Shocking report on literacy levels in schools

By PETER ORENGO

Imagine your child who has completed Standard Eight cannot comfortably read a storybook meant for Standard Two pupils. That would be a shock!

Well, if not in your household this scenario could be happening in your neighbourhood or village.

If the findings of a new study released yesterday at the Kenya Institute of Education are anything to go by, Kenyan parents and Education officials have something to worry about.

The study faults the methods used by teachers who have concentrated on making children pass exams rather than helping them actually learn.

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This finding could shake the trust in the education system and pours cold water on success of the Free Primary Education programme.

The findings of a study conducted by Uwezo, a non-governmental organisation that has been collaborating with the Ministry of Education, puts Kenya’s education system in the spotlight with some shocking findings that a child can go through the motions of completing Standard Eight but cannot read a book meant for Standard Two.

The findings paint a grim picture of the state of literacy and math skills of children in Kenya.

It also points out that children in private schools acquire skills better that those in public schools.

Northern Kenya Development Minister Mohammed Elmi, who launched the report Thursday, said the findings reveal what other studies have failed to do.

"Education is fundamental to the quality of our national life hence it is critical that we understand the true impact of our investment," said Elmi.

He said most researches do not reveal the true state of affairs in different regions in the country.

"As minister for arid lands where conditions are rarely reflected in national data, this study has revealed what provincial-level data has always concealed," said Elmi.

The minister said the education system should change focus from "schooling to learning".

The study found that children attending private schools to be better grounded in basic literacy and numeracy.

The researchers used English, Kiswahili and Mathematics for Standard Two to test the ability of children between the age of six and 16 on reading and arithmetic skills.

The organisation embarked on the study last year and visited 40,338 homes and tested 104,472 children before coming up with the findings.

Pace-setters

In its first key findings in the Annual Learning Assessment Report 2010, titled Are Our Children Learning? it says two in three children in Standard Two cannot read at the required level, while worrying numbers of children in older grades cannot comfortably read books designed for Standard Two level.

Of the children who participated in the countrywide assessment, 86 per cent were in public schools while 9 per cent study in private schools.

Despite the availability of universal primary education, five out of 100 of all children aged 6-16 years still don’t attend any school.

This was blamed on unpredictable reception of free primary education funds and timeliness of the fund, especially in the North Eastern Province.

However, the report says arid districts were pace-setters in pre-primary enrolment. At 94.6 per cent, Samburu Central recorded enrolment three times higher than Kakamega’s 38.7 per cent.

The reports provides worrying signs of schools that lack books and sufficient teachers, of poor attendance and dropouts as well as children who finish school without the basic essentials of literacy and numeracy.

"The disparities across the country are very large; while some districts do reasonably well, many others, particularly in the arid districts across the North of the country, have unacceptably low levels of learning," said Rakesh Rajani, Head of Twaweza East Africa, formerly the executive director of Haki Elimu.

The Minister also said a system of static schools was incompatible with the way of life hence it is time Kenya made radical changes to the education system.

And despite the Education Ministry’s ban on extra tuition, the culture was still entrenched in the primary school system where it starts as early in Std One, both in public and private schools. Parents who wanted their children to excel mostly pay this for.

Nationally, seven out of 10 children covered in the study could read short sentences in Kiswahili while six in every 100 could not even read a syllable.

Central Province children were best in Kiswahili followed by Coast, while Western province did poorly.

The most interesting finding of the study indicated that mothers held the key to literacy and numeracy.

In all districts, children’s literacy competence increases with mother’s level of formal education.

Kenya Primary School Heads Association (Kepsha), chairman Joseph Karuga blamed lack of professionalism in education and slow pace by policymakers to change with the times.

"Facts and figures don’t lie. At the moment we are just manufacturing our students to get ‘As’ but not giving them an education. We need to radically change our system if we are to catch up with the rest of the world," said Karuga.

Kenya National Union of Teachers (Knut) Secretary General Lawrence Majali said the issues of accessibility, equity and equality should become the key when enrolling children in schools.

"There is need to closely follow up on performance at every stage to ensure consistent acquisition of both skills and knowledge especially at the early stage of a child’s schooling," said Majali.

He said targeting children at age three to 16 is crucial because it is the time when issues of enrolment, retention, dropout and competence take shape.

Knut urged the Government to take the report seriously and act on it to the letter.