EARLY GRADE READING INTERVENTIONS AND LEARNERS’ READING ABILITIES IN PUBLIC PRIMARY SCHOOLS IN KIAMBU COUNTY, KENYA

Abstract

The majority of learners in Kenya’s primary school are not able to read at early grade level. With the support of United States Agency International Development and Department for International Development, Kenya’s Ministry of Education came up with the Early Grade Reading Activities (EGRA) with the aim of improving reading in grades one to three. This study sought to investigate the influence of the Early Grade Reading interventions on the reading abilities of learners in public primary schools in Kiambu County. The objectives of the study were: to establish the influence of teachers’ capacity-building intervention on learners’reading abilities; the influence of Early Grade Readtng Activities teaching and learning resources on learners’reading abilities; the influence of monitoring and evaluation on learner’s reading abilities; and the influence of ICT use by teachers on learners’ reading abilities. The study was guided by the Vygotsky’s Socio-cultural Cognitive Development Theory and Holdaway Theory of Literacy Development. It employed the descriptive survey research design. The target population was 26,156 respondants from the 576 public primary schools in Kiambu County. This population comprised 1,408 grade one to three teachers and 24,748 grade 3 learners in the public primary schools in Kiambu County. A sample of 1066 individuals comprising of 57 lower grade teachers and 1009 grade 3 learners were selected using the cluster sampling technique. Questionnaires were used to collect data from the teachers while an achievement test was used to collect data from learners. A pilot study was carried out to establish validity and reliability of the research instruments. Data was analysed using frequencies, percentages, means, and standard deviation while the multiple linear regression method was used to test the relationships between variables at the 0.05 level of significance. Results showed that teachers’ capacity building interventions (β= 0.474, t= 4.055, p= .000) had a p-value that is less than 0.05 level of significance, which led to the rejection of the first hypothesis of the study. These results imply that teacher capacity building interventions have a positive and statistically significant influence on reading abilities of early grade learners in public primary schools in Kiambu County. EGRA teaching and learning resources (β= 0.209, t= 2.263, p= .028) also had a p-value that is less than the 0.05 level of significance, which led to the rejection of the second hypothesis of the study. This implies that EGRA teaching and learning resources have a positive and statistically significant influence on reading abilities of early grade learners in public primary schools in Kiambu County. Similarly, EGRA monitoring and evaluation (β= 0.231, t= 2.295, p= .026) had a p-value that is less than the 0.05 significance level, which led to the rejection of the third hypothesis of the study. This implies that EGRA monitoring and evaluation has a positive and statistically significant influence on reading abilities of early grade learners in public primary schools in Kiambu County. On the other hand, EGRA ICT interventions (β=0.089, t= 0.933, p= 0.356) had a p-value that is less than 0.05 level of significance, which meant that there was no sufficient evidence to reject the fourth hypothesis of the study. This implied that EGRA ICT interventions do not have a statistically significant influence on reading abilities of early grade learners in public primary schools in Kiambu County. Based on the findings, the study concludes that interventions that seek to build teacher capacity, improve teaching and learning resources, and enhance instructional monitoring and evaluation are effective in improving early grade reading abilities. The study recommends that the Ministry of Education should sustain these interventions. However there is need to reevaluate how the ICT interventions were implemented because results indicate that these interventions were not having a significant influence on learners’ reading ability.