Does Olato Sam know what he is talking about?

Feb 21, 2016 Letters

Dear Editor,
On January 29, 2016 the Chief Education Officer (CEO), Mr. Olato Sam held a meeting with all primary school head teachers in Berbice. A few things were said at that meeting that I acquiesce with but at the same time those things said were contradictory to the requirements of the Officials from the Ministry. Mr. Sam said “teach the pupils and not the curriculum”.
I agree with him fully. However, these very pupils that we were told to teach are being tested at a national level based on curriculum regardless of their learning abilities. The slow learners, average and high flyers are being tested with a National Examination based on the curriculum. How then can we teach the learners and not the curriculum? In this case there is no need for Curriculum Coverage in every classroom. In my opinion, teaching and learning is all about meeting the needs of every learner. Whenever the ministry assesses a school based on performance they do so at National Examinations and will so determine whether a school is considered to be a low performing or a high performing one. Isn’t this contrary to what the CEO was saying? He went on to say “Why teach new things when children did not grasp the previous concept ?” Again, I agree with him. In that way learning will be inevitable. On the other hand, when the Education Officers visit schools and find that the schemes do not correlate with the weekly journals they are ready to bombard the teachers whose schemes do not correlate. For example, a teacher plans to teach “Multiplication “ on the first week and “Division “ the second week. However the first concept was not grasped by most pupils so the teacher works with what the CEO said, then in his/her journal for the second week you will find the first topic repeats itself. These officers questioned that. They want to see the correlation of schemes with journals. This again is contrary to what the CEO said as mentioned above. Headteachers were asked by Mr. Sam at another forum about the contributing factors for the failures of our children. They said “parental involvement “. I think this is indeed one of the contributing factors among many others in the failures of our children. In his response, he said, “do what you are being paid for six hours a day”.
Did he tackle the issue of parental involvement in his response”? Certainly not! Most times these officials would not listen to what the classroom teachers have to say since they are in authority and will so dictate the orders hence, our pupils suffer. The classroom teachers know of the problems they are being faced with at present in the education system and should therefore be heard. This does not happen. Officials would tell you they were once classroom teachers and know of the problems well. I ask the question, how long ago that is? Would that help to resolve the current issues faced within the classrooms by these teachers? I would like to call on the Minister to have regular meetings with the classroom teachers and listen to their concerns so that we can take this system forward and continue to mould the nation’s children.
Primary School Teacher.

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