My uncle has given me the best gift ever; my 7-year old cousin whom I affectionately call munyo. Everywhere we go, he calls me “mama” and sometimes I forget he’s my cousin, because he feels like a son. We do everything together; I wake him up every morning, get him ready for school, pack his lunch, drop him and pick him up from school, do his homework with him and hug him at night.
I rarely raise my voice at him, but when it comes to doing homework together, it’s always a disaster. He’s in Standard One at an inexpensive private school, which is probably at the same level as a public school, except for his language of instruction is in English. Sometimes our homework sessions end in tears because I get so frustrated that he cannot do simple mathematics or English. How can a child about to finish Standard One not be able to do such simple mathematics? What on earth are our teachers teaching? Are they teaching at all? Or are our children the problem?
In September this year, Uwezo Tanzania released its annual learning assessment Report Tanzania 2010, which has one main conclusion: despite the enormous advances in education made possible by investing trillions of shillings each year, the vast majority of children in Tanzania are not learning. Some of the key findings of the report state that while one in five primary school leaders cannot read Standard 2 level Kiswahili, half of the children who complete primary school cannot read English. Although girls do better than boys, those with educated mothers perform better.
All this is extremely frightening particularly because 43.1% of Tanzanians are between 0-14 years of age. These are the people who will one day decide our country’s policies; these are the future ministers and presidents of Tanzania. This should be the priority of our leaders right now!
I look back at our parent’s generation and I am mesmerized by how they studied so hard and in dire conditions. My mother was the first born, and had to take care of her younger brothers, house chores, cooking, and her studies, and for some miraculous reason, she ended up getting her Master’s degree, the first in her family. Where did she get the discipline to study growing up in those circumstances in rural Tanzania? She often tells me it is my late grandfather who instilled a sense of the importance of education in her, although he himself was not well educated. Many of our parents had thousands of responsibilities and did their homework with a candle at the end of their days, but many of them succeeded despite those challenges.
So, the question is, what are we doing wrong with our children nowadays? Is it us as parents and society that are the causes of this dismal learning or is it our educational system? And since we have identified that there is indeed a problem, how are we going to deal with this?
Undeniably, the problem lays both with us as parents as well as in our schools. As a pseudo-parent, I can see how parents can be too caught up with their lives, the busyness of our schedules, our own worries and taking care of our homes, that our children’s homework does not become a top priority. Unfortunately, the burden falls on women to assist with issues such as homework, but between everything we have to do, we often find ourselves paying little attention to this important task. And for those children who do not have educated parents, this task is unattainable, and our children find themselves doing the homework alone or not doing it at all. Some argue that many students do not live in an environment that is conducive to learning after school; they could find themselves too busy with chores, or may not have the space to actually work. But this reason is not viable, considering our parents had it worse back in the day.
And then there are some who are like me, those who are frustrated that our teachers are not doing enough. When I ask my little munyo, why he does not know the answer, he says the teacher “mwalimu ameandika tu ubaoni lakini hajatufundisha” (the teacher simply wrote the homework on the blackboard but did not teach us about it), and when I say why didn’t you tell him you don’t understand? He looks at me as if I’m stupid saying “Mama, unataka nipigwe na mwalimu? Mimi naogopa!” (Mama, you want the teacher to beat me? I’m scared!)
Clearly, that tells you that our system needs some serious revamping. Some of our children are taught in a fearful environment where they feel intimated and scared to ask questions to their teachers since some teachers have no issue spanking students. But it is more than that. How can we provide primary school education in Swahili and as soon as our children enter Secondary school, they are instructed in English. That in itself is a bigger problem.
Uwezo’s findings clearly indicate that it is indisputable that our educational system needs an in-depth analysis, everything from teaching methods and materials to classroom environment and student assessments. We may be in a race to reach the Millennium Development Goals of achieving universal primary education; but let us remember that it is not simply about providing this education, but it is high time we look at the quality of this education and the manner in which it is delivered.
Learning does not end in the classrooms. Our children are constantly learning. At home, we need to dedicate time (and patience for some of us) to help them with their homework. Parents and teachers need to work hand-in-hand, but before we can even get to that, we all need to get our act together before it’s too late.
