surindra Rajabhat University. The camp primarily aimed to teach the Bachelors of Arts (B.A.) who enrolled at university for 4 years (English Communication). The university prepared the materials for the camp, while a Fund Isaan volunteer assisted the faculty and acted as a sounding board to assure English was spoken at all times and major pronounciation errors were corrected.

The camp took place over a period of four days, in the theater building on the campus. The lesson plan was mainly focused on a refresh of basic grammar rules. However, all the activities were aiming at making students apply these rules during conversations rather than on pure theory. The camp activities consisted of fun games, group activities and role plays.

We believe that our students finished the week with a better grasp of the English language and a sense of accomplishment after completing the activities. We helped them learn and develop new activities to make teaching more exciting and educational for the students with listening, speaking, and writing activities as well as English games and songs. The camp has been very successful and we are confident that the teachers and the students enjoyed it very much.

Special thank to the Head of Foreign Language Program, teachers and staffs at Surindra Rajabhat University who made this happen. It was an excellent opportunity for the students to get inspired to learn English and have a lot of fun learning with our Fund Isaan volunteer and experienced native English speaking staff from the United States!

As this was the first time Fund Isaan and Surindra Radjabhat University organized a camp together our founder, Rony Wuytjens, was the volunteer on duty !