A report on annual learning assessment on literacy and numeracy in East
Africa prepared by Uwezo in 2014 revealed that two out of three Standard
Three pupils did not have Standard Two literacy and numeracy skills.
PHOTO | FILE
What do you make of this?
“That
day I was on school the car was on road left the women who was talking
would of the headteacher the become one best teacher on school there
people of school was come at road beside.
The woman who was talking was
be a country school our school become position one the teacher and
pupils happen a but out school on one good name the parents my heart was
come run our education is one very good education.”
In
case you are wondering what it is all about, the above is an excerpt
from a 2013 Kenya Certificate of Primary Education (KCPE) candidate’s
composition. The task was quite simple: The candidates were given the
beginning of a story and were expected to use their imagination,
literary and literacy skills to come up with an interesting story. The
above candidate scored a dismal two marks out of a possible 40. The
examiner noted in their footnote that the candidate “hardly communicates
anything. The language ability is minimal”.
The
examiner did note, however, that the candidate could correctly rewrite
some of the words used in the rubric (the beginning of the story) as
well as shape most of the letters well.
In
contrast, the most highly rated composition, which won the examiner’s
heart and earned an impressive 38 marks, was so well written and
coherently structured that it is difficult to believe it was written by a
Standard Eight pupil. Sample this:
“The
interior had elegant seats upholstered with high leather covers and all
first-class trimmings you can expect in a Mercedes C-Class...I let out a
stentorian scream which cut through the air like knife in butter.”
The
obviously impressed examiner lavished praise on the writer of this
composition. “The level to which English idioms and vocabulary are used
is commendable,” said the footnotes.
FREE EDUCATION
The
few errors did not prevent this composition’s entry into the bracket of
the best compositions for the year 2013, the footnotes said.
The two candidates described above represent the disparities in literacy levels among primary school children.
Studies have consistently shown that literacy levels among primary school children are steadily falling.
A
report on annual learning assessment on literacy and numeracy in East
Africa prepared by Uwezo in 2014 revealed that two out of three Standard
Three pupils did not have Standard Two literacy and numeracy skills.
It further noted that one out of four Standard Seven pupils did not have
Standard Two literacy and numeracy skills.
The free primary education
introduced in 2003, which led to increased enrollment, had the
counter-effect of compromising the quality of education as the
teacher:student ratios went up considerably. PHOTO | FILE
While
these levels vary between children in public primary schools and those
in private schools, the different studies generally indicate that
children in primary schools are struggling, not only to read and write
English, but also to express themselves adequately in the queen’s
language.
The fact that primary
school children cannot read and write English the way they are expected
to is testimony to the challenges faced by primary education in the
country. The free primary education introduced in 2003, which led to
increased enrollment, had the counter-effect of compromising the quality
of education as the teacher:student ratios went up considerably. The
biggest casualty of the low quality of education have been the lessons
that involve skills such as reading, which require lower teacher:student
ratios so that teachers can take time with their students. With one
teacher serving a large number of pupils, most teachers are overwhelmed
when it comes to introducing basic literacy skills such as reading
English.
Add to that the fact that
the curriculum at the lower primary school level is overloaded and you
will realise that the children barely have time to develop critical
foundation skills such as reading and comprehension.
“One
of the issues we want to address is the question of reducing the
workload at the lower primary school level to create time for developing
foundational skills such as literacy,” says Dr David Njeng’ere, the
senior assistant director at the Kenya Institute of Curriculum
Development.
But before we can even
conclude that Kenyan primary school children cannot read English, let’s
ask one vital question. Which language should be used to introduce
literacy to a child? Should it be a foreign language or the child’s
mother tongue?
A look at global
language policies indicates that best practice suggests that countries
should not introduce literacy in a foreign language. In other words, it
is less effective to introduce literacy, the concept of reading and
writing, to a child in a foreign language. This is pegged on the
principle of moving from the known to the unknown, which means using
mother tongue to introduce the new concept of reading, and subsequently
teaching another language.
