–spearheads phonetics workshop for Linden nursery school teachers

NURSERY school teachers in Linden were on Monday given a crash-course in phonetics, in the hope of equipping them with the necessary skills to teach their young charges to read effectively.

The training programme, called ‘Reading Revolution’, was hosted by Linden’s First Lady, Ms. Nikosa Holland, who explained that as a mother of four, she became concerned about the reading programme in the community’s public schools.
The idea of having the workshop, Holland said, came about after she noticed that her third son, who, unlike his two older siblings, was attending public school and was lagging behind with his reading.

“I became passionate about this, because I kept getting information from teachers and from parents that reading is not really striving in our school system,” Holland said, adding:
“What is missing is that they have been taught, but not reinforced.”

The programme, which catered for 60 teachers, was facilitated by Ms. Helen Beresford, a retired teacher renowned for teaching phonetics and her teaching skills in general, and Ms. Gloria Britton, a former headteacher and education stalwart in Linden.
Holland believes that having a foundation in phonetics will help teachers do a better job at teaching children, especially preschoolers, how to read.

“Nursery is the most important level when it comes to reading, because children are more sensitive at that time; they learn quicker at that time,” she said, “and when they grasp the concepts, they are able to master them so that by the time they get to Grade I, they can decode any word using the tools.”

The teachers were encouraged to share the skills imparted to them with the other teachers at their schools. Partnering with Ms Holland for the success of the programme was also Mr. Edmond Braithwaite of Banks DIH Limited.