Interesting. my first question is this, why doesnt the government work hand in hand with organizations like Uwezo, HakiElimu etc to find solutions to such problems. I am saying this because, it seems like, organizations like Uwezo have done their homework, they have a lot of data, therefore, from their findings, the Government could use such resources to make better policies, decisions etc etc that hopefully will eventually improve the educations system..
This talk of building schools is nice but its not getting us anywhere it seems. Because now its seems to be a trend, with every president when asked about education, the rush to sweet talk us with their statistics on how many schools they have built during their first term & presidency.
It leaves one eager to ask, kwani Serikali kazi yake ni kufyatua matofali na kushughulikia ujenzi? kama jibu ya hili swali ni ndio, basi wizara ya elimu na wizara ya ujenzi ziunganishwe tujue moja.
Going back to the issue of doing homeworks. The traditional family structure has changed and some of the effects of this are evident today, as outlined in this article. Traditional family means, the mother stays at home, soccer moms as they are known in the West. The unfortunate thing in this case is, the more societies become modernized, and life becomes harder, both parents find themselves having to work. Its unfortunate that this structure is slowly changing, because I believe many kids benefited from it and there are those who are benefiting from it today, and I will explain.
The stay home mothers help/ helped their children with everything (homework being an example here), and even if the mother wasn’t educated, at least she saw everything first hand, and started to seek help immediately, like if the child was struggling with his homework, what should be done (attending parents teacher meeting being one of the measures to find solutions to the problem). But today most children find themselves alone because both parents are working, and all they have around is the lady who helps with the house work, who is also most likely uneducated, and has a lot of house work herself, to just sit around worrying about the children’s school matters.
Lastly, the debate about language of instruction should be Kiswahili and not English has been going on for years now. however, this question of why our children are not learning, has a simple answer. The answer is a there is a need for some serious collective efforts, with the Government leading the way/ showing the way, rather than priding itself for doing simple things, coz thinking small has never done anyone any good. Hapa ndio philosophy ya Ujamaa na Ubuntu inaingia sasa, kwani tatizo hili linahitaji applications nzuri za falsafa hizi mbili.
Very true, Bahati. But the question is, how can the government actually do something about it? I mean, they see the reports, they cannot say “we don’t know what is going on” when it is out in the open. What is extremely frightening to me is that nearly half of our population in Tanzania is young people, young students and it is only a small percentage of those who benefit from private education which is arguably better in many cases. There needs to be some kind of “Townhall meeting” with government officials responsible for education. Or else, reports will be published, the media will write about it and within a matter of minutes, hours and days, the story is forgotten. But how can we forget something that involves the future of our country?? I am sure like many Tanzanians our there, there is a great feeling of powerlessness… Even if we did push the government to pay attention to this, I am sure their response will be “We do not have the money to deal with this” – – – yet where does all that money we receive from aid go? What about money from our own industries (like tourism)? seriously, let’s not just stay quiet before it is too late.
What’s funny is that Uwezo uses data found by the Tanzanian government itself. Uwezo breaks this data down and makes it available in a way that makes it easy for laymen to understand.
Ergo, it’s not that the government doesn’t know about these facts. It knows, it just denies responsibility.
So, @bahati @khairoon, how is collaboration with the government possible when the government is in denial?
well, may be voting CCM out will be a good start..hah!!
Unachosema Jack ni kweli nadhani hapa ndipo vyama vya upinzani vinatakiwa kuwa wapinzani kweli kweli kwa kuonyesha mifano badala ya mijadala ya pinzamizi tu bungeni. Kwa mfano, wafanya yale ambayo CCM imeshindwa majimboni mwao. Kama mimi ni mbunge wa upinzani, naweza kukaa na hizi organizations, nikashauriana nao jinsi ya kuboresha elimu katika jimbo langu. Nikifanikiwa, kesho na kesho kutwa nitakuwa na udhibitisho wa kuwa uboreshaji elimu unawezekana lakini ni Serikali ndio imeshindwa kazi.
@bahati kweli, nakubali. lakini kitu kimoja kinanisumbua – hatuwezi kufanya kazi bila msaada wa serikali. does that mean serikali ibadlishe its ways ama sisi tubadlishe vitu vya kufanyia kazi? nafikiri lazima tubadlishe sisi, kwa sababu there are pressures serikalini that don’t affect others, and the “freedom” the others have can be used positively.
