Abstract:
Education in Kenya requires rethinking as the country prepares to face the demands of transformations of the 21st century. The first general objective of primary education in Kenya states that primary education should provide the learner opportunities to acquire literacy, numeracy, creativity and communication skills. There is evidence from research reports that the objective has not been fully met. A number of learners go through the primary school course without having acquired the basic literacy skills while the focus of the country is to develop a knowledge economy grounded in research. The objective of this study was to identify the cause of that scenario so that it could be addressed. The methodology adopted was document analysis and survey research design. Syllabus and course books were analysed and it was established that they contain sufficient content and recommended skills and teaching strategies that could develop learners’ numeracy and literacy skills. A total of 75 teachers from five counties across the country were purposively sampled and were observed teaching and 93.3% of the teachers observed used teacher centred teaching learning approaches with little learner involvements, rote and teacher directed questions and answer when teaching and 61.4% other teachers indicated that they used lecture methods. The majority 60(80%) used teacher - learner interaction in class and controlled student participation. Only 1(1.3%) teacher was rated ‘good’ in use of teaching learning resources, while 34.6% others were rated ‘poor’ and 34.6% others did not use the resources to enhance teaching and learning. The conclusion arrived at was that teaching and learning approaches were faulty and it require redress. Recommendation was made that efforts should be made towards enhancing teacher quality through teacher professional development.
