Education Focus Magazine MarchApril Edition (2) compressed - Flipbook - Page 27
COVER STORY
There have been cases where the KICD changes or
overhauls textbooks in the same academic year
leaving parents complaining that they have not been
given adequate time to buy the new books. Parents
have also complained that they are wasting a lot of
many due to the constant and unplanned change of
textbooks, leaving the old ones useless.
Teacher-learner ratio in schools has emerged as a
major challenge in the implementation of the CBC.
This has been complicated by the government policy
on 100% transition
. Classes are now holding large number of pupils, a
scenario in which the teacher finds himself or herself
burdened by the workload. Ideally CBC requires
teacher-learner ratio of 1:20. The current ratio is 1:56
which makes it near impossible to implement the CBC.
On January 7th 2025, data from the TSC indicated that
despite efforts to recruit more teachers, a shortage of
72,422 teachers still remains. The TSC has been trying
to alleviate this problem by hiring teacher interns but
this has also faced headwinds
with the hired interns demanding that
they be placed on permanent and
pensionable terms, a situation that
demands huge allocations in budget to
the TSC. The government is currently
faced with budget deficit and hiring all
the teachers required will be an uphill
task. The end result of the low teacherpupil ratio is that the teacher is left
overwhelmed by the workload with the
resultant effect that teaching and
learning is compromised.
ICT infrastructure and skills is another
challenge facing the implementation of
CBC. On January 7th 2025, Education
Cabinet Secretary Julius Migosi
Ogamba noted that currently there is an
ICT infrastructure shortfall of 7,801 ICT
laboratories. Currently teachers are
required to upload learners’ marks using
computers.
Education Cabinet Secretary Julius Ogamba plants a tree when he presided
over the Homa Bay County Education & Prize Giving Day at Tom Mboya
University. Mr Ogamba inspected the construction of a Grade classrooms.
Teachers need to be equipe with the knowledge
and skills needed to effectively integrate ICT into
the teaching and learning. The main challenge in
integration of ICT in CBC is that it requires facilities
such as power, computer devices, software and
connectivity. Not many schools in Kenya are
connected to the main grid especially in the farflung corners of the country. Many teachers lack
the proficiency to use computers effectively for
teaching. There has not been a deliberate effort to
train teachers in ICT and
the few who have to use computers depend on the
general knowledge of computers that they have
acquired from self- training.
CBC requires clear assessment standardization.
Assessment in CBC is expected to be both formative
and summative in gauging learners progress
continuously and over along period of time. Lack of
clear assessment and standardization has hampered
the implementation of CBC. As mentioned elsewhere in
this article, most teachers use end of lesson exams to
grade pupils because they feel challenged in designing
and preparing a CBC test. Lack of clear criteria for
assessment is likely to bring about biased assessment.
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