Serikali ina jukumu, lakini raia tuna jukumu vile vile.
Hatuwezi kutaka serikali itufanyie kila kitu wakati tushawaona ama hawawezi au hawataki.
Kuna shule ambazo hazina walimu wa kutosha kwa mfano na kwa uhakika serikali haitaleta walimu, kwa nini raia tusijikusanye tukafanya kazi za ku volunteer kusomesha hawa watoto walau kwa masaa machache kwa wiki?
Tungeomba basi hata watoto waende shule Jumamosi, na wananchi wafike pale na kusomesha.
Si kitu cha ajabu, niliona hilo likifanyika kwa shule za Zanzibar. Vikudi vya kujitolea hupita vyuo vikuu kuomba walimu wende kufundisha katika kipindi cha likizo.
Wananchi wanatoa mchango wa malazi, chakula na nauli kwa ajili ya walimu wa kujitolea na watoto angalau kwa kipindi cha miezi mitatu ya likizo wanakuwa na walimu wa kueleweka, huku wananchi wenyewe wakienda kufundisha siku za wikiendi.
Taratibu hizi za kujitolea huwa zinafanywa hata katika nchi zilizoendelea na hufanyika katika nyanja mbali mbali, madaktari, walimu, wapanga miji, mpaka wasafisha barabara.
Nafikiri tatizo kubwa kwetu ni kuwa wengi hatujajua wajibu wetu kwa nchi na tupo tukisubiri tufanyiwe na serikali.
Jack D, I am convinced that the TZ govt. did NOT take part in this study; I went through the list of NGOs on the report intro and didn’t find any govt-affiliated organizations…
Hyperkei, nakuunga mkono. Mpaka watu watakaposhtuka na kutambua kuwa suala la elimu ni jukumu la jamii nzima (mfano, kufuatilia watoto ambao hawaingii madarasani na badala yake kuzurura mitaani sio jukumu la serikali) ndio labda tutaamka.
Jinsi tulivyo… tukiambiwa mtu anafanya/soma PhD, wengi tunacheka kwasababu tunajua kwenye fani husika labda jamaa ataishia kuwa mhadhiri (lecturer) chuoni. Ni jambo ambalo linaonekana ni la kawaida na hatushtuki kabisa.
Kwenye nchi ambazo wanathamini maendeleo walimu ni lulu; wakijua fika maendeleo ya kweli huletwa na ujuzi, utaalamu, na kubadilishana hivyo vitu.
Sasa, hapo ndipo tunarudi kwenye ile hoja ya Jack D — the ministry of education (I didn’t use the capital letters intentionally!) need to discuss with the citizens, NGOs etc, and be honest about the current state, as Roonie mentioned above. If there is no roadmap, a clear goal or vision stipulated by the leaders, how can the citizens organize themselves? It’s possible at university level, lakini kule Ndungu (Upareni) itawezekana? Siwezi nikazuka tu Vikindu na kuwaambia kwenye hii miezi mitatu mi’ nitakuwa nawafundisha hesabu… Nimebadilisha mawazo wakati naandika hiyo sentensi ya mwisho: Nadhani inawezekana, tatizo tunakwepa sana kuitikia wito kama huu.
Kwa hiyo, ni jukumu letu sote. Ndio msaada wa serikali utahitajika, lakini tujaribu kujihusisha na mambo kama haya. Kwa upande mwingine, walimu walioko mashuleni wawe wanaongea na watu, ndugu, jamaa na marafiki. Kuna wakati mwingine, labda darasa/lecture moja tu inatosha kubadilisha fikra za angalau mwanafunzi mmoja.
