Report from March 2014, written by Teacher Margaret
We greet you all our partners and friends.
We are nearing the end of the first term and are preparing for the end-term exams which will start on Monday next week. Schools will be breaking for the Easter holidays next in April. We shall break for the same holidays on the 9th of April 2014 and report back to school on 5th of May 2014.
The school calendar
The country’s school calendar is divided into three terms a year and thus three breaks. First term starts in January up to early April, and then we break for Easter. Second term begins in May up to early August when we also take a second break. Third term begins in September and is also the shortest term because we break for Christmas holidays in November. First takes duration of 14 weeks. Learning starts immediately after opening day though most children do not report to school until the second week.
Syllabus activities
In lower Primary classes and the Pre-school the syllabus is inclusive of the following activities:
Language activities
This includes oral activities where children learn skills such as listening skills. They are also taught how to imitate sounds, tell news, tell stories, sing simple songs and make simple requests. The teacher uses story books, charts, flash cards, and any teaching aid that is appropriate for the activity.
Reading readiness activities. The children are taught how to observe pictures and objects and how to sort and match pictures and objects by looking at them and picture reading. They are also taught the names of pictures and objects and their colors. The teacher then can assess if they are able to recall what they have seen and learn. Mostly this takes minimal writing.
Writing readiness activities for the small children and beginners, the skills they learn for writing readiness are scribbling, drawing, modeling, colouring and tracing. This enables them to exercise teir finger muscles. They use crayons of different sizes and colours, charcoal, chalk, stones, sticks, pencils, papers and pictures.
Oral activities. They learn storytelling, reciting of the letters of the alphabet, responding to requests, passing simple information and singing.
As the children progress in growth and advance in classes, the same language activities take place but of course they become a little more advanced step by step.
We also have mathematics activities where children are taught 1, classification, 2, numbers and 3, measurement. These activities include sorting and grouping, matching and pairing, rote counting, measuring sides of objects, measuring weight of objects, measuring volume of small containers and surfaces of objects. These activities also advance with the age of the children.
We also have outdoor activities which start with warm-up exercises. The first activity in this area is body movement. Currently our school just takes our kids to the field for play because we don’t have the apparatus like swings, slides, tunnels, see-saw and balance beams. At our school we use ropes, balls, and bean bags for our outdoor activities. Games and dances also take place during the activities.
Science activities are also part of what children learn in schools in Kenya. They learn names of parts of the body, of animals and plants, the environment, classification of specimen of animals and plants, sorting and grouping, experimentation, observation and field excursions. This is where the kids are taken for field visits.
Social activities are also taught. This includes the topics family members, our home (food, utensils used at home) domestic animals and work done at home.
Creative activities include modeling, painting, printing, colouring, tracing, drawing, pasting and sticking, tearing and construction.
More activities that children learn are religious education, music and movement and life skills development. All this activities are divided into lessons and also allocated specific time. All teachers have timetables which guide them in teaching. This helps them to achieve the intended objectives.
We follow the handbook for early childhood development education syllabus which comes from the ministry of education.
Foodprogram
As we reported last month the porridge for the kids during break time has come a long way into helping the kids concentrate in class because they are not hungry. Thank you to all those who have enabled this.
Our plans for the project and mostly for the kids are still on and we hope to achieve them one by one.
Your help, comments, advice or thoughts that would go into the progress of the school is most welcome.
Thank you very much for your continued support. We value you so much.
