KWENDA SCHULENI

Visiting the schools 

As part of my education-based mission, I have been visiting our different partner schools  to introduce myself to the headmasters and teaching staff, as well as observe lessons and teaching methods. Based on these observations, I was able to assess the needs and develop two training programs for the teaching staff. 

Our partner schools are Mukambi, Eschimuli, Khaimba and Khabakaya (Primary Schools), as well as Ebubere and Khaimba (Secondary), and Rise & Shine School for special needs students.

I was lucky enough to receive a lovely welcome in all schools and to observe a lot of different topics in different levels.

Some of the classes I attended were science, Religious studies, chemistry, English, Kiswahili, social studies, and ECD, Early Childhood Development. A great opportunity for me to get an overall idea of how lessons are conducted here, what type of methods are being used, how teachers communicate with students, what type of materials they use, and so on. 

The main thing that comes to my mind after all my visits is that it takes a lot of courage to be a teacher in Kenya ! Classrooms are often packed, more than 40 to 50 studends in Primary, and 90 in ECD ! Ninety 3 to 4 year olds in one classroom make for a happy mess, even if teachers are quite reactive and have it under control. The other thing is resources ; as a teacher in Europe, I’m used to having all the resources I want, and diverse and fun materials, enough for all students, ect… Here, the only material available is the blackboard. Most students do not own a copy of the text book, they have to share it with other schoolmates. Pens and pencils are scarce, and very often there are only a few color pencils available for the whole class. 

Anyways, back to the purpose of my mission; there are many different areas that could be covered in terms of teacher training, so I had to decide what would be most beneficial for the schools and students. 

The two topics that I chose are : 

- Safer school environment based on the child-friendly school approach

- Maximising student engagement by using active learning techniques

The first topic is based on UNICEF's child-friendly school initiative; the program contains a lot of different guidelines and subjects, but after witnessing some violence-related incidents at school, I decided to focus on "creating a safe learning environment", including gender-based violence, health issues, and developing child-confidence. 

This topic is to be handled cautiously and bearing in mind the cultural gap. Although corporal punishment is illegal in Kenya, it is still frequent and accepted in schools. Children get caned for poor grades, missing school, or graver issues. Yet most teachers and headmaster know beating a child is unacceptable; because of that, talking openly about it is quite complicated. People are reluctant to talk about it, and even more so with a Mzungu (white person) who knows nothing of Kenyan ways and therefore cannot understand. I am still in the process of figuring out how to efficiently communicate with teachers and reach them on this subject. 

Otherwise, for everything else that is included in a "safer learning environment", schools are usually quite aware of recommendations, although it is sometimes hard to put in place. For example, a Child-friendly School would require separate single-sex toilets for hygiene and girl protection; most schools can barely afford to build enough toilets for all the students, so the idea is appealing yet unrealistic. 

The second topic focuses on methodology and teaching ideas; from my observation, Kenyan schools are mostly using lectures as a pedagogical approach. There is no or few time given to self-reflexion and understanding, rather repeating and learning by heart. Students rarely work in groups or pairs, limiting brainstorm and assimilation. 

Studies on education and learning process show that the information assimilated by actually thinking and understanding is 3 times more likely to be remembered on the long term. Active learning promotes recall and deeper understanding of material, as students are engaging with the content rather than simply listening and repeating it. 

It was honestly a challenging issue to tackle. Most teachers here agree that the Kenyan curriculum and methodology is based on lecturing, but they don't necessarily see the problem with that. Without understanding why lecturing and one-way teaching is not the most efficient way for students to gain and retain knowledge, it is therefore complicated to understand the importance of engaging the students. At first they mostly see the challenges; loosing class control, loosing time, having to prepare a lesson plan... Yet I had the pleasure of seeing through discussions and brainstorm the beginning of a change in the mindset. Obviously one training is not going to change their approach entirely, but it's a first small step. 

Overall, conducting such trainings is very interesting and pleasant, as I get to exchange and share ideas with the school staff, and they seem genuinely implicated (expect that one time a teacher asked if they were going to get paid at the end of the training, and when I answered no, she left the room 👍). The question mark remains as to the long term efficiency of such trainings; I hope to conduct at least one reinforcement training and some monitoring activity before I go in March, but such an important and complex topic should be covered regularly to reinforce good practices among teachers. 

Finally, aside from observing and training staff,  I had the occasion to get active with the students quite quickly. I was asked to conduct sessions in different schools with class 6, 7 and 8 on the empowerment through education, and HIV/AIDS and early pregnancy prevention. I was also able to participate in Lower Primary and ECD classes, allowing me to practice my Kiswahili and exchanging with the learners.

All of these experiences were a great learning process for everyone, myself included, I feel very privileged for having the occasion to share with teachers and students from Kenya !