Abstract
This paper presents a case study of a competitive debate program designed for teachers-in-training at the Basic Education College in Kuwait. Stakeholders at different levels have expressed an interest in introducing more constructivist-based pedagogies into the Kuwaiti national education system, but institutional and ideological challenges have hindered implementation. Teachers at the college designed and implemented a debate program based on constructivist principles of authenticity, student meaning-making, collaboration, and high performance expectations. Survey data suggest that participants experienced debate as a transformative experience, changing their perception of themselves, of the world, and of their ability to effect change in it. Participants came to imagine themselves as future system leaders preparing future generations with higher-order skills involving complex solving, which an increasingly complex social reality demanded. From 2015 to 2018, a group of professors formed debate teams at the Kuwait University National English Debate League. This endeavour formed the empirical research presented here as evidence to support a move from instructivist teaching to constructivist learning for future teachers in Kuwait.
Highlights
Training Teachers for the Kuwaiti ContextLike other Gulf Cooperation Council countries, Kuwait is a small but global society, with a minority population of Kuwaiti citizens living among a larger population of residents hailing from, or otherwise connected to, other countries
The Kuwaiti economy is likewise international, with most of its revenue coming from the export of petroleum products and the import of internally traded goods and services through commercial networks spanning the globe
From the mid- to late-twentieth century, petroleum provided the financial means to rapidly improve the standard of living for Kuwaitis, including the extension of free, universal education
Summary
Training Teachers for the Kuwaiti ContextLike other Gulf Cooperation Council countries, Kuwait is a small but global society, with a minority population of Kuwaiti citizens living among a larger population of residents hailing from, or otherwise connected to, other countries. From the mid- to late-twentieth century, petroleum provided the financial means to rapidly improve the standard of living for Kuwaitis, including the extension of free, universal education. Educational leaders across the globe have been forced to rethink how best to prepare students for a world in which information is copious and free, whereas the ability to sort, evaluate, synthesise, and effectively act based on that information is in high demand. What is clear is that traditional educational systems, focused on the memorisation of raw information, provide students with information that they could access elsewhere, while failing to challenge them in the application of higher-level critical and creative skills necessary to contribute meaningfully to an increasingly complex world. This research acknowledges that while the ‘well-formulated, teacher directed, didactic learning’ of instructivism has been of benefit to our learners, for students to reach a globally recognized potential in problem-solving and knowledge creation (Bereiter, 2002), constructivism’s ‘student-centered forms of instruction, including social, situated, knowledge creating, and intersubjective’ (Porcaro, 2010), will support
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