The 3rd in our series of programs for the school was focused on the Teachers of the Collegiate and Primary school. The program titled “Teachers make a difference – from good to great” endeavoured to focus on teaching with “heart and soul”. It was the day before the 3rd term commenced viz. 3rd September 2012 when almost 125 teachers came together at the Assembly hall of the collegiate school at 8.30am. It was the first time the teachers were about to follow an ‘Outbound’ training program with Mr. Namal Heenatigala as the Resource person, assisted by Mr. Ajith Kumara and Mr. Gamini Bandara.  The program embraced a new dimension of training very common in the corporate word – thinking out of the box as opposed to the normal class room type instructions.

After the Welcome address by Rev. Sr. Shermila Jayawardena (Principal, Collegiate School) an outline of the PPA ‘Student and Teacher Development Program’ and an introduction to Resource Persons was given by Dr. Nirmala M. Pieris, President, PPA. The Resource persons then took over with a short inaugural address and exercises on developing Effective Communication skills.

The program progressed with a number of action packed, strategy based team games in which the players were introduced to the essential aspects of Teamwork, Leadership Development, Problem Solving, Innovation and Motivation.  The competitions included, the Signal game, Balancing nails, Lion hunter, Through the rope, Interactive ball passing and Egg wrapping. Each of the activities had a specific message for the Teachers to understand the children for whom they were responsible as well as to appreciate each other. The program was an ideal platform for: a) Seeing things a little differently with a new perspective b) Handling change optimistically c) Building trust between teachers and) Appreciating each other's differences and strengths.

From the comments we received at the end of the ½ day program the training was an enormous success with a unanimous request for more such programs in the future.  The entire program was facilitated and finance by the PPA.

Resource Persons Profile

Mr. Namal Heenatigala - B.Com (Special) Degree, University of Sri Jayewardenepura
Diploma in Human Resource Management, Diploma in Psychology
12 years experience as a Outbound trainer who has conducted about 250 three day Training programs as well as nearly 100 one day Workshops

Mr. Ajith Kumara - Foreign trainer (India)

Mr. Gamini Bandara - Foreign trainer (Singapore)
NMP
11092012