Part 2: Reflective Conceptual Journal

Journey Through 8-4-4

   1. Experiences as a Primary School Pupil - Nyagondo Primary School

1.1. The Curriculum Content and Pedagogy

Nyagondo Primary School is a mixed day Public School in the Western Parts of Kenya. During my 8-year stay in the school, the curriculum and teaching styles were fixed and similar to any other public primary school in the country. The teachers would come to class and sing all the content to us, as we listened motionlessly the whole time. Sometimes the 35-minute lessons felt like forever as the Geography, History and Civics teacher went on and on about how the world is part of a solar system or what the country has achieved since independence or flew like 5-seconds when the Mathematics teacher was singing the beautiful song of algebra and arithmetic. I was so in love with mathematics that when, in Class 5, the teacher asked the class to memorize the whole multiplication table in one week, I managed to do memorize and sing it in two days.

Mathematics, Science and languages were always accompanied by homework which was not a problem at all to me. The problem was, however, the note-taking that came with Science and GHC (Geography, History and Civics). We always had to copy loads and loads of notes after every lesson as there was not enough coursebooks for all the pupils in the Classes. Teachers would sometimes write the notes on the chalkboard as we copied them in our books or they would leave the notes with the class prefect to write on the board for other students. I honestly did not love so much the stress placed by teachers on memorization and passing exams but who was I to oppose what the most learned people in society had established as best for us. 

The focus was so placed on passing the National Examinations that my headteacher (who was also our mathematics teacher in class 8) promised a handsome reward (Ksh. 200) for any student who scored 90% or more in mathematics in the KCPE Exams (Needless to say I managed to score 92% in the KCPE Maths exams but i´m still awaiting my reward)

1.2. Discipline and School Attendance

I was always one of the few ´good´ students throughout Primary School (as I was hardly ever caught napping in the classroom). The teachers were particularly strict on school attendance and time keeping. Registers were marked by the teachers themselves strictly on daily basis and absence from school had better have a strong excuse or your tiny bottoms would be whipped silly by every teacher present in the staff-room when you are summoned there. 

The good boy I was (😉) was never caught in the crossfires of ´hell´. The faces that came out of the staff-room after someone was served their strokes told a non-amusing story. Some faint hearted chronic absentees even opted to drop out of school completely in fear of the hell-house that the staff-room had become. 

Discipline was not solely left to the teachers, though, as the parents were equally stern when it came to bad behavior. You were completely finished when it so happened that the teacher reported your misbehavior to the parent. Luckily for me, the one time i tried to ´grow some horns´ and refused punishment from the prefect for coming to school late, the Principal was ´kind enough´ to serve me with a few (8) whips of the cane. 

1.3. Performance and Selection 

In my Primary School days, progress through classes was based on the performances in the end of year exams. I was lucky to never have been in the rat-race for selection but it was always sad to see a friend forced to repeat a class because he failed to pass in the end year test. The performance at the end of every term would be announced in a special closing assembly and best performers called forward and offered presents like mathematical sets and books while the students at the bottom of the class lists were called forward and scolded. I would only think to myself of the torture those bottom students endured. Just because some of us memorized the science, language and GHC notes and passed meant we were always better than them? I did not think so! But still we kept memorizing and passing and gaining teachers´ praise, and they kept falling on the other end of the list and growing in contempt for us ´clever´ lot.

2. Experiences as a Secondary School Pupil - Nyagondo Mixed Day Secondary School

2.1. Increased coverage and an end to Multiple-choice exams

2.1.1. More Subjects

The first shocker on us as soon as we began studies in high school was the increase in the number of subjects from five up to eleven. Science was split into Chemistry, Biology and Physics; Geography and History were learnt separately and several technical subjects were introduced into our syllabus. 

