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Context

Learning to teach Reading and Mathematics in Africa: Exploring the nexus of training and practice TPA /FICEA project funded by Hewlett Foundation. Context. Rising numbers in schools - need for more teachers. Importance of early grades to avoid drop out and ‘silent exclusion’

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Context

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  1. Learning to teach Reading and Mathematics in Africa:Exploring the nexus of training and practiceTPA /FICEA project funded by Hewlett Foundation

  2. Context • Rising numbers in schools - need for more teachers. • Importance of early grades to avoid drop out and ‘silent exclusion’ • Reading and mathematics as basis for whole curriculum • Are our children learning: PASEC, SACMEQ, UWEZO, EGRA?No - not many • Is teacher education making a difference?

  3. ITE Curriculum and Primary Curriculum Documentary analysis ITE in action Questionnaire (n=4699) Observations followed by Trainee focus groups and tutor interviews Newly qualified teachers Questionnaire (n=1079) Observations followed by Interviews with teachers Design and methodology Ghana Kenya Mali Senegal Tanzania Uganda

  4. Initial Teacher Education counts Reading Mathematics Has the strongest impact on NQTs’ practice

  5. Curriculum delivery raises questions about efficiency and costs Teaching undertaken in relatively large groups (eg. TTR Senegal = 92 / Mali = 60) Not enough time and opportunity given to learning to teach reading and maths in contexts which allows for practical hands-on learning

  6. Training induces misplaced confidence • Teaching by formula – universal answer unresponsive to context and children. • Criterion for the good lesson – performing the magic formula – is carried over from training to school I am now able to go to class and teach properly … now I know the procedure (Kenya Trainee)

  7. Teaching practice does not deliver the practical skills needed We have the ability to teach mathematics grade 1 and 2: the problem is that during teaching practice we are not accepted to teach in these grades (Tanzania Trainee Focus group)

  8. School curricula in advance of ITE curricula • New competence or outcome-based curricula • Learner-centered and material-rich approaches • Expectations for pupil progress: ‘pupils should be able to read a text silently within a specified time, with correct pronunciation, stress and intonation and answer simple questions’ (Ghana, grade 3) • Not studied in ITE • Tutors are not up to date with new requirements • Trainees & NQTs unprepared for new approaches and expectations

  9. Foreign Languages? • Not confident in own language • Having to teach in an unknown language • Recognition of English / French as foreign language

  10. Learning to teach maths missing essential elements • Concrete materials in teaching strongly valued • But, connection between concrete materials and maths concepts not strongly made in teaching - quick movement to abstract work

  11. Concrete materials not working!

  12. Teachers do not learn to teach reading for meaning • Children progress to higher primary grades unable to read lower grade texts fluently and with meaning (UWEZO and EGRA) • NQTs focused on syllables, words and sentences not linked to fluency or reading for meaning • NQTs and trainees found text level work the most difficult to teach: Early readers need to be trained in systematic reading; they can start with letters, words, pictures, then later for upper classes stories could be introduced (Uganda tutor)

  13. Examples of good practice? • Awareness of difficulties in L1 to L2 transfer • Wider range of approaches to word level, eg. synthetic and analytic • Wider repertoire of participatory methods with good classroom management • Faster cognitive pace and sense of progression • Use of teaching aides integral to concept taught • Pupils differentiated, diagnostic assessment • Team teaching in TanzaniaWho does this? Some experienced teachers in East Africa, exceptional NQTs in Senegal and Ghana.

  14. Recommendations:Practice based ITE curriculum • Design coherent, intensive programmes • Retrain tutors to use these programs, and give them access to primary schools • Work with trainees in smaller groups • Study the primary school curriculum • Highlight language demands on children • Reschedule the practicum

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