About

The aim of the English and New Competencies for Ukrainian Reformed School Education (ENCOURSE) project is to empower English language school teachers to meet the requirements of the New Ukrainian School (NUS) reform, utilize the new Upper Secondary School Standards, and introduce practical approach to development of mediation skills in teaching and learning of English as a foreign language. 

Supporting role

The reform of Upper Secondary School education is a final stage of the large-scale NUS education reform, in which the British Council has played a supporting role since 2018. We stepped in and together with our partners trained 17,000 primary school English teachers in 2018. Between 2021 and 2024, more than 12,000 English teachers of basic secondary school completed professional development courses on the British Council Online Teacher Community platform.

New initiative

Our new initiative, the ENCOURSE teacher professional development course aims to address the needs for professional development of teachers in Upper Secondary School. The ENCOURSE is contextualized with Ukraine’s situation as has been developed both with help of the UK expertise in English language teaching and input from the Ukrainian context.

The course content is based on the combination of mediation competencies, learner-centred and communicative learning and includes extensive opportunities for learning and development, practicing, and reflecting.

Essentially, learners play an active role in teacher development on this course. At a specific stage of the course, learners are involved in experimenting and gaining new learning experience in their classrooms which, in its turn, helps teachers better reflect and develop.

Implementation

The British Council piloted the course in November 2024 with two groups of teachers from Dnipro and Vinnytsia. According to the pilot results, the course was positively perceived by both teachers and their learners.

Since the pilot, the British Council has already delivered ENCOURSE to 400 teachers. The training took place both in person and online, depending on the security situation in the region, and was split into two Cohorts, conducted in February-March and April-May 2025, respectively.

Capacity-building training of master trainers to prepare future trainers and participants for the ENCOURSE October, 2024

Capacity-building training of trainers to deliver the ENCOURSE to English language teachers

 November, 2024

Round table: ‘Professional development of teachers: professional interaction and development of new competencies’. 
Project presentation.
Meeting with the Ministry of Education and Science of Ukraine, rectors and methodologists of the regional INSETTs.

 November, 2024

ENCOURSE piloting in Vinnytsia and Dnipropetrovsk regions (face-to-face and online)

 November-December, 2024
Cohort 1 delivery (18 regions of Ukraine are taking part) Ferbruary-March, 2025
Workshop for the INSETT methodologists March, 2025
Cohort 2 delivery (18 regions of Ukraine are taking part) April-May, 2025

Professional workshop on mediation under the ENCOURSE project at the “Teachers of the Future” educational festival

 June, 2025
Four-day workshop for ENCOURSE project trainers August, 2025
Cohort 3 delivery (25 regions of Ukraine are taking part) October-November 2025
Cohort 4 delivery January-February 2026

  • The course used real, practical tasks to help teachers practice mediation. For example, they worked on activities such as amplifying, streamlining texts, adapting language, and collaborating in groups, etc. The course successfully addressed a gap many teachers face today – helping them respond to the growing need for developing mediation skills in their students. (Liudmyla, Kyiv)
  • The topics met the needs of teachers, they were eager to learn more about TBL lesson planning and deepen their knowledge on formative assessment. (Oksana, Kyiv region)
  • Based on my experience delivering the course to three groups, a consistent pattern has emerged from participants' expectations. During the introductory sessions, the participants consistently expressed interest in several key areas: understanding what mediation means in a teaching context, designing and delivering lessons incorporating mediation competencies, and developing approaches for assessing mediation skills. Additionally, there is a strong interest in the practical application of Task-Based Learning (TBL), with participants wanting to understand how to design and teach lessons using the TBL structure and gain more profound knowledge about the TBL framework itself. This recurring feedback across all three groups indicates that participants seek theoretical understanding and practical implementation strategies, particularly around the intersection of mediation competencies and TBL methodology. (Iryna, Odesa)

  • The course really helps to see how mediation works in the classroom through real examples and clear strategies...Mediation is no longer just a concept from CEFR descriptors. I see it as a practical, dynamic skill that helps learners bridge gaps: between languages, between texts and audiences, between ideas, and between people. (Teacher, Kharkiv region)
  • The modules are planned very thoroughly to help participants be engaged in all activities to achieve the objectives successfully. (Teacher, Chernihiv region)
  • ...the most valuable aspect, in my opinion, was learning how to support students in handling different types of tasks independently, while also fostering their imagination and critical thinking. It has been a breath of fresh air for my lesson planning. (Teacher, Ivano-Frankivsk region)
  • The strategies of this course are practical and applicable beyond the classroom. They can be used in parent-teacher conferences, and in collaboration with colleagues, promoting a more cooperative and collaborative school culture overall. (Teacher, Poltava region)
  • The course content was highly effective—clear, well-structured, and relevant. It balanced theory with practical activities, making it easy to apply mediation skills in real-life situations. (Teacher, Cherkasy region)
  • The course content provided a strong foundation in mediation competences with clear explanations, practical strategies, and real-life examples that I could immediately apply in my teaching. The balance between theory and practice helped me understand both the why and how... The materials were well-structured, easy to follow, and supported meaningful reflection. (Teacher, Dnipropetrovsk region)

  • One of the quieter students took the lead in editing the video, a skill that hadn’t been visible in previous lessons. His confidence and initiative surprised me and his peers. (Nataliia, Ivano-Frankivsk region)
  • I have already brought TBL to my classroom and saw how my students were engaged. They revealed that this approach was new for them because they started with a task and then went on to discover some language issues. In addition to that, I have already tried mediating concepts during our SWITLO meetings when my colleagues had to figure out which type of motivation was described while working in small groups and relying on their prior knowledge. (Maksym, Volyn region)
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