Lakini sisemi kwamba Serikali na wizara husika waache kutafakari hili suala; wanahitaji kuunda mfumo mpya, kutochanganya elimu na biashara (ndio, wale wanaotegemea tenda za kuchapisha vitabu kila mwaka), kufanya watu wapende kufundisha, na muhimu ni KUWAJALI NA WALIMU WETU — wanahitaji ujuzi, vitendea kazi na nyenzo chungu n’zima. Bila kusahau kuwatunuku wale wanaofanya vizuri…
Kwa kumalizia tu, wakati tunaendelea kujadili hili, kuna kizazi kiko darasani sasa hivi ambacho kitamaliza darasa la saba bila kujua kusoma na kuzungumza Kiingereza cha darasa la pili kwa ufasaha. Kizazi hicho kitajiunga na shule za sekondari hapo baadae ambapo kila somo litakuwa linafundishwa kwa lugha ya Kiingereza.
Pia, lishe bora ni muhimu… Mbona kasheshe? Kuna ripoti nyingine ya kusikitisha kuhusu utapia mlo Tanzania.
Ukitazama matatizo yote tulioyokua nayo kama nchi, mambo mengi sana yanalead to serikali na kazi wasioifanya. It’s a very disturbing fact because if so many countries could get themselves together and get busy and put their citizens first, why can’t Tanzania do it.
Bahati, naona hiyo plan ya kutokuipigia kura CCM is a good plan and as time goes, especially in our next elections, CCM will get a true wake up call that it’s time to get themselves together or else…
Hii issue ya elimu ina so many angles… inabidi uzingatie kila kitu.. jinsi wanafunzi wanavyofundishwa madarasani, quality ya elimu yenyewe, attitude za walimu (which are often affected by their salaries, and living conditions, benefits etc), na kama Steven alivyosema LISHE bora ni kitu muhimu sana.
Yaani naona inabidi tuplan meeting with our govt officials. if only they listened to us…
forgive my mix of english n swahili, i only learnt swahili until darasa la sita kwahiyo i speak better than i write!
Kweli kabisaaaaa, kwenye suala la Wananchi na sisi tuna majukumu. Lakini hata mzazi hawezi kusema, mtoto ajilee mwenyewe, lazima mzazi ampe mwanaye malezi mazuri, hoping kuwa na mtoto atafanya maamuzi mazuri. Point hapa ni hii, sisi kama watoto tunamajukumu pia, kufanya maamuzi ya maana katika maisha yetu, lakini maamuzi hayo hutokana na kuwa tumelelewa vizuri.
Serikali ina majukumu makuu, ya kutengeneza mfumo mzuri ambao utatoa mwongozo mzuri. Kwa mfano, mpaka leo mimi sielewi kwanini tunabishana juu ya suala la lugha ya kufundishia. Hivyo basi, serikali ikifanya maamuzi mazuri na kuboresha mfumo, itarahisisha kazi ya wale wanaotaka kujitolea, itasaidia uelewa wa wanafunzi, na ubora wa elimu yenyewe itakuwa ya mawazo ya kusonga mbele.
Haya sasa, kama hilo tatizo la utapia mlo, hata wazazi mkijitokeza kusomesha watoto, madarasa yatakuwa matupu kwani nani anaweza kusoma na tumbo linalo unguruma, oh wait, mwenye utapia mlo. Mazingira kama haya yanabidi wananchi na serikali zisaidiane. Kwenye sehemu ya njaa, mambo mengi yataathiriwa, elimu ikiwa moja wapo.
Hapo sasa wizara husika ya kushughulikia chakula inabidi ifanye kazi kwa namna moja au nyingine na labda wizara ya elimu kuona. Pointi hapa ni hii, matatizo haya siyo isolated, lakini kila mtu anataka kufanya yake pekee, kufanyaa maamuzi yake binafsi, kana kwamba maamuzi hayo hayataathiri watu wengine.
Thanks Y’all for taking the time to write and discuss about the status of education in Tanzania. Going back to the question “Why are our children not learning”, several factors are at play here. One, the learning activities that are used in most classrooms does not reflect the interests of children. We are still using teaching strategies that are outdated, non-engaging and based on memorization to teach children whose attention span has changed over the years. We cannot continue to teach non interactive lessons, lessons that don’t address children brain development and expect our children to learn. Our colleges “UDSM where are you?” need to do research to find out what actually interests our young people today and develop curriculum that reflects those interests.
