Role of ICT in Primary Education in Kenya

For quite sometime, I have
involved myself with lots of ICT
oriented programs in education
without really having a clear
understanding or having a clear
metric to measure my success and
impact. After helping Found
Wikimedia Kenya
(www.wikimedia.or.ke), we went
ahead to carry out our very first
education oriented program which
simply involved installing the
offline version of Wikipedia for
Schools in Kenyan Secondary
Schools. It was an interesting and
thrilling project most of us. All of
us still being in Campus then, felt
that we were already doing our bit
of Social responsibility through the
skills and knowledge we were/had
gained in Campus. The feeling
was ecstatic to some of us for a
few reasons:
1. We had managed to have
the Chair of the Board of
Trustees for Wikimedia
Foundation then Mr.Ting
Chen grace the official
launch of the project
2. We had managed to secure
audience
and participation from
various high ranking
stakeholders like Google
Kenya, Kenyatta
University,Strathmore
University ,The ICT Board
and many more
This we considered quite
an achievement at how we could
rub shoulders with such
stake shoulders all with the aim of
promoting the place and use of ICT
in Kenyan education. After a
successful launch of the project
and official endorsements from the
Wikimedia Foundation which gave
us a small grant to carry out the
pilot, we set out to the challenging
task of executing the actual project
which we found more challenging
than we actually thought. First of
all we had to get an approval letter
from the Education Ministry
okaying the kind of Content we
were to install in the Secondary
school’s computers. After
numerous unsuccessful visits to to
Jogoo House to get audience and
explain the nature of our activities
to the Permanent Secretary, we
decide to carry out the project
without the approval but leave
our request and proposal with the
Ministry. After all, we were helping
the schools and students access
content that they would not
otherwise have access to due to no
internet connection. Being the Lead
for one of the regions we had
agreed on for the Pilot phase, I
did a quick reconnaissance visit to
the region to get to understand and
collect statistics on the kind
of infrastructure the schools had
and get their buy in.I was both
pleasantly surprised and sad to
learn that some schools were really
quick to buy into the idea. Exciting
and thrilling was the idea of them
to have a repository to supplement
and complement their teaching
resources that
are usually obviously strained.
Sadly, some teachers ( or is it
schools) could hear none of
it.There argument being, unless we
had a written and
official permission from the
Ministry of Education to okay the
kind of content we were
distributing, they would
not participate in the project.This
was very disturbing to me
personally as I could not
understand why a school
needed approval to provide
resources to its Techares
and Students?! We had
categorically explained to the
schools that this was content that
the Techares and students would
otherwise need an
internet connection to access but
we were just easing
the accessibility and cutting the
cost, they would have none of that.
We however did carry on with the
project to the willing schools in 3
regions Kakamega, Nyeri and
Mombasa but this would get me
thinking what exactly was the role
of ICT in primary education in
Kenya? Drawing comparisons from
my earlier days in schools, when I
would hunger and thirst for
resources, books and anything that
I could read to increase and
broaden my knowledge scope. I
wold find myself finding solace in
novels, journals, magazines besides
the conventional school based
textbooks that the school would
provide. Not to sound my
own trumpet but I strongly credit
my presence to the extensive
reading habits, not just for
school content, but for far and
beyond materials to broaden
my knowledge discourse, that I
would understand and interact with
the world. This to me was the best
learning experience . Having to
learn and discover things, people,
places all on my own through all
those pages of text. It gave me
solace, taught me many customs,
exposed me to new horizons and
places both in thinking and
understanding. This to
me ,provided the fertile ground
that would allow me to undertand
and comprehend and put
into perceptive the abstract
education concepts that i was
taught in class. As a result, I
could understand and
answer question drawing arguments,
conclusions and abstracts from far
places and people. This is the kind
of fertile ground I believe ICT
should play in our Primary
education. Everyday and very
often, the tem ICT in education has
been overly used and abused in
education sector in Kenya
to connote  simply Computers , t o
me, I think ICT should be thought
of as a tool to help change and
enhance the mindset of
the learners to new horizons
and thoughts. To enable them think
differently. To introduce to them a
different world with different terms
and aspects. To allow the learners
expand their horizons in education.
If we think of ICT as the tool to
learning in schools, and not simply
as a means to learn, we would
churn out the kind of learners that
Kenya needs. Learners who are able
to think and provide solutions to
Kenya problems , with a global
perceptive and mindset… With this
understanding, I have
personally engaged and started a
small program that involves the
use of XO laptops as leaning tools.
I have introduced this to my
remote village school and I must
say am very satisfied with the
progress.
Although I have no numerical and
mathematical metric to measure
the success of this program,
I definitely have the change
mindset and learner satisfaction
that I have seen in the kids. Last
month when I visited the center to
do an audit, I had a one on
one interview with
the learners to measure how much
change in mental mindset
and ambition had happend in the
kids. I was mesmerized when the
kids as young as 3 had learnt and
were aspring something bigger
after the interaction with the
XO’s. Particularly interesting was
my 7 year old Cousin
who pleasantly surprised me with
his Art Skills. He had mastered how
to draw using the Paint Activity and
told me he is contemplating
pursuing art in future. My 11 year
old sister whom I had tried for
many years to introduce modern
learning concepts to her in vain,
after interacting with the XO, she
has surprised very many of us with
her mastery of writing and speech.
She was able to identify
2 possible carees in life: Journalism
or Law. This is the kind of learning
I want my kids to associate ICT
with. Learning by discovery
and interaction.