What next with these changes in curriculum?

What you need to know:

When the new education policy was announced in 2014, there were many things that caught the eye and one of those was the reduction of the duration a child would be required to attend primary school, from seven to six years.

Earlier this year, the government through the Ministry of Education, Science, Technology and Vocational Training announced major changes in primary education curriculum.

When the new education policy was announced in 2014, there were many things that caught the eye and one of those was the reduction of the duration a child would be required to attend primary school, from seven to six years.

As part of the sweeping changes the number of specialized subjects too, were trimmed down from eight to just three for Standard I to III pupils and now they will have to make do with Reading, Counting and Writing.

Reasons for the change remains as mysterious as its implementation as odds continue to rare its ugly heads against what seems to be a complete overhaul especially after years when successive surveys showed that children were not learning.

A certain survey even indicated that some children completed primary education without having the basic competences.

Evaluation is another issue that is causing a stir as the children unlike in the past will not do examinations, instead some continuous assessment shall determine who will be eligible to join secondary education.

There are those who argue that there was not enough room given for consultation on what was wrong with the previous curricula, whereas some say it was more about the pupil teacher ratio.

A simple survey carried by Success shows that, given the status quo of the education system in Tanzania, the changes came at the wrong time as the changes are likely to create more challenges than solutions.

Stakeholders in the education sector says that, committing to the new changes required enough time to create a room for engagement among educators and the ministry of education on the impact of the changes.

Ezekiah Oluoch, the Tanzania Teachers Union General Secretary who is also education expert says that, he can’t find another word that befits the impending situation other than a crisis in the making.

According to him the new changes will bring a lot of challenges in the education sector three years to come when the first batch of the pupils complete their primary education at Standard VI.

This to him wasn’t thoroughly thought out because the ministry of education came up with a decision without involving education experts who are in a position to overlook and assess the impact of any sensitive decision that can affect education system in the country.

“In order for Tanzania to record success in the education sector the Ministry of Education should work closely with the education experts who can translate any change in the curricula before the government undertakes its implementation,” says Oluoch.

Through the education law which was enacted in 1978 and amended in 1995, it is advised that every education minister has to form a technical council of education experts that advises the minister on any decision he has to make and present its pros and cons before the ministry makes any public announcement.

The advisory council has to only work for the period of three years and a new one has to be formed.

“Surprisingly, apart from Margaret Sitta none of the ministers has ever taken trouble to form the advisory council since Tanzania got its independence. This is probably because she came from the Tanzania Teachers Union and she was among other people who wanted to see that council up and running. However, the council couldn’t survive after three years,” says the outspoken teacher.

Other educators corroborate Oluoch’s sentiments saying the new policy is likely to pass on graduates who lack a solid foundation from primary schools and therefore creating fresh problems in the education sector.

Adrian Banyukwa the Head Teacher at Patmo Junior Primary and Nursery School sees the challenges as grave given the fact that very few teachers are trained on how the they are going to deal with the changes.

This according to him has been made difficult for the teachers as there are no clear guide lines on how to implement the new curriculum.

“At my school we were told to only take one teacher for the training who after that was supposed to share the knowledge she acquired with fellow teachers. Worse still none of the trainers has visited the school to asses if what she learnt is working with other teachers,” says Banyukwa.

He sees a challenge in the feedback channels as there is no clear accountability on how the trained teachers are supposed to relay their experiences and how the trainers are supposed to find out if at all what they were doing as exactly as they were told.

“In other words the challenge is not easy to even try to think on the best way to address it if we will have to implement the new changes. As if trainings for the teachers is not enough new books that goes along with the new curricula are not yet at the schools until now while mid-term examinations are approaching,” adds Banyukwa.

Scolastica James is one of the teachers who was selected by her school to go for the training on the new curricula changes, she too, believes the challenges that await are grave.

According to her the changes might bring a lot of complications to the private schools as most of the private schools use English as the medium of instruction.

“The new changes that force us to only teach three subjects might also collide with the English medium schools to use Kiswahili from standard I-III however I don’t see that happening,” says Miss James.

She says that, the new curricula changes will allow pupils to leave their classes at 11:00 am and not 03:00 pm.

That will force private schools to create extra curricula studies to compensate the remaining time so that transport schedule goes smoothly.

The government doesn’t allow trained teachers to move from one school to another for the period of two years to make room for other teachers to learn more from her with the new curricula but still just one teacher is not enough to introduce the skills to the entire school.

Leonard Akwilapo, Deputy Permanent Secretary from the Ministry of Education (Primary School) was quoted as saying pupils who started their primary education in 2015 are the ones who will start with the changes.

He also said that, they have trained two teachers from each school.