LANGUAGE BARRIER
“Children are, therefore, confronted with two challenges: An unfamiliar language, and a reading challenge,” says Dr Njeng’ere.
Reading
is about decoding symbols. It is tough decoding symbols in a language
you do not understand. Which is why the government adopted the policy
that reading should be introduced to children using mother tongue.
“Studies
—including those by the United Nations Educational, Scientific and
Cultural Organisation (Unesco) — have shown that the best way to
introduce literacy to a child is using their first language, but people
think that the best way to introduce literacy is using English,” says Dr
Njeng’ere.
It is less effective to
introduce literacy, the concept of reading and writing, to a child in a
foreign language. This is pegged on the principle of moving from the
known to the unknown, which means using mother tongue to introduce the
new concept of reading. PHOTO | FILE
Unesco’s
2014 Education for All Global Monitoring Report gives an example of a
successful programme that was implemented in Viet Nam under the Primary
Education for Disadvantaged Children project. Vietnamese, the language
of the Kinh majority, is the medium of instruction in primary schools in
that country. However, it is not the mother tongue of the 53 other
ethnic groups. That means that children in remote, single-ethnic
minority communities who are taught in Kinh have difficulty grasping
what they are taught.
As a result,
Viet Nam recruited 7,000 local bilingual teaching assistants in 32
provinces to support ethnic minority children from isolated communities.
The assistants helped the children prepare for school through early
childhood education activities for two months before they joined
Standard One and provided additional instruction after they joined
school, including help with learning Vietnamese. The programme began in
2006 and by the time it was completed in 2009, it had reached more than
100,000 children.
It was noted that
the Standard One pupils in schools that had participated in the
programme scored between 20 per cent and 30 per cent higher in reading
and writing as well as shape and number identification than children who
had not.
Parents in Viet Nam also
became eager to send their children to school, knowing that they would
have somebody who understood their language and culture. As a result,
there was an increase in both enrollment and attendance.
The
same Unesco report observed: “To ensure that children from ethnic and
linguistic minorities acquire strong foundation skills, schools need to
teach the curriculum in a language the children understand. A bilingual
approach that ensures continued teaching in a child’s mother tongue
alongside the introduction of a second language — ideally throughout
primary school — can improve performance in the second language as well
as in other subjects,”
Closer home,
in Cameroon, the language of instruction in primary schools in the
north-west region is English, which is unfamiliar to both the children
and their parents. Between 2007 and 2012, 12 schools in the region used
the local language (Kom) as the language of instruction for standards
one to three, only switching to English in Standard Four.
Results
from standardised tests showed that children taught in Kom performed
much better in both reading and mathematics compared with those who were
taught in English only. The children who were taught in mother tongue
built strong foundational skills, and these findings showed the
importance of continuing mother tongue instruction alongside other
curriculum subjects.
In
multi-lingual contexts such as Nairobi, where it is difficult to settle
on an indigenous language, the lingua franca of the catchment area
should be considered.
Further, few primary schools
have reading materials that can help sharpen reading skills and improve
literacy; is currently, only two per cent of Kenyan primary schools have
libraries. PHOTO | FILE
But
despite the government policy and numerous studies showing that
children respond better to literacy when it is introduced to them in a
language they understand, schools — especially those in areas — still
introduce literacy in a foreign language.
Further,
few primary schools have reading materials that can help sharpen
reading skills and improve literacy; is currently, only two per cent of
Kenyan primary schools have libraries.
Reading nurtures skills such as creative imagination, critical thinking, and most importantly, literacy.
Consequently,
a shortage of reading material to help develop children’s reading
skills is manifested in poorly-written compositions like the one quoted
at the beginning.
********
FYI
About Uwezo
Uwezo
(capability in Kiswahili) is a five-year initiative that aims to
improve competencies in literacy and numeracy among children aged
between six and 16 years in Kenya, Uganda and Tanzania by using an
innovative approach to social change that is citizen driven and
accountable to the public.
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