Two, we actually have two groups of students in Tanzania: those that attend English medium schools (the very minority) and those attending regular education (the majority). The facilities difference between the schools is quite staggering. The ones attending regular education schools have no books, teaching aids, dilapidated teaching environment, and have teachers who are ill prepared to teach the courses their supposed to teach and no professional development opportunity for them to become proficient educators. I always ask myself why we entirely depend on the people who failed to teach our kids. Failures produce failures in my book.
Three, the fact that students are scared to ask questions in class is very troublesome to me. Teachers are supposed to be facilitators of children’s search for knowledge. It is the duty and responsibility of each teacher to encourage children to ask questions, to guide children in their thirsty and hunger for knowledge. How are children going to learn if they do not have the opportunity to ask questions? What type of citizens are we producing? Citizens who cannot ask? Analyze?
To counteract these issues, the government needs to be at the forefront. The government needs to develop goals on how our educations system should look like for the short and long term. Without a plan, it will be impossible to measure if our education is actually addressing our needs for the short and long terms. The government needs to develop a vision of what the education system needs to look like. To develop competence levels we should expect at each level of education. What a standard seven leaver needs to know and do? What a form four leaver need to know and do and so forth. Yes, citizens are to be involved in these changes….but the government needs to be a leader. It is shameful that the government has failed to lead in this front.
Just to add to the above discussion…..
In my views, the age factor need to be seriously evaluated. Standard seven leavers are indeed too young to participate meaningfully in any civil and citizenship responsibilities i.e. getting a job. I certainly believe that raising the end of school age…to form four for all will adequately help to give our youngsters enough time and growth physically and academically to participate fully in their nation building. How to get there i.e. the money factor and the school structure need to be discussed openly. We are indeed leaving a whole generation of talented Tanzanians behind. I was one of those persons who passed standard seven alone in my school and I don’t believe that I was the smartest of them all. I have no idea of where my standard seven friends are right now….it is a shame that I left a lot of them behind to fend for themselves at the age of 13-15.
Does anyone know what is the income difference over a life time for primary school leavers and secondary school leavers in Tanzania? Maybe this question will help in formulating policies that would allow for secondary school education for all youngsters in Tanzania. In terms of the Environmental issues, there are several ideas that could be ideal for Tanzania. The issue of using solar cooking pans could be explored fully as it has a potential to reduce deforestation caused by fire wood and charcoal use in Tanzania. Yes, the technology is cheap and it has been documented to be easily adaptable in an African setting.
So I posted a comment last night and due to a weak Internet connection, I lost everything. I will try to remember what I said but I think this is the jist of it…
Thanks for posting this Roonie, it’s amazing that in a time where many countries have embraced ideas like “investing in our future”, “children are the key to sustainable development”, “save our children,” “leave no child left behind” etc etc. governments have viewed education as a statistic rather than an investment. It is like a bad joke.
It is striking how bad things have become especially in the current environment where the Millennium Development Goals (MDGs) were reenergized at the United Nations in September. The MDGs are useful because it provides countries with a blueprint towards development and prosperity and it rightly puts education as a goal in itself. However, I think governments have missed the ball. Universal primary education is great, but it’s only a start. Unfortunately governments have run with it and only stop at the doorstep. In the grand scheme of things, universal primary education can be easy.
I’m currently doing research on gender equity and education in Kisumu, Kenya and what I see there is basically a microcosm of the problems in education in Kenya, Tanzania and Africa. When governments institute free education for public primary schools you obviously have higher enrollment levels. The problem is quality and not quantity. Like Roonie has mentioned, quality of education is what is really important. It’s great if you have high enrollment levels for boys and girls in public primary education, come 2015 governments can check off the universal primary education goal off a list but what happens afterwards? We all know how important secondary education is when it comes to investing in our own future. How do we manage this when most kids drop out before secondary education and when girls (in Kisumu) drop out of secondary school? Governments need to look harder at the quality of education, the quality of teachers, infrastructure and sustainability. If they don’t, we will just have a lot of kids in primary education but with no real education…just a statistic.
I think most of us were lucky because our parents believed that education, not to be cliché, was the key to our future; knowledge is power. Education, for our parents, was the cornerstone of freedom and a good life. Education was the key to decolonization and they saw how important it was and made sure their children understood what it was. What is education for us and how can we translate that to our kids and the kids of tomorrow?
Apologies for this essay!