2.1.2. End to Multiple-choice exams

The real kicker was, however, when we did our first exams and realized there were no multiple choice questions. This change in learning and examination style hit me real hard and I found myself languishing in the 31st position for the first time in my school life. Dad was not impressed. You are never comfortable around your African parent when he´s not impressed. Mum was sent with the chilling message that went something like "I´m not paying all that money in school fees for some hopeless piece of work" (the yearly fees was only an equivalent of 200 Euros guys for crying out loud😩). 

2.2. Improved learner engagement in teaching

Our participation in the classroom teaching increased as teachers included us more in the teaching process. We were encouraged to ask questions in class, respond to teachers´ questions and engage each others in group discussions. This improved my interest in literature as it basically involved airing our views based on the experiences gained through the education process. I was so much of an active participant in the class discussions and arguments as well as the school debates that my absence in the argument situations was always greatly missed  (well, I think so). The more I engaged in the learning process, the more i realized I understood the content in the area. My favorite subjects were now increased from Mathematics and science to Mathematics, Science and English Literature.

2.3. Social aspects of Education

One of the subjects on the School timetable was life skills education which was basically concerned with educating us on the effects of the deviant behaviors associated with youth. Though non-examinable, life skills was a must-attend lesson and the class teachers were in charge of the lesson with support from the counselling department. Though most of the talk about HIV/AIDS, drug abuse and hygiene diseases was found comedic by students at first, they were actually really helpful in the long run as we learnt to avoid preventable diseases and deviant behavior (well, mostly).

2.4. School Governance and Fee payment

When it came to school governance, we always knew the bus stops with the Principal who was ´worshiped´ by all students as he represented everything scary and fearsome about the School. Mr Musolo knew he was so intimidating to us that he would regularly come up with big and random adjectives, some that don´t even exist in the English language, to express the extents of the potential punishment for any aspiring ´goons´. We occasionally saw a group of respected old people meet in our school once or twice in a term and were told these were the `Board of Governors´ for the school. We had to be in our best behavior when they were around.

 
3. Experiences as a University Student - Kenyatta University

Back in Secondary school, teachers told us to read hard and pass well in order to go to the University and have fun there. Apparently according to them Universities are not places for ´reading´. I thereby did everything humanly possible to go to this place where people are called students yet they don´t read all those books; and guess what.... I made it to the University. 

3.1. Governance and University Structure

As opposed to Secondary and Primary schools where we often had direct contact with the Principal and all teachers, access to the dean of my faculty was practically almost impossible. The communication channels were too complex and structured for my liking. The lecturers were only available during lectures and official consultation hours. Seeing the Vice Chancellor was as difficult as seeing the President himself, needless to say i never had a close-up meeting with Dr. Olivier Mugenda through my five-year stay at Kenyatta University😒😒. The students also had their own share of bureaucratic framework that was headed by the President of the Student Union. The Union leaders were annually elected on a highly charged political process that often left the school highly polarized. 

3.2. Assessment and Grading

Kenyatta University Class of 2015

The assessment system in Kenyatta University involved 1) a series of continuous assessment tests 2) take-away assignments, 3) Practical Reports (for students like myself that took science programs) and 4) high-stakes end-of-semester sit-in examinations. The end of semester examinations counted for 70% of your final marks. All the others were combined to form the remaining 30%. The pass mark for the courses was always 40% and that was not meant to be a problem to such elite group of scholars, right? Well, wrong.. A good group of students often found trouble passing courses, cheating in exams and even (in rare cases) suffering exam-related mini-seizures. I was enjoying the learning however and had no problems not only ´passing´ the exams but passing handsomely.


3.3. Student Freedom and involvement

Just like we were told from secondary school, University education came with more freedom of choice on life decisions. You were a few hundred kilometers from your strict parents and could afford to mess around a little. This was however a new opportunity to take more charge of your decisions and life. Student self-regulation in the learning process was also encouraged by the teachers and group-work and task sharing were highly advised. 

 

Goodbye 8-4-4:  Joy of the Final Exam