Tanzanian
students sit a few national examinations to progress through their schooling
and it would be fair to say that their government is not satisfied with the
pass rate. For reasons I won’t go into here, I had an interest in schools and
their academic performance. But of let me say, change is one of the constants
in life and I am only reporting on what I saw in rural schools at the time I
was there. I have known some students who excelled under the system and others
who did not, which may well be the case anywhere. Intellect and diligence are
not always the main factors in pass rates, the daily lives of individuals has perhaps
more of an impact.
‘Saa
moja’ - one o’clock, they call seven
o’clock in the morning, because it is the first hour of sunlight. Daybreak, and
sunset, are abrupt in the tropics, and that alone is a factor! In the morning there
will be a small fire going with water boiling as mother makes tea. It is not
always possible, but the tea will be half milk and sugary. There may be uji – a
thin millet or maize flour porridge, but only if the ingredients are available and
so often they are not. There might be some roasted peanuts. During hard times,
there may be nothing for breakfast!
Most
will have a toothbrush and toothpaste, but if not twigs are used – some of the
trees we planted around schools suffered from being stripped for teeth cleaning!
Water would have been collected the night before, but after cooking the evening
meal, the water has to be rationed for bathing. Time in the ‘the place of
bathing’ depends on pecking order, but it is done out of a plastic bucket or
similar container. The amount of water varies with availability and most
usually it is cold.
A
lotion, or Vaseline is applied to make the skin shine and to protect against the
low humidity and dust that dries the skin, causing cracks. Dressed in school
uniform and shoes that have first to be at least dusted off. The child may have
a long walk to school, five kilometres is common. The monitor class is required
to be there as early as 7:30am to clean the classroom and the school yard. With
no brooms available, twigs and brush are used – the tree plantings again
suffered – and the dust raised, sticks to the lotion or Vaseline and is
breathed in.
During
the rain seasons, of which there are two, if banana leaves are not available
for makeshift umbrellas, the kids are soaked and sit in a cold classroom most
usually with no glass in the windows. So combined with this and the dust it is
no wonder there are chest problems. But on hot sunny days, the roofing iron
radiates heat. There are no ceiling boards because if there was, over time, the
gradual dust buildup would cause them to collapse. So the classrooms can be
stifling and a poor learning environment – which is why we promoted trees to
offer shade.
There
are times when students are required to work in the school grounds;
cultivating, planting/sowing seed and harvesting either beans or maize.
Sometimes the harvested grain is used to feed the kids at lunchtime, but more
usually it is shared among the teachers because there are times they have to
wait for their wages and anyway their earning are low. I recall one time when
the students spent the day squashing army worms with their feet! Army worms are
actually caterpillars and will eat any vegetation, they arrive in plague proportions,
much like locusts! So while the squashing was a reaction, in fact it did little
to stop the plague. The school is also required to supply water to the
teachers’ accommodation and that means the kids have to cart it and sometimes
from afar!
At
lunchtime there may be a meal; sponsored by some organisation, or utilising
crops grown at the school, sometimes the parent will work collectively, other
times the students living nearby may go home for lunch but very often there is
nothing! During drought times I have interviewed students and found that on
average they went totally without food for three days and after the three days
a half-glass of water mixed with a mashed banana was their only sustenance.
After
school there are chores to do, and traditionally boys do different work to
girls, but if the family doesn’t have the sex mix, the jobs still have to be
done. Firewood has to be collected for the cooking fire, water carried, dishes
washed from the previous evening meal, feed for the cow or goat has to be
collected for those who have zero grazed livestock otherwise shepherding animals
so they have full bellies for the night, cleaning out the animal pen and fanya usafi – make clean (the house).
Darkness
descends at 7:00pm (saa moja jioni – one o’clock, evening) and most usually
there is no lighting! Of course some have electricity, a few kerosene lamps,
while others use candles but a majority only have the cooking fire. We were
1500 metres above sea level, 3.3° south of the equator and 450 km from the sea,
so the evenings could cool down considerably. The fireplace was therefore the
focal point with the evening meal being eaten at around 9:00pm. So homework?
Difficult to find time and difficult to complete in the dark. Reading the same,
but no worry, there are no books!
Teaching
standards were variable, especially so in remote schools, where there was
difficulty in finding teachers prepared to go there, and those there, didn’t
really want to be there, so the standards suffered. Primary schools are taught
in Swahili with English as a subject but most schools suffered from a lack of reasonable
English teachers. Secondary school on the other hand is taught in English so
the students tend to struggle. Teachers wrote lessons on the blackboard, and
not being strong English speakers they made errors. Students copied those
errors and made errors in tabulation as well! I once translated a year’s worth
of Agriculture notes in exercise book from English to Swahili but the errors
were not language only. The student passed the exam!
Regardless
of teaching standards, the curriculum standards are high. Three English
secondary teacher graduates found they could not teach senior students
curriculum maths at the local secondary school because the standard was beyond
them!
The
average student can speak three languages; Swahili, their own tribal language
and that of a neighbouring tribe. The majority nowadays have at least a
smattering of English. Despite a lack of resources, and the many factors
against them, including a lack of the common experience richer countries’
students may take for granted, the Tanzanian students I interacted with were
intelligent and somehow happy.
