ABU DHABI // There can be few UAE schools established as long as Al Rabeeh School that have only had one head teacher. Jane Kadri, a British expatriate, has run this private English-curriculum primary school in Abu Dhabi since she founded it in 1979. She has seen her "baby" grow to the extent that there are now nearly 900 pupils, almost 90 per cent of whom are Emirati. Mrs Kadri said that, 30 years ago, she could never have imagined Al Rabeeh would expand as much as it has.
"It was obviously my baby, but my baby has grown up and therefore in effect it's no longer my baby. It's an entity on its own," she said. Just as the country has changed dramatically over thee decades, so have the attitudes of parents, whom Mrs Kadri said were now much more closely involved in their children's education. "At first it was a case of putting their children into school and leaving them, but now they all realise how important education is. They can make appointments and we have two open days a year," she said.
Teaching methods had changed too, Mrs Kadri said, with less of an emphasis in today's classroom on just passing on information. "It's not a question of sitting the class in front of you and teaching page one. There's got to be understanding of the children and the class and their ability," she said. The school, which begins with two kindergarten years and takes youngsters up to year six, is split into four "houses", each containing youngsters from the various years.
In keeping with the UAE's characteristics, these are named petroleum, palm, falcon and, of course, pearl. All lessons, apart from Arabic, Islamic studies and UAE social studies, are taught in English, and Mrs Kadri said the aim was for children to be bilingual. "I have seen year four children who can read the newspaper in Arabic and English," she said. Just as the teaching methods have changed, so has the technology used in schools.
Every teacher must be computer literate and in recent years the school has invested heavily in technology. Mrs Kadri, who has lived in the UAE since 1969, insists this must not be at the expense of traditional skills, though, so there are two well-stocked libraries and pupils can borrow books. As with many schools in Abu Dhabi and Dubai, space has placed a limit on growth. To ensure none is wasted, the school has a playground on its roof where children can play basketball and table tennis.
"A lot of parents are very keen for us to expand into a secondary school, but the problem is the land and the building," Mrs Kadri said. The school prints its own text books to localise what the children learn, allowing it to teach subjects such as UAE history and culture instead of British equivalents. Being at arms length from Britain's education policies also brings advantages, according to Gillian Thorp, one of two deputy head teachers.
"We watch the changes in the UK and we have the freedom to take the best of them. Sometimes things are introduced very quickly in the UK only to be changed," she said. Hugh Carey, the other deputy head teacher, said being in the UAE, where the compulsory testing of young children carried out in the UK does not occur, meant the school did not need a curriculum that was "driven by results". "It's driven by children's development. We're not constrained by league tables," he said.
"We encourage the children to look at their own history, their own heritage. We encourage them to be aware that they're going to be citizens of the UAE and going to be the decision makers." @Email:dbardsley@thenational.ae
