Education
As curtains fall on the 21st Kenya Primary Schools Head Teachers (KEPSHA) annual meeting that brought together more than 15,000 Head Teachers of Public Schools, Education stakeholders are now appealing to the Ministry of Education to leverage technology to disseminate information on the Competency-Based Curriculum (CBC).
Wambugu wa Kamau, a Motivational Speaker identified a communication gap during his visits to schools across the country. Kamau says the information parents expect to get from the Kenya Institute of Curriculum Development (KICD) has not reached them. He therefore turned to social media platforms to educate parents on the new curriculum.
“I urge KICD to use social media and develop programmes to be aired on television to explain to people how CBC works,” stated Kamau. He said that the train has left the station as CBC will be implemented and the country will not go back to the 8-4-4 system.
Julius Muchege, a head teacher at Kieni Primary School, Tharaka Nithi lauded the new curriculum saying it will have a far-reaching impact if it is implemented well. “What we need the most is to be given teaching equipment that will enable us to implement CBC the way it is supposed to be implemented,” he said, adding that teachers need to be retooled.
Another head teacher, Otakamong Mathew from Kakamega County called for the recruitment of more teachers to address staffing challenges. He noted that they are forced to allocate teachers, subjects they have not been trained to teach. Mathew also called for an increase in capitation to primary schools to efficiently run school operations.
Lydia Murei, a head teacher from Nandi County says they have challenges with textbooks, some of which have wrong curriculum designs. “We want one curriculum designs as some subjects were merged,” she said. Bancy Murithi a head teacher from Embu County thanked the government for the new curriculum that she noted will help to nurture the talents of learners at a tender age.
“Though there are some challenges, at the beginning of this year, different learning areas were merged and we didn’t have the designs ready for the same changes,” she said, adding that they strived to use the designs without textbooks. She thanked the government for constructing classrooms to accommodate Junior Secondary Schools.